Study On Social Security Legislation By UK Blair Administration

Social security is the core of social welfare policy. In the third way of thinking the Blair government has established a series of social security legislation which is conducive to social stability, social investment and promotion of employment, and has attempted to enter the society where “economic efficiency and social justice can be realized at the same time”.Concretely speaking, confronted with the broken and complex old-age security legal system, the Blair government attempts to construct a new third way of old-age security legal system, to eliminate pensioner poverty and fulfill policy objectives by way of three acts, Welfare Reform and Pensions Act 1999, Child Support, Pensions and Social Security Act 2000 and State Pension Credit Act 2002, and their related regulations, respectively from the private pension and national pension. SPS plans to help middle-income workers in their own savings, S2 P plans to help low-income workers to increase their savings, and PC plans to stimulate the old-age savings. In employment promotion, through the legislation of The Social Security Amendment(New Deal) Regulations 1997 and The Social Security Amendment(New Deal) Regulations 1998, the Bair administration implements New Deal programs to promote employment, encourage the unemployed to enter the labor market with the provision of occupational welfare. In child support, the government carries out the interventionist family policy so as to improve child development and child human capital investment. Child Trust Funds Act 2004 provides the children with assets welfare to attain equal opportunity.More importantly, by means of Tax Credits Act 1999 and Tax Credits Act 2002, the Blair administration designs a system of tax credits, to combine tax with social security benefits so that the old-age security, employment promotion, and child support are connected together to form a complete welfare supply system.This paper has three parts: introduction, body and conclusion. The main body consists of five chapters, involving the Blair administration's thought of social security, pension security legislation, employment promotion legislation, child support legislation, and the Blair government social security legislation from the international perspective.The introduction part covers the significance of the topic, research methods, literature review, research framework, and innovation and inadequacies.The first chapter is mainly about the Blair government's thought of social security. By combing the history of UK social security thoughts, it can be found that the work ethic, which goes through the history of the social security legislation, is the core of the social security thoughts. The Blair government's innovation lies in the development of the work ethic connotation by organically linking the rights and obligations of work throughout the stages of life based on the thought of social solidarity.The children's right to support grows out of pre-work benefits. Children are the future of the world, and the national and social obligation is to achieve social justice through an intergenerational transfer of wealth, and is to improve children's capacity to take their job duties by helping children develop in the form of investment in human resources. The social security right of the employment age population originates in the in-work benefits. Work is both a personal right and a personal obligation. Each person who has the ability to work must enter the labor market and achieve self-reliance. The social security right of the old aged population is the after-work benefits. The source of the old age security right is based on the assumed duty of work, and the social fairness is realized through the intergenerational wealth transfer.The second chapter discusses the different nature of the Blair government pension legislation. Combing the changes of old-age security system since the poor laws, it can be seen that the political standard of old age determines old-age social security right can only enjoy the absolute guarantee of basic life regardless of poor laws, self-protection and social insurance. In addition, individuals should save for their old age. SPS which is typical of state intervention, high value, flexibility and security helps middle-incomers with old age savings; S2 P, strengthening the redistribution effect of state pensions, takes gradual transitional arrangements, and ultimately raises low-incomers' flat rate pension; PC aims accurately at poor pensioners, security for those who cannot and savings for those who can.The third chapter is mainly about the employment promotion legislation. Though the change of the legal system of unemployment insurance, it is not difficult to find out that the work relief has been the main form of the unemployment insurance, and the social security right and the work ability are not compatible. Different from the previous poor law punitive measures, the Blair Administration chose the way of incentives to induce labor supply. New Deal programs help those who can work. Meanwhile, tax credits increase the incentive for employment. The Blair government combines traditional social security policy and economic policy, advocating positive production benefits to replace negative consumer welfare, changing psychologically passive ideas of welfare recipients, and cultivating the awareness of rights and obligations to welfare.The fourth chapter is about the legislation of child support. British child support policy has experienced a process from passive to active, from punishment to compensation, from the simple family income support to encouraging family employment. The radical child policy is an important link to realize the equal opportunity in the Blair administration's social security thought. Blair government accurately aimed at children, through the child tax credit and child trust fund legislation. In addition to the parents' duty to work for child support, child tax benefits and asset welfare are added as necessary social investment in child development and child human resources, thus fulfilling the system change from wage subsidies to direct assets welfare for child support.The fifth chapter discusses the Blair administration social security legislation in the international field of vision. Under the guidance of the active docking of EU law, the European integration has some impact on the Blair government by way of the EU social security coordination mechanism so as to create a family friendly welfare system. However, the impact of EU law is limited, depending on the needs of the British domestic legislation. In the interaction with the Clinton administration and the Schroder administration, the Blair administration stay on the way of 100 years of British tradition, walking in between the United States and Germany, and even more inclined to the German system, and has developed a worthy approach named “the middle way” with great achievements of good policy effect.Finally, the conclusion part reveals that absorbing from the historical wisdom and the extraterritorial experience, the Blair government initiates the new work ethic connotation by organically linking the rights and obligations of work throughout the stages of life, childhood, adulthood and old age. Meanwhile, a new welfare supply pattern consisting of public welfare, occupational welfare, tax benefits and asset welfare is constructed through the combination of social security benefits and tax system and direct welfare for children. Eventually by "supply side" reform, reducing the supply of the direct welfare state, encouraging the non-national welfare supply, UK social security system has shifted from the first generation of welfare to the second generation, from passive welfare to the positive, from the consumer-style welfare to the production-style.