The contemporary American welfare state is a highly controversial institution plagued with tremendous deficiencies. There is agreement over the entire political spectrum that the current welfare system needs an overhaul, but there is considerable disagreement on how this should or could be accomplished. Neither liberal nor conservative reform proposals can be understood as solutions to the problem because they lack an appropriate analytical framework.

This thesis tries to contribute to the current welfare debate by developing an analytical framework by which we can judge welfare policies. It is based upon contemporary theories of the welfare state and the concept of equality, by which we can judge welfare policies. This framework will be used to reveal how and why existing policies fail to achieve the central purpose of the welfare state and to re-introduce a policy proposal that might be able to avoid the difficulties that have plagued existing policies.