Social Security Act of 1935

Social Security Act of 1935

Social Security Act of 1935 established old age insurance for much of the over 60 population. Half of the funds are provided by a payroll tax on workers and half is paid by employers. The act also provided federal unemployment insurance, welfare aid to low-income mothers (later amended to families), funding for individual state assistance to elderly individuals, and various other social insurance provisions.

Cry Wolf Quotes

I fear it may end the progress of a great country and bring its people to the level of the average European. It will furnish delicious food and add great strength to the political demagogue. It will assist in driving worthy and courageous men from public life. It will discourage and defeat the American trait of thrift. It will go a long way toward destroying American initiative and courage.

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Senator Daniel O. Hastings (R-DE) speaks against Social Security in 1935.

Unfortunately, the measure is in some respects ill-considered. It’s constitutionality is by no means certain: if the Federal Government may compel the states to adopt unemployment insurance under the guise of a tax, why may it not similarly compel them to adopt any other sort of legislation

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Editorial, The New York Times.

Business and industry are already operating under heavy burdens: and that old –age insurance would cause more unemployment.

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Allen Treadway (R-Mass), the ranking minority member of the Ways and Means committee.

Imagine the vast army of clerks which will be necessary to keep these records.

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Alf Landon, the 1936 Republican nominee for president.