Study Guide: Health & Welfare

 

Glossary:

mental disorder schizophrenia relative poverty
psychosis public health care dual welfare system
Medicaid managed care stratification
bioethics physicians assistants social mobility
medical model of behavior Medicare absolute poverty
HMOs deinstitutionalization structural unemployment
iatrogenic sick role class
secondary deviance primary deviance underclass
wealthfare fee-for-service medicine class consciousness
crisis medicine curative medicine culture of poverty
AIDS welfare state division of labor
chronic disease lifestyle changes split labor market
longevity life expectancy
acute disease

 

News:

Please Note:

 
Development and disease patterns
HIV (U.S. and around the world)
Causes of the rise in health care costs
Social factors in illness
Lack of access
Recent poverty rates
Demographics of the poor
Feminization of poverty
Working and poverty
Disability and poverty
Deinstitutionalization and poverty
Poverty and the rise of service occupations
Welfare reform

Names to Know: 

Thomas Szasz

Herbert Gans

William Julius Wilson

Christopher Jencks

 
Practice Quiz
 

Charting the Problems: 

Health
 
MAP--Global Calorie Consumption
Annual Deaths in Developing and Developed Countries
Populations with Access to Health Care
Infant Mortality
Indicators of Health in Five Countries
Ten Leading Causes of Death in the U.S., 1900 and 1993
Average Medical Costs for Americans
Distribution of U.S. Health Care Expenditures
Non elderly Population without Health Insurance
Who Has Health Insurance?
Number of Sick Days by Income
How People Get AIDS
Percentage of Americans Diagnosed with AIDS Who are Women
Growth of AIDS in the U.S.

 Poverty
Median Household Income by State
Changing Structure of Occupations, 1900-1992
Poverty in the U.S.:  1960-1993
Dimensions of Socioeconomic Status, Part 1
Dimensions of Socioeconomic Status, Part 2
Social Class Distribution in the U.S.
Families and Wealth
Percentage of Income Received by Each Fifth of Families Since World War II
U.S. Social Class Ladder
Poverty by Age and Race/Ethnicity
Poverty Rates of Children Age 6 and Under
Persons Below the Poverty Level, 1959-1994
Median Family Income by Type of Family and Race, 1992
Racial Groups and Poverty in Metropolitan Areas
Poverty and Dependent Populations
Poverty:  1959-1993
Global Poverty Rates, 1987 & 1998

Essay Questions:  

  1. According to Elwell (Industrializing America), what is managed care?  What are the consequences of managed care for medical practitioners? For patients?
  2. According to your instructor, what factors account for the rapidly escalating medical costs in American society?
  3. How is development related to disease patterns within a sociocultural system?
  4. How does SES affect access to health care in the U.S.?
  5. What factors led to the establishment of managed health care in America?
  6. According to The Economist (The Euthanasia Wars), what is the difference, if any, between doctor-assisted suicide and euthanasia?

  7. What is passive euthanasia?  Why is this less objectionable to many people than active euthanasia?

  8. Describe the arguments that are generally made against doctor-assisted suicide.  Do the data from the Dutch study support any of these arguments?

  9. According to Cohen (Who Should be on Welfare), what do Welfare professionals mean by "the hard to serve"?  What makes these individuals so difficult to serve?

  10. Briefly describe the new Welfare rules.

  11. How has the current booming economy helped former Welfare recipients?  Under the new Welfare rules, what will likely happen to these people as the economy slows down?

  Bibliography: 

Bernstein, Aaron. 1996. "Is America Becoming More of a Class Society?," Business Week. Iss. 3464 (February 26): 86-91.

Birenbaum Arnold. 1993. "Managed Care: What's in Store for U.S.?," USA TODAY: The Magazine for the American Scene. Vol. 122. (November): 20-22.

Blau, Joel.  1992.  The Visible Poor: Homelessness in the United States. New York:  Oxford University Press.

Block, Fred and Richard A. Cloward, Barbara Ehrenreich, and Frances Fox Piven.  1987.  The Mean Season: The Attack on the Welfare State.  New York: Pantheon.

Bogdanich, Walt.  1992. The Great White Lie: Dishonesty, Waste, and Incompetence in the Medical Community. New York: Touchstone.

Children's Defense Fund.  1989. Lack of Health Insurance Makes a Difference. Washington, D.C.: Children's Defense Fund.

Gittleman, Maury and Mary Joyce. 1995. "Earnings Mobility in the United States, 1967-91," Monthly Labor Review. 118 (September): 3-13.

Harrington, Michael.  1984. The New American Poverty.  New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Ilg, Randy E. 1995 "The Changing Face of Farm Employment," Monthly Labor Review Vol. 118. (April): 3-12.

Jones, Jacqueline.  1992. The Dispossessed: America's Underclasses from the Civil War to the Present.  New York: Basic Books.

Kissick, William L.  1994.  Medicine's Dilemmas.  New Haven: Yale University Press.

Kozol, Jonathon.  1985.  Illiterate America.  Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Press/Doubleday.

Kwitney, Jonathan.  1992.  Acceptable Risks. New York: Poseidon Press.

Leigh, Wilhemina A.  1992.  A Health Assessment of Black Americans. Washington, D.C.: Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

Lemann, Nicholas.  1991. The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration and How It Changed America. New York: Knopf.

Light, Donald W. 1994. "Managed Care: False and Real Solutions," Lancet Vol. 344, Iss 8931 (Oct 29): 1197-1199.

Merline, John W. 1994. "Making Money by Denying Health Care," Consumers' Research Magazine 77 (September): 10-15.

Rose, Stephen J. 1996. "The Truth About Social Mobility," Challenge 39 (May): 4-8.

Starr, Paul.  1982.  The Social Transformation of American Medicine. New York: Basic Books.

Wholey, Douglas R. Christianson, Jon B., Sanchez, Susan M. 1993. "The effect of physician and corporate interests on the formation of health maintenance organizations," American Journal of Sociology 99 (July): 164-200.

Wilson, William J.  1987.  The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy.  Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Woolhandler, Steffie and David U. Himmelstein. 1994. "Giant H.M.O. 'A' or Giant H.M.O. 'B'," Nation. Vol 259, Iss 8. (September 19): 265-268.

 

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