welfare state
nounEtymology Compound of welfare + state.
1
A national level social system of a sovereign country operated by its central government for the citizens' welfare overall responsibility, providing health care, education, unemployment benefits and social security.
- In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. The welfare state is dismantled. Essential public services are cut so that the rich may pay less tax. […]2013 May 17, George Monbiot, “Money just makes the rich suffer”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 23, page 19:
- Wagenknecht […] argues further that a policy of high migration enforces a minimal welfare state that is ‘cheaper for the upper and upper middle classes in comparison to a real welfare state, but it is not an attractive project for the middle and lower middle groups. Thus, if one wants to remove support for social provisions, this is exactly the way to do it’.2024 August 18, Jörg Michael Dostal, “Left Conservatism: Sahra Wagenknecht's Challenge to the German Party System”, in The Political Quarterly, volume 95, number 4, →DOI, page 641 of 634–644:
2
A country in which such a system operates.
- Derived terms
- welfare stater, welfare statism