While the welfare state helped raise the material standard of living of low-income people, the social vision that created the welfare state also featured an undermining of behavioral standards and moral values. In New York, for example, the earlier housing projects screened applicants and screened out people with a history of “alcoholism, irregular work history, single motherhood and lack of furniture.”99 In short, it was judgmental and exclusive—contrary to the taboos of the new social vision that began its triumph in the 1960s. The New York City Housing Authority, for example, “loosened its
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