The Policy-Based Profession: An Introduction to Social Welfare Policy Analysis for Social Workers

by Philip R. Popple

two major shortcomings. The first is that—given the time it takes to do a policy study, and then write, edit, and finally distribute the findings—much of the material ...

The second shortcoming of analyses by policy professionals from the perspective of the social work practitioner is that they almost always deal only with what we identified in Chapter 2 as macrolevel policy. In additio...

The solution to the problem of gaining access to current information regarding policies that affect social work practitioners is to become skilled in what we refer to in Chapter 3 as practitioner policy analysis. There is nothing esoter...

and, for this edition, because of the current intense political concern with immigration, we have added a chapter on this topic.

The problem with many current social welfare policy proposals is that the people instigating them have no knowledge or understanding of history.

The assumption seems to be that the public sector assumed responsibility for social welfare out of some misguided liberal desire to extend the scope of government.

In reality, the public sector assumed responsibility for social welfare only when the Great Depression bankrupted private charitable agencies and thus demonstrated the inability of a private system to deal with the massive social and economic disruptions characteristic of a modern urban industrial state. The g...

proposals to privatize large portions of the welfare system are not only wrongheaded but...

historical research is manageable for most social wor...

Historical analysis can be successfully done by anyone with a good general education; training in some basic principles, as laid out in Chapter 4; and a willingness to do some car...

Social welfare policy changes so fast that even the very first person to read this book will have to read our Current Proposals section as the last part of the history section and will have to go out and do his or her own analysis to find out, as the folksy commentator Paul Harvey used to say, “the rest of the story.”

highs. Current analysis suggests that public pensions are manageable as long the recovery continues and public employers resume funding of pensions at scheduled rates.

Oops.

Dying is not usually thought of as a focus of social policy. We all have to do it and don’t see why the government should be involved.

Like all aspects of social work, hospice care requires culturally competent practice.

Outreach efforts and culturally sensitive social workers are clearly called for

selective mutism

unwillingness or refusal to speak

Mental Health and Substance Abuse

They got together a few weeks later and had lunch at a taqueria, where they indulged their mutual love for the hot sauces that their families had sent to them in Afghanistan. They talked a long time, even reliving the experiences they had tried to forget. The next day they went running. They felt better, at least for a while

mental illness is characterized by the four “uns”—it is “undefinable, untreatable, unpredictable, and unmanageable.”

that 18.5 percent of American adults— about one in five adults—suffer from a diagnosable menta...

If you are counseling someone who is potentially violent, how much information should you share and with whom? What is your responsibility in relation to a client’s privacy versus to those in the community he or she m...

Marijuana has for some time been assumed to be a gateway drug: one puff and it’s only a matter of time until you’re shooting heroine. This does not seem to be the case. What about other drugs? What about this orange powder that Jeff is snorting? What about prescription pain pills like Oxycontin? How do you know if they are gateway drugs? If t...

Some argue that the best substance abuse counselors are former addicts. Many social workers disagree. But could the same argument be made for those counseling veterans? The suicide rate among veterans is very high even for those who have not experienced combat. Why do you think that is? Some believe that returning veterans miss the intense sense of purpose and group solidarity they experienced in the...

e.g., I don't want to see a straight therapist/counselor/doctor. I would much rather see an LGBTQ+ person in any of those situations, because a cisgender heterosexual person can't understand the issues the way another LGBTQ+ person would. While it is our job to be empathetic and work to understand the ways others perceive and interact with the world, it is also very difficult to fully place your foot into the trauma of a marginalized community.

$247 billion is spent on treating childhood mental disorders

The annual cost of untreated mental illness in lost earnings alone is estimated to be $201 billion. It has surpassed heart conditions, the former number one in cost, which was $147 billion in 2013. In 1996, heart condition costs were $105 billion, while mental illness was only $79 billion

depression generally leads to the longest average length o...

most of us have or will encounter at some point in our lives the kinds of problems—mild depression, anxiety, or stress in our marriages or relationships with parents—that make it difficult t...

the rehospitalization rate among persons with severe mental illness is quite high, and treatments for mental difficulties may take longer...

that 60 percent of those medicated for schizop...

psychiatric rehabilitation services for adults can reduce time spent in a psychiatric hospital, raise earning power, and increase the ind...

SUBSTANCE...

affects many people in our society and has led to a variety o...

an estimated 27.1 million Americans age twelve and over, or 10.1 percent of the population, were current users of illicit drugs. Another 138.3 million Americans aged twelve and over reported current use of alcohol, with 24.9 percent reporting binge drinking and 6.5 percent qualifying as heavy drinkers.

Yet only a small percent (10.8) of those with drug- or alcohol-related problems get treatment at a specialized facility (defined as a rehabilitation or community mental health center, inpatient hospital; self-help groups are not counted in this calculation)

The line between substance use and abuse can be unclear.

Substance abuse constitutes a problem on the national, state, community, organizational, family, and individual levels.

Individual businesses and other organizations suffer from reduced employee productivity and from job accidents caused by inebriated or incapacitated workers.