The US Congress passed the landmark Social Security Act on 14 August 1935 as part of the "new Deal" offered by President Roosevelt. This act established a system of old-age benefits for workers, benefits for victims of industrial accidents, unemployment insurance, and aid for dependent mothers and children, the blind, and the physically handicapped. (Tindall, George Brown)Prior to the passage of the US Social Security Act of 1935, welfare activities such as support for elderly and disabled was left to the respective family, or at best the respective states.
[...] Others argue that exclusions of job categories such as agriculture was due to the administrative difficulties in covering such workers, and all later Social Security legislations in the world also exclude agricultural workers for the same reason.(Katznelson, Ira. p. 43) Subsequent revisions Several amendments have taken place to the original 1935 Social Security Act, and such amendments have removed much of the inequalities. The 1935 Act catered to the idea of large reserves that would pay the benefits. The 1939 amendment reduced the extent of these reserves to cater to the economic recession and Social Security became more of a pay-as-you- go system (Berstein, Merton and Joan. [...]
[...] The formal citation of the Act is Social Security Act, ch Stat People however soon began to refer to this act as the National Old Age and Survivors Insurance in natural parlance. Major features The major provision of the Social Security Act was the system of social security that provided retirement benefits that people could collect when they stopped working at age of sixty-five. Two other major provisions of the act was a shared federal-state plan of unemployment insurance that covered workers and their dependents, and the federal government funding of a broad range of welfare activities such as vocational rehabilitation. [...]
[...] The Social Security Act of 1965 was an amendment of the 1935 legislation, the major addition being the inclusion of mediclaim health insurance. The reserve funds moved from the independent "Trust Fund" to a “General Fund” that catered to additional congressional revenue. The age at which widows could begin collecting benefits reduced to sixty. The 1972 amendment increased benefits and the 1977 and 1983 amendments altered the payroll tax formula. The reduction of the reserve pool, the change over from a trust fund to general fund and increased payout of benefits led to payments outpacing growth, until the system exhausted its reserves and had to borrow funds. [...]
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