Why Trust Matters: Declining Political Trust and the Demise of American Liberalism

Abstract

Why Trust Matters: Declining Political Trust and the Demise of American Liberalism. By Marc J. Hetherington. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004. 208p. $35.00. Fifteen years after the signing of the Social Security Act, this already broad government program was expanded. With the amendments of 1950, an additional 10 million additional people were covered, including some of the poorest—domestic and agricultural workers. By using the payroll tax to support Social Security payments, citizens saw the program as one to which they contributed and from which they should receive. Even in very different times 55 years later, Americans continued to support this approach to public pensions. Despite comparatively low levels of trust in government and decades of antitax and antigovernment movement successes, President George W. Bush's efforts to privatize Social Security fell flat.