Are the ‘Deserving Needy’ Really Deserving Everywhere? Cross-cultural Heterogeneity and Popular Support for the Old and the Sick in Eight Western Countries

The comparative literature on public support for welfare state policies has identified a demarcation line between citizens’ attitudes towards ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ social groups. While there is considerable cross-national variation in citizens’ support of public responsibility for social groups believed to be undeserving of public aid (notably the unemployed and the poor), a high level of support for groups of ‘deserving needy’, and especially the old and the sick, is prevalent in most western industrialized countries (see Papadakis and Bean, 1993; Ardigo, Borre and Scarborough, 1995; Bean and Papadakis, 1998; Bonoli, 2000; Gevers et al., 2000; Svallfors, 2004).