Administrative Law for Public Managers or Battle for Social Security

Administrative Law for Public Managers

Author: David Rosenbloom

This book focuses on the essentials that public managers should know about administrative law—why we have administrative law, the constitutional constraints on public administration, and administrative law’s frameworks for rulemaking, adjudication, enforcement, transparency, and judicial and legislative review. Rosenbloom views administrative law from the perspectives of administrative practice, rather than lawyering with an emphasis on how various administrative law provisions promote their underlying goal of improving the fit between public administration and U.S. democratic-constitutionalism. Organized around federal administrative law, the book explains the essentials of administrative law clearly and accurately, in non-technical terms, and with sufficient depth to provide readers with a sophisticated, lasting understanding of the subject matter.

New interesting textbook: Teams or Toward a Global Business Confederation

Battle for Social Security: From FDR's Vision To Bush's Gamble

Author: Nancy J Altman

This book illuminates the politics and policy of the current struggle over Social Security in light of the program's compelling history and ingenious structure. After a brief introduction describing the dramatic response of the Social Security Administration to the 9/11 terrorist attack, the book recounts Social Securityâs lively history. Although President Bush has tried to convince Americans that Social Security is designed for the last century and unworkable for an aging population, readers will see that the President's assault is just another battle in a longstanding ideological war. Prescott Bush, the current Presidentâs grandfather, remarked of FDR, "The only man I truly hated lies buried in Hyde Park." The book traces the continuous thread leading from Prescott Bush and his contemporaries to George W. Bush and others who want to undo Social Security. The book concludes with policy recommendations which eliminate Social Security's deficit in a manner consistent with the program's philosophy and structure.

The Washington Post - Robert G. Kaiser

The context provided by Altman, who chairs the Pension Rights Center's board, may actually offer the best single explanation for Bush's humiliating failure to "reform" Social Security or even build significant support for his ideas. As she demonstrates, the Social Security program has become a pillar of American life that supports millions of Americans -- one that we take for granted, like death and taxes.

Library Journal

Social Security is still the most relied-upon government program, and one hotly contested by many conservatives. Enacted in 1935 to deal with unemployment, disability, and poverty-especially among the elderly-it included unemployment relief and a longer-term program that grew into compulsory old-age retirement insurance. Politicians have railed at it, boosted benefits before elections, and fought ideological battles as to whether the government should provide insurance at all. Each time Social Security was in "crisis," a consensus was forged to restore its fiscal health. In this timely book, Altman (Harvard Law Sch.), who assisted Alan Greenspan in 1983's Social Security amendments, provides a detailed and fascinating look at the birth, development, and currently endangered status of Social Security, directing fire at President Bush's efforts to undermine Social Security with private accounts, noting that at no time in the past 70 years has any President proposed changes that could destroy it. Private accounts would do nothing about projected deficits, he says, but they would cause benefit cuts both in old-age payments and in programs that aid disabled workers and families that have lost a breadwinner. Altman concludes by offering suggestions that would remedy Social Security's shortfall and ensure that it remains a program of social insurance for all Americans. Highly recommended for public and academic libraries.-Duncan Stewart, Univ. of Iowa Libs., Iowa City Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Table of Contents:

Chapter 1: From the Poorhouse to Free Parking.

Chapter 2: Social Security’s Grandfather.

Chapter 3: Essential Insurance, Poor Welfare.

Chapter 4: Bold Woman, Cautious Men.

Chapter 5: A Teeny-Weeny Bit of Socialism.

Chapter 6: Dirty Tricks.

Chapter 7: Ready, Set, Start Again.

Chapter 8: Dr. Win-the-War Replaces Old Dr. New Deal.

Chapter 9: Third Time’s the Charm.

Chapter 10: All American Program (Minus a Tiny Splinter Group).

Chapter 11: Visible Gains, Subterranean Tremors.

Chapter 12: The Sky is Falling and Social Security Is Bust.

Chapter 13: Aging Gracefully.

Chapter 14: A Leninist Strategy.

Chapter 15: The Drumbeat Finds a Drummer.

Chapter 16: The Ideal, Pain-Free (For Almost Everyone) Way to Strengthen Social Security.

Chapter 17: From FDR's Vision to Busg's Gamble.

Acknowledgments.

Notes.

Recommended Reading.

Index.