| Welfare benefits are a contradiction within the capitalist state since non-market means, outside the family, are relied upon to meet human needs. Safety regulation and enforcement are an example of such a contradiction. This is a study of the origins of such benefits in the instance of coal mine safety.;This study tests these theories in a case study of the benefit of decreased death and injury derived by U. S. coal miners form 1970 to 1977. The benefit is compared in magnitude to that of miners other than coal.;The results showed that a considerable benefit in reduced death and injury was derived and that this benefit can best be explained through a complex neo-marxists analysis of the economic and social conditions affecting coal miners then.;Wildcat strikes, defying union, company and, government combined with permissive economic conditions such as, rising demand for coal, labour intensity requirements, and increased production and profitability, to make safety salient. Splits among competitive coalowners allowed the state to act independantly to interdict the wildcat's threat to capital accumulation, through a response re-establishing legitimacy. Further wildcats ensured enforcement of safety laws.;Conservative, liberal and marxist explanations of the origins and function of social welfare benefits are identified. The conservatives see "defined right" benefits as error in the system, resulting from excesses of political democracy and functioning to interfere with the market, and functioning to reduce the viability of the economy. Individual action alone produces real benefit. Liberals disconnect social welfare and the economy, offering an explanation in formal electoral processes and asserting fulfillment of the humanitarian impulse as the function of welfare. Technical innovation leads to progress. Orthodox marxists say welfare results from working class victories in the class struggle. Neo-marxists add that the state acts independently to support legitimation of the capitalist system, as a whole, while promoting the state's parallel function of aiding capital accumulation.;Direct electoral explanations are poorly supported. Neither miners' individual safety behavior, nor technical innovation were significant factors in reducing casualties. Productivity is inversly related to safety. |
