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FAMILY ALLOWANCE

Introduced in 1945, a monthly payment given to the mother of every child under age 16 (changed to age 18 in 1973) and who, if of school age, was attending school. Beginning in 1978 a merging of social security programs and income tax provisions introduced the notion of a child tax credit as a way to target families in need of government assistance. This eventually led to the elimination of the family allowance and, many argued, to the end of universality as a principle of Canadian social security. The family allowance was also known as the ‘baby bonus’. While the government once fulfilled an obligation to every child we now have a system in which the government makes no tax or social security allowance for many children. See: UNIVERSALITY / .

Last updated 2002--0-9-

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© Robert Drislane, Ph.D. and Gary Parkinson, Ph.D.
The online version of this dictionary is a product of
Athabasca University and
ICAAP

*This social science dictionary has 1000
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