The Welfare state is one in which the government looks after individual citizens in need through the provision of social welfare programmes. Examples of early welfare-states in the modern world are the Sweden and New Zealand of the 1930s. Changed attitudes in reaction to the Great Depression were instrumental in the move to the welfare state in many countries, harbinging new times where "cradle to grave" services became a reality in contrast to the harsh mass-poverty of the depression.
Examples of welfare states:
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