Dependency In The Gilded Age

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Dependency began to have a good and bad significance. Independence was understood in two different ways; it helped labor and woman movements, in which woman and children were part of and were seen as good “dependency”, and on the other hand, this “charity and relief” were seen as bad. “The old distinction between the deserving and the undeserving poor intensified in the late nineteenth century’s Gilded Age. Theoretically, the undeserving should not be receiving aid, but constant vigilance was required to make sure they did not slip in, disguising themselves as deserving. Dependence on assistance became increasingly stigmatized and it was harder and harder to rely on relief without being branded a pauper.” (320) The New Deal had created a system