Limits of Welfare. How the Family Remains Pivotal for Work Attitudes in the “Youth Enabling” Welfare State of Denmark

Denmark is well known as a highly “de-familiarized” welfare state. Generous welfare programs have been instituted to make young adults independent of the traditional family structure. These “youth enabling” policies—such as student aid and free education throughout the academic system—have been in place for several decades and could plausibly affect how work attitudes are transmitted from one generation to the next. Relying on ten semi-structured biographical family interviews with three generations of family members, the chapter explores whether that is the case. It turns out that families, as expected, does not play much of a role economically or hierarchically. Yet, as far as the interviews of the chapter allows us to conclude, work attitudes nevertheless remain highly dependent upon family background.