This book provides a fresh narrative of policy reforms to support low-income workers in France and the United Kingdom in recent decades. It tackles the puzzle of why two institutionally-distinct welfare states came to make use of similar instruments - including subsidising wages via in-work benefits - to 'make work pay' and reduce in-work poverty. Drawing on primary interviews and documents, the account argues that governmental decisions were decisively influenced by prevailing ideas among political and policy elites, rather than the concrete demands of voters and interest groups. It also charts how wider developments in each state's social security and labour market system led to a process of partial welfare state convergence. The findings contribute to contemporary debates regarding welfare state politics, ideational power, and democratic representation. The volume will be of interest students and researchers in the fields of social and public policy, political science, political economy, sociology, and cognate disciplines.

Dr Ewan Robertson is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the School of Social and Political Science, University of Edinburgh. He holds a PhD in Social Policy from the same institution. In 2024 he was awarded the prize of Excellence in Doctoral Research from the UK Social Policy Association.