Includes bibliographical references (p. 287-302) and index.

Acknowledgments; Introduction; Framing the Issues; Compensation for Accidents before Workers' Compensation; The Economic Impact of the Switch to Workers' Compensation; The Timing of Workers' Compensation's Enactment in the United States; The Political Process of Adopting Workers' Compensation; The Fractitious Disputes over State Insurance; The Battles over Benefit Levels, 1910 -- 1930; Epilogue: Lessons from the Origins of Workers' Compensation; Appendix A; Appendix B; Appendix C; Appendix D; Appendix E; Appendix F; Appendix G; Appendix H; Appendix I; Appendix J; Appendix K.

Workers' compensation was arguably the first widespread social insurance program in the United States--before social security, Medicare, or unemployment insurance--and the most successful form of labor legislation to emerge from the early progressive movement. In A Prelude to the Welfare State, Price V. Fishback and Shawn Everett Kantor challenge widespread historical perceptions by arguing that workers' compensation, rather than being an early progressive victory, succeeded because all relevant parties--labor and management, insurance companies, lawyers, and legislators--benefited from the ruling.