In the globalization era that we are witnessing, the social problems of welfare and development have become key points on the agendas of European countries and not only. The present economic and political context has proved once more that social welfare represents an essential objective of any society.    As the core objective of any economy is to create goods and services in order to satisfy needs on the one hand and social discontent occurs in societies characterized by obvious inequalities on the other hand, it will be natural that any nation will try to achieve a system producing social-economic welfare or, in other words a welfare economy. The role of the state in this field will consist in the creation of tools and methods which should lead to the redistribution of incomes, as economic welfare in a consumption society is deeply connected to the welfare of individuals, families, groups; consequently the standard of living becomes the most important indicator measuring the level of economic welfare. The present article is a comparative study of different types of welfare states as well as a comparative presentation of the situation of the welfare states for different European countries.