"Love on the Dole" drew the British public's attention to a social problem in the United Kingdom in a similar way that "Look Back in Anger", "Cathy Come Home" or "Boys from the Blackstuff" would do for future generations (although its style is closer to "Hobson's Choice"). The historian Stephen Constantine attributed its impact to the way it moved the mostly middle class audiences without blaming them – Gow said he "aimed to touch the heart." In 1999 it was one of the National Theatre's "100 Plays of the Century".