Safety Net Use

  • Karen Jusko
  • Mark Duggan
  • Hilary Hoynes

Leaders: Mark Duggan, Hilary Hoynes, Karen Jusko

The Safety Net RG is devoted to monitoring changes in government transfers and anti-poverty programs and assessing whether they are meeting the needs of the poor. The U.S. safety net is undergoing such changes as (a) an ongoing decline in TANF cash benefits, (b) rapid increases in spending on EITC, Medicaid, Disability Insurance, Unemployment Insurance, and SNAP, and (c) a dramatic shift toward spending that favors the “working poor” over the more destitute. The CPI affiliates working within this research group are monitoring these changes, examining their implications for poverty, assessing the effectiveness of key government and nongovernment programs in reducing poverty, and modeling the costs and benefits of possible changes in policy and programs. We’ve provided a sampling here of some of this ongoing research.

Poverty Relief Project: With Kate Weisshaar, Karen Jusko uses the poverty relief ratio to evaluate the effectiveness of anti-poverty programs over time, across states, and across countries. Which state is the least effective in fighting poverty? Has the U.S. become more or less effective over time? These and other questions are answered in our latest State of the Union reports.

Long-run effects of SNAP: Have we underestimated the returns to SNAP by ignoring the long-run effects on children exposed to it in their early childhood? It’s now possible to find out.

California Welfare LaboratoryThe poverty rate in California, when measured with the Supplemental Poverty Measure, is the highest in the country. What can be done to bring that rate down? The mission of the California Welfare Laboratory is to make research on California’s welfare programs accessible to all and thus facilitate an informed discussion of what is working and what needs to be improved.

Differential EITC effects: It is often argued that early interventions have especially high payoffs.  Are the returns to the EITC indeed larger when it goes to parents with young children?

Disability and poverty: Does the federal government’s disability program reduce labor supply? Although it’s long been difficult to identify a causal effect, Mark Duggan has now found a way.

The effects of TANF: The TANF program is very decentralized and thus takes on dramatically different forms. How can we exploit that variability to find out what’s working?

Safety Net - CPI Research

Title Author Media
Economic Status and Health in Childhood: The Origins of the Gradient Anne Case, Darren Lubotsky and Christina Paxson

Economic Status and Health in Childhood: The Origins of the Gradient

Author: Anne Case, Darren Lubotsky and Christina Paxson
Publisher: American Economic Review
Date:
The Rise in Disability and the Decline in Unemployment Autor, David and Mark Duggun

The Rise in Disability and the Decline in Unemployment

Author: Autor, David and Mark Duggun
Publisher: Quarterly Journal of Economics
Date:
The Epidemiology of Social Stress Turner, Jay R., Blair Wheaton and Donald A. Lloyd

The Epidemiology of Social Stress

Author: Turner, Jay R., Blair Wheaton and Donald A. Lloyd
Publisher: American Sociological Review
Date:
Pharmaceuticals and the Developing World Michael Kremer

Pharmaceuticals and the Developing World

Author: Michael Kremer
Publisher: Journal of Economic Perspectives
Date:
Stature and Status: Height, Ability, and Labor Market Outcomes Anne Case and Christina Paxson

Stature and Status: Height, Ability, and Labor Market Outcomes

Author: Anne Case and Christina Paxson
Publisher: Journal of Political Economy
Date:

safety net - CPI Affiliates

Cybelle Fox's picture Cybelle Fox Professor of Sociology
University of California, Berkeley
Edward B. Montgomery's picture Edward B. Montgomery Dean of the McCourt School of Public Policy; Research Associate, National Bureau for Economic Research; Fellow, National Academy of Public Administration
Georgetown University
Emily Hannum's picture Emily Hannum Professor of Sociology and Education; Associate Director, Population Studies Center
Univerisity of Pennsylvania
Isabela Mares's picture Isabela Mares Professor of Political Science; Victoria Schuck Faculty Scholar
Columbia University
Jan O. Jonsson's picture Jan O. Jonsson Official Fellow of Nuffield College, Oxford University
Oxford University

Pages

Safety Net - Other Research

Title Author Media
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America Barbara Ehrenreich

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America

Author: Barbara Ehrenreich
Publisher: Metropolitan Books
Date:

Our sharpest and most original social critic goes "undercover" as an unskilled worker to reveal the dark side of American prosperity. Millions of Americans work full time, year round, for poverty-level wages. In 1998, Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that a job - any job - can be the ticket to a better life. But how does anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6 an hour? To find out, Ehrenreich left her home, took the cheapest lodgings she could find, and accepted whatever jobs she was offered. Moving from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, she worked as a waitress, a hotel maid, a cleaning woman, a nursing-home aide, and a Wal-Mart sales clerk. She lived in trailer parks and crumbling residential motels. Very quickly, she discovered that no job is truly "unskilled," that even the lowliest occupations require exhausting mental and muscular effort. She also learned that one job is not enough; you need at least two if you int to live indoors. Nickel and Dimed reveals low-rent America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity - a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate stratagems for survival.

Securing Prosperity Paul Osterman

Securing Prosperity

Author: Paul Osterman
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Date:
Governmental Constraints and Labor Market Mobility Abbott, A. and D.R. Smith

Governmental Constraints and Labor Market Mobility

Author: Abbott, A. and D.R. Smith
Publisher:
Date:
Changes in Labor Force Participation in the United States Juhn Chinhui and Simon Potter

Changes in Labor Force Participation in the United States

Author: Juhn Chinhui and Simon Potter
Publisher: Journal of Economic Perspectives
Date:
The Time Divide: Work, Family, and Gender Inequality Jerry A. Jacobs and Kathleen Gerson

The Time Divide: Work, Family, and Gender Inequality

Author: Jerry A. Jacobs and Kathleen Gerson
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Date:

Safety Net - Multimedia

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