Skip to main content

Research Archive

Welcome to Our Research Archive

Search and filter by content type, issue area, author, and keyword

January 5, 2023

Faith After the Pandemic: How COVID-19 Changed American Religion

Key Points Read the PDF. Introduction The COVID-19 pandemic touched nearly every aspect of American life. Schools, offices, grocery stores, and churches faced daunting challenges in the early days of the pandemic in their efforts to operate while keeping their employees, members, and the broader community safe. For churches and religious organi­zations, concerns over COVID-19…

December 9, 2022

“Automatic Stimulus”: How It Would Have Increased the Record Unemployment Benefits Paid During the Great Recession and Pandemic

Key Points Read the PDF. Executive Summary The COVID-19 pandemic saw unemployment claims reach a high of over 33 million in June 2020—over two and a half times the prior record set during the Great Recession. From March 2020 until temporary federal programs expired in September 2021, nearly 1.6 billion weeks of benefit checks were…

November 28, 2022

Public School Instructional Offerings and Enrollment Changes: Evidence from Two Years After the Pandemic

Key Points Read the PDF. Executive Summary We examine how COVID-related reopening policies during the 2020–21 and 2021–22 school years affected enrollment in public school districts. We use difference-in-differences and event study designs to estimate plausibly causal effects of different reopening policies on public school enrollment. Consistent with prior research, we find that public school…

September 12, 2022

Section 199A and “Tax Parity”

Key Points Read the PDF. Executive Summary In 2017, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act included a new deduction for business income: Section 199A. This provision allows taxpayers to deduct up to 20 percent of qualifying business income against their taxable income and provides a special tax benefit for “pass-through” businesses—those not subject to the…

August 10, 2022

A Failure to Respond: Public School Mask Mandates in the 2021–22 School Year

Key Points From September 2021 to late February 2022, school district mask mandates were in place for 61 percent of students in the US.During that period, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidance advised all students and teachers to mask indoors, with no flexibility based on local conditions.On February 25, 2022, the CDC adopted…

February 23, 2022

The Case Against Universal Free Lunch

Key Points Read the PDF. Introduction Who should feed children? Parents or the government? Before the pandemic, more than half of American public school students were eligible for free or reduced price school lunch (FRL).1 Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has proposed expanding the program to provide free breakfast, lunch, and dinner to every American public school…

July 2, 2021

Addressing the Shortcomings of the Supplemental Poverty Measure

Key Points Read the PDF. Executive Summary The US Census Bureau publishes the Supplemen­tal Poverty Measure (SPM) each year to provide important information on low-income Americans’ well-being. In early 2021, a National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) panel formed to evaluate and recommend improve­ments to the SPM. To inform the NASEM panel and…

August 3, 2020

Replace the Federal Student Loan System with an Income Share Agreement Program

Key Points Read the PDF. Introduction We hear a lot about how student loans are unaffordable for borrowers. That notion was central in the 2020 Democratic primary race, with Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) proposing to wipe away massive amounts of debt. Student loans—an oft-forgotten policy issue in days past—were addressed in…