December 1, 2023
Making the Child Tax Credit “Fully Refundable” Converts It into Welfare Checks
In what is becoming an annual ritual, news accounts and DC sources suggest liberals’ end-of-year legislative wish list once again includes reviving the worst part of Democrats’ partisan 2021 child tax credit (CTC) expansion. That proposal would convert the pro-work CTC into new federal welfare checks for nonworking parents, which Congress should flatly reject. Here’s how the respected Committee for a Responsible Federal…
December 1, 2023
The 2023 American Opportunity Index
The 2023 American Opportunity Index, a collaboration between the Burning Glass Institute, Harvard Business School’s Project on Managing the Future of Work, and the Schultz Family Foundation, examines the career paths of 4.72 million employees in 396 major U.S. companies. Unlike traditional job quality metrics, this index directly observes real-world outcomes by analyzing millions of…
December 1, 2023
Unlocking Economic Prosperity: Career Navigation in a Time of Rapid Change
New research from the Project on Workforce and the National Fund for Workforce Solutions sets an evidence-based, field-informed agenda for a 21st century career navigation ecosystem. Pathways to economic opportunity are broken in the United States, disproportionately affecting Black, Latinx, and Indigenous individuals and those from low-income backgrounds. Disrupting long-standing occupational segregation and improving outcomes for…
December 1, 2023
Cities Use Covid Funds to Run Guaranteed-Income Experiments
Alexandria, Va. Dozens of cities around the country have launched welfare experiments called guaranteed-income pilots to send monthly checks of up to $1,000 to needy people. The goal is to demonstrate that giving the poor direct cash aid can improve their economic stability, their children’s educational attainment, and even their mental health. Most of the…
December 1, 2023
Red States Can Lead the Way on Marriage and Fatherhood
“If we care about our children, if we care about the vibrancy of our communities, we have no choice but to have the conversation” about absent fatherhood, said Chris Sprowls, who served as a prosecutor in Florida before going on to become speaker of the state house in 2020. In his work on cases involving gangs…
November 30, 2023
A Valuable New Perspective on America’s War on Poverty
I suppose if you’re someone who thinks American capitalism has failed and unironically uses the phrase “late capitalism,” there’s probably no changing your mind. So I guess this post is meant for folks who have concerns about the American economy yet also have an open mind about new information. For this group, I have a…
November 30, 2023
Evaluating the Success of the War on Poverty since 1963 Using an Absolute Full-Income Poverty Measure
Abstract We evaluate progress in the War on Poverty as President Lyndon B. Johnson defined it, which established a 20% baseline poverty rate and adopted an absolute standard. While the official poverty rate fell from 19.5% in 1963 to 10.5% in 2019, our absolute full-income poverty measure—which uses a fuller income measure and updates thresholds…
November 27, 2023
Bribing Homeowners To Build Tiny Houses Won’t Solve NYC’s Housing Problem
Those who believe New York City not only needs more housing but more types of housing to serve its many types of households should be cheered by the Adams administration’s support for “granny flats.” These small “accessory dwelling units” built in backyards, converted basements or converted garages can help homeowners pay their mortgages and older adults…
November 27, 2023
For kids, marriage still matters
The science could not be clearer: On average, the children of married parents are more likely to experience happier, healthier and more successful lives. Brookings Institution scholar Melissa Kearney powerfully underscores this truth in her new book “The Two-Parent Privilege,” writing, “The decline in the share of U.S. children living in a two-parent family over…
November 21, 2023
Defining Poverty Up
Thirty years ago, the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D., N.Y.) wrote a seminal essay titled “Defining Deviancy Down.” He argued that Americans had “become accustomed to alarming levels of crime and destructive behavior” such as soaring out-of-wedlock childbearing behind increased welfare dependence. Policy-makers responded to Moynihan’s call, and the bipartisan 1994 crime bill (which Moynihan…