The Poverty-Reducing Effects of the EITC and Other Safety Nets for Young Adult Parents

In this brief, Jess Carson explores the poverty-reducing effects of key federal safety net programs among 18-24 year old (“young adult”) parents. An estimated 2.5 million very young children live with a young adult parent, with low-income children especially likely to do so. The brief finds that more than four in five young adult parents, regardless of income, participate in at least one major safety net program. Of these, the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is the most widely used and the most effective at reducing poverty under the Supplemental Poverty Measure, and poverty would increase by 6.7 percentage points without the EITC. Continued efforts to expand and support access to the EITC can provide young families with a key source of poverty-alleviating income

Household reports of energy assistance receipt increased 48 percent during recession: Proposed cuts threaten vulnerable families

This brief examines heating assistance usage and the implications of President Obama\u27s 2012 budget proposal to cut $2.5 billion from the$5.1 billion energy assistance fund for low-income families at a time when families are struggling with higher energy costs amid a difficult economy. The federal Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) assists vulnerable families in paying their home heating and cooling bills. Nationwide, from the winter of 2006/2007 to the winter of 2009/2010, there was a 48 percent increase in households receiving energy assistance. This growth appears to have accelerated with the recession, particularly in the rural Northeast and Midwest. Many more families are eligible than receive assistance. Brief author Jessica Bean discusses how proposed cuts would have a concrete and immediate impact on families, particularly those in rural areas and in harsh winter climates

Rural and central city residents with multiple children likely to be hardest hit by proposed WIC cuts

This brief uses data from the 2007 and 2010 Current Population Survey’s Annual Social and Economic Supplement to describe the distribution of the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) receipt across the population and to detail place-based differences in receipt. WIC is a nutrition program that serves pregnant or postpartum women, infants, and children up to age 5 (who meet certain criteria) by providing them with nutrition education and checks or vouchers for food purchases. The proposed fiscal year 2012 funding is $733 million less for WIC than fiscal year 2011 levels, and far less than what is needed to serve all who are eligible. This brief describes the implications of the cuts to the WIC budget to help policymakers and service providers to better understand the population likely affected by cuts to WIC funding

The Necessity of the Good Person Prosecutor

In a 2001 essay, Professor Abbe Smith asked the question whether a good person—i.e., a person who is committed to social justice—can be a good prosecutor. Although she acknowledged some hope that the answer to her question could be “yes,” Professor Smith concluded that the answer then was “no”—in part because she saw individual prosecutors generally as having very little discretion to “temper the harsh reality of the criminal justice system.” In this Online Symposium revisiting Professor Smith’s question seventeen years later, my answer to her question is “yes”—a good person can be a good prosecutor

Reliance on supplemental nutrition assistance program continued to rise post-recession

This brief uses data from the 2007, 2009, and 2010 American Community Survey to provide an up-to-date look at changes in SNAP receipt over the course of the recession

Many Eligible Children Don’t Participate in School Nutrition Programs; Reauthorization Offers Opportunities to Improve

This brief uses data from the 2013 Current Population Survey’s Food Security Supplement to document levels of participation in two of the largest programs authorized by the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010—the National School Lunch Program and the School Breakfast Program—by region and place type (rural, suburban, and city), to identify areas where expanding participation may be especially important. Author Jessica Carson reports that only 64 percent of eligible households participate in the National School Lunch Program, and 52 percent participate in the School Breakfast Program. Fifty-nine percent of eligible suburban households and 63 percent of rural households participate in the National School Lunch Program, compared with more than 70 percent of eligible city households. Southern households are more likely to participate in the School Breakfast Program than households in the Northeast or Midwest; there are no regional differences in National School Lunch Program participation. She concludes that participation is moderate among eligible households, with room to increase participation among those in need. In particular, legislators with rural constituents may want to consider ways to redress low participation in their communities by supporting policies that expand enrollment

Toward a More Equal Footing: Early Head Start In Maine

In this brief, author Jessica Carson explores the characteristics of Early Head Start (EHS) in Maine, compares them to the national landscape, and connects these findings to a discussion of the federal and state policy climates. She reports that Maine has 837 EHS slots for more than 8,000 poor children age 0–2 in Maine. Limited funding means that EHS is unable to reach the vast majority of children living below the poverty line. Nearly half of Maine’s EHS enrollees participate via the home visitation service delivery model, compared with 37.3 percent nationwide. Although state supplemental funds pay for a small share of all Maine EHS slots (60 of the 837 slots in 2015-2016), in a climate where early childhood education and care is expensive, these slots provide critical access to some of Maine’s most vulnerable families. More broadly, because EHS can reach only a small number of Mainers, the state might consider ways to bolster the stability of this population in other ways, including through state home visitation funds and child care funds more generally. This research was supported by a grant from the Portland-based John T. Gorman Foundation, whose mission is to advance ideas and opportunities that can improve the lives of disadvantaged people in Maine

Who would be affected by a new minimum wage policy?

This brief describes the population who would be directly affected by the President’s proposal to increase the minimum wage to $9.00 per hour: workers earning between$7.25 and $9.00 per hour. Using data from the 2010 and 2012 Annual Social and Economic Supplement of the Current Population Survey, author Jessica Carson details the characteristics of these potentially affected earners and compares them with the hourly workforce more broadly, paying particular attention to rural-urban differences. She reports that nearly 17 percent of hourly paid workers earn between$7.25 and $9.00 per hour and would see a pay increase under the proposed minimum wage policy. The brief also shows that women, young adults, and workers who are nonwhite, never married, and less educated would disproportionately benefit from a changed policy. She concludes with a discussion of policy implications, emphasizing that to minimize potentially negative employment effects, any minimum wage legislation should be crafted with careful consideration of the implications that an increase may have for firms employing hourly workers