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The Obama Administration's Mobility Claims and the "Great Gatsby Curve"
Editor's Note: This opinion piece first appeared on January 17, 2012 as a guest post on National Review Online's domestic policy blog, The Agenda. Several researchers have misinterpreted my point in...
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Stop Feeling Sorry for the Middle Class—They’re Doing Just Fine
Commentators were right to point out that Mitt Romney committed a flagrant gaffe last week. Unfortunately, they were only half-correct in identifying the offense. Yes, Romney was impressively inartful...
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Assessing Income Inequality, Mobility and Opportunity
Editor's note: The below is Scott Winship's testmony for the Senate Budget Committee's hearing on inequality, mobility, and opportunity. Video of Winship's testimony is available at the Senate Budget...
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Welfare Reform Worked
The primary election campaign has intensified a justified concern about inequality in America: People at the top are rising much faster than everyone else. Even low-income Americans consider relatively...
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Policy Solutions for Preventing Unplanned Pregnancy
AbstractUnintended pregnancy is a widespread problem with far-reaching implications: almost half of all pregnancies in the United States are unintended, and the women and children involved in these...
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How Targeted Are Federal Expenditures on Children?
EXECUTIVE SUMMARYChild poverty rose in 2010 as the nation continued to feel the recession’s effects. Forty-four percent of children were living in families with incomes below 200 percent of the poverty...
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Starting School at a Disadvantage: The School Readiness of Poor Children
Executive SummaryPoor children in the United States start school at a disadvantage in terms of their early skills, behaviors, and health. Fewer than half (48 percent) of poor children are ready for...
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The Ongoing Impact of Foreclosures on Children
Five years into the foreclosure crisis, many American families with children continue to lose their homes through foreclosure. An estimated 2.3 million children in single-family homes have already lost...
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Reflecting on SNAP: Purposes, Spending, and Potential Savings
In testimony before the House Subcommittee on Nutrition and Horticulture, Ron Haskins discusses the purposes of the SNAP program.Chairman Schmidt, Ranking Member Baca, and Members of the...
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Twenty Years Later, It Turns Out Dan Quayle Was Right About Murphy Brown and...
On May 19, 1992, as the presidential campaign season was heating up, Vice President Dan Quayle delivered a family-values speech that came to define him nearly as much as his spelling talents. Speaking...
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Combating Poverty: Understanding New Challenges for Families
My name is Ron Haskins and I’m pleased and privileged to have the opportunity to testify before the Finance Committee about poverty. Few topics have enjoyed as much attention from federal policymakers...
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Improving The Lives Of Single Moms And Their Kids
Editor’s note: On NPR’s Talk of the Nation, Isabel Sawhill discussed the societal effects of single motherhood with Neil Conan and Philip Cohen.NEAL CONAN, HOST: [F]or whatever reason, the number of...
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@ Brookings Podcast: Causes of and Solutions for U.S. Poverty's Continued Rise
Year after year, federal spending on poverty programs has been going up, but we still see more and more people who have no margin to guard against unexpected expenses or job loss. At the same time, for...
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Middle Class Wealth: It's Not as Bad as It Looks
Last month, the Census Bureau released its latest data on wealth, updating earlier figures from 2005 to 2010. The numbers confirm findings from a Federal Reserve Board survey showing unprecedented...
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Bring Back the American Dream? It’s Not That Hard.
Restoring opportunity in the United States is not terribly complicated. It will require an activist government and individual responsibility. That means a strong focus on job creation right now,...
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Making Sense of Income Inequality
Not long ago, a former colleague asked me to recommend the best accessible reference on income inequality. I immediately suggested Timothy Noah’s 2010 series of essays, “The Great Divergence,” written...
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Is Retaining Students in the Early Grades Self-Defeating?
Whether a child is a proficient reader by the third grade is an important indicator of their future academic success. Indeed, substantial evidence indicates that unless students establish basic reading...
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The 2011 Poverty Rate: What to Expect and How Long Will It Last?
The Center on Children and Families at Brookings has used a model for the past three years to predict the U.S. poverty rate before the official figure was released by the Census Bureau. As the table...
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Finding a Balance between Personal and Government Responsibility: It’s not...
The media is full of commentary about Mitt Romney’s suggestion that people who do not pay income taxes are lacking in personal responsibility. My view is that personal responsibility matters. In fact,...
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Pathways to the Middle Class: Balancing Personal and Public Responsibilities
INTRODUCTIONThe defining narrative of the United States of America is that of a nation where everyone has an opportunity to achieve a better life. Americans believe that everyone should have the...
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