Since the mid-1980s, several important studies have established the statistical relationship between the poverty rate and overall economic performance. Most of these studies focused on the apparent break in this relationship beginning in the late 1970s or early 1980s. In this paper, we present...

Although high school dropout rates have been declining among members of virtually all major demographic groups, the dropout rates of single mothers remain high. This is troubling, given that the author finds that over the last quarter century single mothers who do not graduate from high school...

Recent research has identified situations in which instrumental variables (IV) estimators are severely biased and has suggested diagnostic tests to identify such situations. We suggest a number of alternative techniques for choosing a set of instruments that satisfy these tests from a universe...

In this paper I present evidence on the extent to which labor market tightness, as measured by job vacancy rates and other indicators of hiring difficulty, affect the willingness of establishments to hire welfare recipients. From these estimates, I infer the effects of the business cycle on the...

This study analyzes short-run AFDC recidivism among mother- only families. Findings suggest that a sizable minority of former AFDC recipients return to AFDC rapidly. Those most likely to return to AFDC are those switching jobs, those moving to publichousing, those adding children, and those not...

Our objective was to assess the concurrent validity of the face valid food security categorical algorithm with Hawaii residents. We also hypothesized that there would be differences in food security status between ethnic groups. We used the 18 question indicators of the Core Food Security Module...

This paper presents a test of the hypothesis that employers in suburban locations are more likely to discriminate against African Americans than are employers located in central cities. Using a difference-in-difference framework, we compare central-city/suburban differences in racial hiring...

Research on poverty is highly fragmented and technical, the work mostly of specialists who analyze data using statistical methods. However, policymakers and researchers also need to understand poverty in a broader, more integrated way. How does one construct such an overview? No definite...