The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 required states to increase welfare recipient employment and participation in welfare-to-work programs. These work requirements are sometimes credited for bringing about large employment increases among single mothers....

Output growth is determined by growth in labor productivity and growth in labor input. Over the past two decades, technological developments have changed how many economists think about growth in labor productivity. However, in the coming decades, the aging of the population will change how...

The U.S. labor force participation rate rose rapidly during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. It then flattened out in the 1990s, and since 2000 it has fallen, without much sign of an imminent rebound. We attempt to distinguish between cyclical and structural influences on the participation rate by...

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 changed welfare programs by increasing state income maintenance programs’ emphasis on employment. Following reform, several states paid reduced welfare benefits to single mothers who resided in their parents’ homes,...