Children represent the largest indirect beneficiaries of the U.S. social welfare system. Yet, many questions remain about the direct benefits of cash aid to children. The current understanding of the impacts of cash aid in the U.S. is drawn primarily from studies of in-kind benefits, tax...

We examine the effects of an unconditional cash transfer on the economic wellbeing (material hardship, ability to meet needs, money on hand, use of friends and family for assistance, and employment) of families and children with very low incomes. We use a parameterized difference-in-differences...

We provide new evidence that cash transfers following the birth of a first child can have large and long-lasting effects on that child's outcomes. We take advantage of the January 1 birthdate cutoff for U.S. child-related tax benefits, which results in families of otherwise similar children...

I discuss recent books offering differing explanations for persistent U.S. poverty. Desmond (2023) argues that aid to low-income Americans is captured by more powerful market actors. I contextualize this concern as about incidence and consider both policies for changing incidence (by changing...

We propose a new measure of the rate of poverty we call the Supplemental Expenditure Poverty Measure (SEPM) based on expenditure in the Consumer Expenditure survey. It treats household expenditure as a measure of resources available to purchase the minimum bundle necessary to meet basic needs....

Large and persistent gaps in social protection coverage, comprehensiveness and adequacy are linked to many barriers, including high levels of informality, institutional fragmentation of the social protection system and significant financing gaps for social protection in a context of limited...

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed significant gaps in the coverage, comprehensiveness and adequacy of social protection systems worldwide. These gaps have jeopardized the health, incomes and jobs of billions of people. Closing these protection gaps, facilitating faster and inclusive...

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused massive disruptions to the global economy and forced policymakers to respond to the newly created challenges. Many policy institutions have therefore had to rethink their established approaches and their usual policy responses.

Burnout of physicians and other medical personnel is a major problem in the economics of healthcare systems, potentially costing billions of dollars. Knowledge of the determinants and costs of burnout at the organization level is sparse, making it difficult to assess the net benefits of...

A growing body of evidence indicates that poor health early in life can leave lasting scars on adult health and economic outcomes. While much of this literature focuses on childhood experiences, mechanisms generating these lasting effects - recurrence of illness and interruption of human capital...