Simulation methods are used to investigate the cost-effectiveness and poverty-reducing effects of the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 (FMWA). The data set is created by matching and merging the Annual Social and Economic Supplement (March CPS) with the Earner Study files, which contain the best...

The relationship between poverty and economic growth is reexamined using pooled cross section and time series estimates of state level poverty. Empirical evidence is provided for both cash and comprehensive income headcounts and Sen indexes of poverty. Particular emphasis is placed on the...

This paper investigates the impact of economic growth, and more specifically robust economic growth along with other macroeconomic determinants, on poverty levels using both the U.S. official measure of poverty and an estimated time series of Sen indices of poverty. The results reveal that the...

This paper comments on the work of Rector et al. (1999a, 1999b). The poverty lines implicit in their restrictive material deprivation approach are disputed and the claim that America has triumphed over poverty is rejected. Evidence is presented showing that poverty among the poorest Americans...

This paper develops and applies new measures of poverty that overcome a number of specific methodological flaws in the official US poverty statistics. Sen's distribution sensitive index of poverty and each of its components are estimated at several distinct poverty thresholds for the period...

Micro data from audited tax returns are used to evaluatechanges in the actual progressitivity of U.S. federal incometaxes in 1979 and 1988, which is distinct from apparent progressivity.Statistical inference methods are applied to global measuresof both actual and apparent residual and liability...