It is well-known that real benefits in the major cash transfer program in the U.S. -- the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program -- have fallen drastically over the past twenty years. State legislatures, which set AFDC benefit levels, have failed to increase nominal benefits to...

A number of states have recently instituted family cap policies, under which women who conceive a child while receiving cash assistance are not entitled to additional cash benefits upon the birth of the child. This paper takes advantage of the variation across states in the timing of the...

The pregibit discrete choice model is built on a distribution that allows symmetry or asymmetry and thick tails, thin tails or no tails. Thus the model is much richer than the traditional models that are typically used to study behavior that generates discrete choice outcomes. Pregibit nests...

Even before the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, the rhetoric of “welfare reform” debate blamed recipients for their poverty while diverting attention from structural problems of our society. Proponents of “reform” argued that by withholding welfare...

A complete account of the U.S. child care subsidy system requires an understanding of its implications for both parental and child well-being. Although the effects of child care subsidies on maternal employment and child development have been recently studied, many other dimensions of family...

A complete account of the U.S. child care subsidy system requires an understanding of its implications for both parental and child well-being. Although the effects of child care subsidies on maternal employment and child development have been recently studied, many other dimensions of family...