Related UI Researchers

Publications on Work/Income

This report is an analysis of alternative datasets and research approaches to assess the effects of Hurricane Katrina on populations served by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services/Administration for Children and Families (ACF). The assessment addresses four overarching research questions, with an emphasis on using existing datasets: 1) where did populations of interest go and where are they living since Katrina; what are the effects on income and employment; what are the needs for ACF programs and services; and how did the disaster affect ACF programs themselves? The report includes an extensive annotated bibliography of analyses through January 2007.

The High Growth Job Training Initiative (HGJTI) is a national grants program administered by the U.S. Department of Labor Employment and Training Administration. Between 2001 and 2006, more than 150 grants were awarded to establish demand-driven job training and related projects designed to meet employer-defined workforce challenges. This report is the second in a series from the evaluation of the HGJTI being conducted by the Urban Institute, Johns Hopkins University, and Capital Research Corporation. This report documents the national initiative and describes the structure and implementation of projects developed by selected grantees. The information presented is based on reviews of grantee applications and quarterly reports, and on site visits to six grantees.

In this paper I note the basic paradox of workforce development policy: that, in an era in which skills are more important than ever as determinants of labor market earnings, we spend fewer and fewer public (federal) dollars on workforce development over time. I present trends in funding and in program evolution over time for programs funded by the Department of Labor and others. I then review the cost-effectiveness of programs for adults and youth from the evaluation literature. I consider some other possible reasons for funding declines, and some newer developments in workforce policy, mostly at the state and local levels, before concluding with some policy recommendations.

In this paper, I review what we have learned about living wage laws and their impacts on the wages, employment and poverty rates of low-wage workers. I review the characteristics of these laws, predictions from economic theory about their likely effects, and two bodies of empirical evidence: studies across cities or metropolitan areas and those within particular cities. I conclude that living wage laws have modestly raised wage levels of low wage workers and have reduced their employment at covered firms, but that the magnitudes of both effects are likely quite small, given how few workers are usually covered by these ordinances.

One-quarter of workers ages 51 to 55 develop work disabilities before age 62. Disabilities often force people to curtail their work hours, derailing retirement preparations. However, protections built into Social Security, including disability and spouse benefits and the system's tilt toward workers with low lifetime earnings, cushion the impact of midlife health problems. After other factors are controlled for, the onset of health-related work limitations between ages 51 and 61 reduces Social Security retirement benefits at ages 63 to 67 by only about 2 percent, much less than the impact on other retirement savings.