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62. Delivering a Local EITC: Lessons from the San Francisco Working Families Credit
- Author:
- Tiana Wertheim and Tim Flacke
- Publication Date:
- 05-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- For families struggling to make ends meet on earnings from low-wage jobs, the federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) has become an essential form of support, boosting the size of annual tax refunds by as much as several thousand dollars. The program is widely recognized for its accessibility (working through the tax code and tax filing system), administrative efficiency and simplicity, and its effectiveness in lifting working poor house- holds out of poverty. Why then shouldn't the EITC serve as a model for other programs for working families, particularly in parts of the country where high costs of living create added difficulties for lower-income residents?
- Topic:
- Demographics, Economics, and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- United States and San Francisco
63. Fulfilling the Promise: Seven Steps to Successful Community-Based Information Strategies
- Author:
- Pari Sabety
- Publication Date:
- 05-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- While some neighborhoods in American cities are resurgent, many others remain stubbornly entrenched in a cycle of underinvestment. A contributing factor is that—despite thriving immigrant populations, high volumes of cash transactions, and relatively stable housing markets—these neighborhoods are victims of an urban information gap which undervalues their commercial potential. The importance of good information for private and public investments is widely acknowledged, but fragmented funding, lack of standards, and spotty data has impeded either effective or universal use of these tools. This paper sets forth seven steps for practitioners and investors to follow in investing in local community information initiatives and, in turn, close the urban information gap and accelerate investment in these markets.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
64. Financial Access for Immigrants: Lessons from Diverse Perspectives
- Author:
- Audrey Singer, Jeremy Smith, Robin Newberger, and Anna Paulson
- Publication Date:
- 05-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- The United States has long benefited from the aspirations, talents, and hard work of the many immigrants who have settled here. Each generation has debated the costs of immigration and its benefits and grappled with how best to incorporate immigrants into U.S. society. The unparalleled size and growth of the contemporary immigrant population means that these conversations and debates continue today in communities throughout the country. The well-being of the nation increasingly depends on whether immigrants' economic progress keeps up with their demographic growth.
- Topic:
- Economics, Markets, and Migration
- Political Geography:
- United States
65. Credit Scores, Reports, and Getting Ahead in America
- Author:
- Matt Fellowes
- Publication Date:
- 05-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Everyday, more than 27,000 employees in the credit bureau industry walk into over 1,000 locations around the country and process over 66 million items of information. Out of this massive churning of activity, credit bureaus produce consumer credit reports and scores, two of the most powerful determinants of modern American consumer life.
- Topic:
- Civil Society, Economics, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
66. Overcoming Barriers to Mobility: The Role of Place in the United States and UK
- Author:
- Alan Berube
- Publication Date:
- 04-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- In late 2004 and the first half of 2005, the US media elite caught the mobility bug. Within weeks of one another, three newspapers of national record – The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal , and the Los Angeles Times – each independently published a series of articles describing, by various measures, whether and how Americans are 'getting ahead' today. Collectively, the articles offered a re-examination of a powerful narrative in the United States: that of a classless society, with boundless opportunity awaiting those who choose to seize it.
- Topic:
- Civil Society and Development
- Political Geography:
- United States, United Kingdom, America, and Europe
67. Making Sense of Clusters: Regional Competitiveness and Economic Development
- Author:
- Joseph Cortright
- Publication Date:
- 03-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- In recent years, "cluster strategies" have become a popular economic development approach among state and local policymakers and economic development practitioners. An industry cluster is a group of firms, and related economic actors and institutions, that are located near one another and that draw productive advantage from their mutual proximity and connections. Cluster analysis can help diagnose a region's economic strengths and challenges and identify realistic ways to shape the region's economic future. Yet many policymakers and practitioners have only a limited understanding of what clusters are and how to build economic development strategies around them.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Government
- Political Geography:
- United States
68. One-Fifth of the Nation: America's First Suburbs
- Author:
- David Warren and Robert Puentes
- Publication Date:
- 02-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- One of the more encouraging metropolitan policy trends over the last several years is the increased attention on America's older, inner-ring, “first” suburbs. Beginning generally with Myron Orfield's Metropolitics in 1997, a slow but steady stream of research has started to shine a bright light on these places and begun to establish the notion that first suburbs have their own unique set of characteristics and challenges that set them apart from the rest of metropolitan America. Since then first suburbs in a few regions have assumed a small, but significant, role in advancing research and policy discussions about metropolitan growth and development.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Migration
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
69. Firm Sizes: Facts, Formulae and Fantasies
- Author:
- Robert L. Axtell
- Publication Date:
- 02-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Recently discovered facts concerning the size distribution of U.S. firms are recapitulated—in short, these sizes are closely approximated by the Zipf distribution, a Pareto (power law) distribution with exponent of unity. Interesting consequences of this result are then developed, having primarily to do with formulae for the distribution's moments, and difficulties of reasonably characterizing a 'typical' firm. Then, a leading candidate explanation for these data—the Kesten random growth process—is assessed in terms of its realism vis-á-vis actual firm growth. Insofar as it has fluctuations that are quite different in character from actual firm size variability, the Kesten and related stochastic growth processes qualify more as fables of firm growth than as credible explanations. Finally, new explanations of the facts are proposed by considering firms to be partitions of the set of all workers. Assuming all partitions to be equally likely, the observed distribution of firm sizes is hypothesized to be the distribution of block sizes in the most likely partitions. An alternative derivation of this distribution as a constrained optimization problem is also described. Given that these calculations involve unimaginably vast magnitudes, it seems just short of fantastic to consider them relevant empirically.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Industrial Policy
- Political Geography:
- United States
70. The Affordability Index
- Publication Date:
- 01-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- This brief describes a new information tool developed by the Urban Markets Initiative to quantify, for the first time, the impact of transportation costs on the affordability of housing choices. This brief explains the background, creation, and purpose of this new tool. The first section provides a project overview and a short summary of the method used to create the Affordability Index. The next section highlights the results from testing the index in a seven-county area in and around Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN. To demonstrate the usefulness of this tool at a neighborhood level, the third section projects the effect of transportation and housing choices on three hypothetical low- and moderate-income families in each of four different neighborhoods in the Twin Cities. The brief concludes with suggested policy recommendations and applications of the new tool for various actors in the housing market, and for regulators, planners, and funders in the transportation and land use arenas at all levels of government.
- Topic:
- Economics, Emerging Markets, and Government
- Political Geography:
- United States