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22. The Economic Potential of American Cities
- Author:
- Bruce Katz
- Publication Date:
- 10-2006
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- The relationship between the federal government and American cities is intricate and complex. Majoy federal policies on tax, trade, transportation, and immigration have a substantial influence on the health and vitality of city economies and the shape of metropolitan growth and development. Other federal policies on education, job training, wages, financial services, health care, and housing help shape the life opportunities of urban residents, particularly those who earn low or moderate incomes. Each of these policies influences and is influenced by the nation's changing demographic and economic reality, which in turn has significant implications for cities.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Development, and Economics
- Political Geography:
- United States
23. The Decline of the Underclass
- Author:
- Paul A. Jargowsky and Isabel V. Sawhill
- Publication Date:
- 01-2006
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Hurricane Katrina reminded the nation of the consequences of entrenched poverty, and Congress now faces complicated policy questions set against the backdrop of class and race. As America confronts these issues in cities and states beyond the Gulf Coast, it is important to realize that the number of poor people living in troubled neighborhoods—often described by journalists as the “underclass”—are actually fewer now than in the 1980s. Yet public policies that encourage education, work, and opportunity are urgently needed to keep that positive trend from reversing.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Development, Economics, and Government
- Political Geography:
- America
24. The Spread of Innovations through Social Learning
- Author:
- H. Peyton Young
- Publication Date:
- 12-2005
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Innovations often spread by the communication of information among potential adopters. In the marketing literature, the standard model of new product diffusion is generated by information contagion: agents adopt once they hear about the existence of the product from someone else. In social learning models, by contrast, an agent adopts only when the perceived advantage of the innovation--”as revealed by the actions and experience of prior adopters--”exceeds a threshold determined by the agent's prior beliefs. We demonstrate that learning with heterogeneous priors generates adoption curves that have an analytically tractable, closed-form solution. Moreover there is a simple statistical test that discriminates between this type of process and a contagion model. Applied to Griliches' classic results on the adoption of hybrid corn, this test shows that learning with heterogeneous priors does a considerably better job of explaining the data than does the contagion model.
- Topic:
- Civil Society, Demographics, Development, and Education
25. Who Lives Downtown
- Author:
- Eugenie L. Birch
- Publication Date:
- 11-2005
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Over the past few decades, public and private officials have tried to re-invent their downtowns with a variety of tactics. One of the most popular—and arguably most successful—strategies of recent years has been downtown residential development. In this effort, creating a vibrant, “24-hour” downtown has become the mantra for injecting life into struggling main streets and business districts.
- Topic:
- Civil Society, Demographics, Economics, and Human Welfare
- Political Geography:
- New York, Asia, Los Angeles, and Chicago
26. The "Underclass" Revisited: A Social Problem in Decline
- Author:
- Paul A. Jargowsky and Rebecca Yang
- Publication Date:
- 05-2005
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- No single metric can capture all the dimensions of as complex a phenomenon as poverty in an affluent society. Several different empirical strategies, each with strengths and weaknesses, may all contribute to a more complete understanding of the experience of living in poverty in a modern urban setting. The standard federal measure of poverty focuses narrowly on the income of families in comparison to a standard meant to reflect the cost of basic necessities (Orshansky 1963, 1965). The concentration of poverty adds a geographic component, by gauging the extent to which poor families are spatially isolated (Jargowsky and Bane 1991; Jargowsky 1997, 2003). Neither of these measures, however, adequately conveys the extent of social disorganization in poor neighborhoods that has figured so prominently in the political debates over public policies that address poverty and urban development.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Development, Economics, and Poverty
27. High Cost or High Opportunity Cost? Transportation and Family Economic Success
- Author:
- Margy Waller
- Publication Date:
- 12-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Research suggests that having a car is a worthwhile investment in better outcomes for low-income families. Recent reports quantify the additional money required to own and operate personal vehicles, as compared to the lower cost of traveling on public transit. However, this method of accounting fails to consider the fact that poor workers without a car may not be able to search for or accept a better-paying job because public transit doesn't take them there, causing these workers to lose income or benefits as a result. This report outlines opportunity costs experienced by transit-dependent poor households, and concludes that when all costs are considered along with benefits of private vehicles, it makes sense to press for more assistance and policies that reduce car ownership costs for poor workers.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Development, Economics, and Human Welfare
28. The Well-Being of Single-Mother Families After Welfare Reform
- Author:
- Bruce D. Meyer and James X. Sullivan
- Publication Date:
- 08-2005
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Trends in income and consumption tell very different stories about the well-being of single mothers and their children in recent years. On the one hand, data suggest that income fell noticeably for single mothers well below the poverty line, while income grew significantly for single mothers with higher incomes. On the other hand, data on how much these two groups of mothers and children consumed suggest that the material circumstances of both groups improved during the 1990s. We argue that the consumption data better reflect well-being for several reasons. First, consumption is probably measured with less error than income for poor families, and is more strongly associated with other measures of well-being such as health and housing conditions. Second, there is overwhelming evidence that income is underreported by these mothers and that the underreporting, especially of income from welfare and other transfer programs, has increased in recent years.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Economics, Government, and Human Welfare
29. The Rise of New Immigrant Gateways
- Author:
- Audrey Singer
- Publication Date:
- 02-2004
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- The United States is in the midst of a wave of unprecedented immigration. Immigrants comprised 11.1 percent of the U.S. population in 2000. During the 1990s alone, the foreign-born population grew by 11.3 million, or 57.4 percent, bringing the Census 2000 count of immigrants to 31.1 million. The rapidity of this influx, coupled with its sheer size, means that American society will con- front momentous social, cultural, and political change during the coming decades and generations.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Human Welfare, and Migration
- Political Geography:
- United States
30. Metropolitan Magnets for International and Domestic Migrants
- Author:
- William H. Frey
- Publication Date:
- 10-2003
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Hundreds of thousands of people move to the U.S. each year seeking a better life. Millions of Americans move to new locations within the U.S. each year for the same reason. The respective destinations of these two groups—immigrants and domestic migrants—shape the physical landscape, public service needs, business patterns, and political culture of our nation's metropolitan areas. For those reasons, international and domestic migration trends in the late 1990s, and how they shaped metropolitan growth dynamics, represent some of the most eagerly anticipated findings from U.S. Census 2000.
- Topic:
- Demographics and Migration
- Political Geography:
- United States
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