Russell Sage Foundation Research Projects on the Recession
- Awarded Scholar:
- Keith Bentele, University of Massachusetts, Boston
The Great Recession led to sharp decreases in income and increases in poverty rates across the U.S. However, the severity of the impact of the recession on individual families varied based on the interaction of a number of factors: the local intensity of the recession, the strength of the local social safety net, and the level of individual household assets.
Tagged: - Awarded Scholar:
- Robert Moffitt, Johns Hopkins University
During and since the Great Recession, millions of Americans have relied on government transfer and social insurance programs to make ends meet. In principle, these programs, collectively known as the 'social safety net,'should help replace lost income during economic downturns when unemployment is high and wages are low.
Tagged: - Awarded Scholars:
- William Evans, University of Notre Dame
- Robert Schwab, University of Maryland
Over 90 percent of all funding for primary and secondary public schools in the U.S. comes from state and local government. Therefore, the fiscal crisis now faced by state governments in the wake of the recession, and similar budgetary problems just beginning to surface at the local level, are likely to have profound effects on the nation’s public schools.
Tagged: - Awarded Scholar:
- Alicia Munnell, Boston College
The recent political battles over the pension and health benefits of state employees are sometimes portrayed in the press as a consequence of greedy public-sector unions winning overly generous concessions from short-sighted state legislators willing to promise unsustainable future benefits to solve immediate political problems.
Tagged: - Awarded Scholars:
- Howard Chernick, CUNY Graduate Center
- Cordelia Reimers, Hunter College
As a result of the Great Recession, state and local budgets are facing severe fiscal pressure. A recent study showed an unprecedented two-year decline in state spending, and the trend does not seem likely to end soon. Tax revenues were down 12 percent in 2009, and only slightly less in 2010.
Tagged: - Awarded Scholar:
- Andrea Louise Campbell, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Great Recession and its aftermath have put enormous fiscal pressures on the American states, which must bear the triple burden of steeply declining tax revenues, exploding costs for social assistance programs, and large investment losses in state pension funds. The aggregate budgetary shortfall experienced by the states amounted to some $430 billion between 2009 and 2011.
Tagged:
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