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Sunday July 5, 2009

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Earned Income Tax Credit

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioDelivering Metropolitan Stimulus

Mark Muro, Robert Puentes and Alan Berube, February 13, 2009, The Brookings Institution

A historic fiscal experiment in this country will evolve in the weeks, months and years ahead as a $790 billion stimulus package is spent to revive America’s economy. Metropolitan Policy Program experts suggest how this money might be strategically deployed to invigorate our nation’s metropolitan areas, the sources of national prosperity. Read More

Metropolitan Recovery and Spending Priorities, U.S. Economic Stimulus, Federal Budget, Economic Mobility, Earned Income Tax Credit

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioPoverty and Economic Stimulus

Rebecca M. Blank and Mark H. Greenberg, February 10, 2009, Real Clear Politics

Poverty and Economic StimulusRebecca M. Blank And Mark H. Greenberg agree that while in the short run, economic need is rising rapidly and we need to address the short-run problems as well as think about the long-term reforms, and that the parts of the recovery plan that are directed to low-income and unemployed families are good economics and good social policy. They say that it would only be the beginning of any serious effort to deal with poverty in America. Read More

U.S. Economic Stimulus, Unemployment, U.S. Poverty, Earned Income Tax Credit, U.S. Economic Growth

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioExpanding the Earned Income Tax Credit to Benefit Families and Places

Elizabeth Kneebone, January 26, 2009, The Brookings Institution

Expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit to Benefit Families and PlacesThe economic recovery bill includes tax relief for lower-income working families, including temporary, targeted expansions in the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). A new Metropolitan Policy Program analysis shows how proposed expansions to the EITC would benefit taxpayers in individual states, metropolitan areas and selected cities around the nation. Read More

Earned Income Tax Credit, Taxes, U.S. Economy, U.S. Economic Stimulus

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioHow to Reverse the Trend of Concentrated Poverty

Alan Berube, December 28, 2008, Cleveland Plain Dealer

Alan Berube urges policy-makers to evaluate short-term opportunities and set long-term strategies in order to help Cleveland’s next generation of residents overcome the challenges of concentrated poverty. Read More

Concentrated Poverty, Unemployment, Children & Families, Earned Income Tax Credit, Economic Mobility

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioFighting Poverty in the Land of Opportunity

Rebecca M. Blank, December 17, 2008, The Charlotte Observer

Fighting Poverty in the Land of OpportunityWith unemployment rising, more families feel squeezed this holiday season than ever. Rebecca Blank urges the new president to consider a plan to support low-wage workers, ensure an effective safety net and create opportunities in high-poverty neighborhoods that might guarantee American families more on their tables in the seasons ahead. Read More

Unemployment, Children & Families, Earned Income Tax Credit, Economic Mobility, U.S. Poverty

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioThe Enduring Challenge of Concentrated Poverty in America

Alan Berube and Elizabeth Kneebone, October 24, 2008, The Brookings Institution

The Enduring Challenge of Concentrated Poverty in AmericaThe Federal Reserve System and its 12 member banks partnered with the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program to produce a new, in-depth look at concentrated poverty in America. The two-year study profiles 16 high-poverty communities across the United States, investigating the historical and contemporary factors associated with their high levels of economic distress. Read More

Concentrated Poverty, Working Poor, U.S. Poverty, Earned Income Tax Credit, Inequality

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioHow Can We Reduce the Rising Number of American Families Living in Poverty?

Rebecca M. Blank, September 25, 2008, Joint Economic Committee

In this testimony, Rebecca Blank argues for the need to modernize our poverty statistics so that we may have a better understanding of who is poor and how these numbers are changing over time. She discusses anti-poverty strategies for the next decade. Read More

U.S. Poverty, Children & Families, Earned Income Tax Credit, U.S. Department of Commerce, U.S. Department of Labor

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioMaking Work Pay – Again

Ron Haskins, September 2008, First Focus

Ron Haskins offers ways policymakers could create an entitlement to housing assistance that would more fairly distribute housing benefits and convert housing into a more effective element in the nation’s work support system. The goal of reform would be to get the most out of the resources now devoted to housing by providing at least some benefit to all eligible families that want a housing subsidy. Read More

Working Poor, Labor, Children & Families, U.S. Poverty, Earned Income Tax Credit

VIDEO

Save to My PortfolioLow-Income Families and Communities

Alan Berube, August 12, 2008

In a new report, Alan Berube and Elizabeth Kneebone explain that following a dramatic decline in concentrated poverty in the 1990s, the number of low-income workers and families living in high-working-poverty neighborhoods rose by a striking 41% in the first half of this decade. Alan Berube says that help for high working-poverty communities will come from stronger national and regional economic growth—plus targeted efforts to protect neighborhoods of choice and connection.

Concentrated Poverty, Working Poor, Earned Income Tax Credit, U.S. Poverty, Inequality

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioReversal of Fortune: A New Look at Concentrated Poverty in the 2000s

Elizabeth Kneebone and Alan Berube, August 08, 2008, The Brookings Institution

After dramatic declines in concentrated poverty in the 1990s, the number of low-income workers and families living in high-working-poverty neighborhoods rose by a striking 41% in the first half of this decade, according to a new report from the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program. The report's authors draw on data from the IRS to measure the change in rates of “concentrated working poverty” nationally and in many of the largest metropolitan areas across the country. Read More

Concentrated Poverty, Working Poor, Earned Income Tax Credit, U.S. Poverty, Inequality

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioEconomic Stimulus Act: Hard to Kill Two Birds with One Stone

Ron Haskins, Summer 2008, Pathways Magazine

Economic Stimulus Act: Hard to Kill Two Birds with One StoneThe bipartisan economic stimulus package was a straightforward application of Keynesian fiscal policy: Spend your way out of recession. However, some might wonder if it’s possible to design a stimulus package that could also reduce inequality. In this paper, Ron Haskins explains why targeted stimulus may reduce poverty in the short run but cannot substitute for investments that will reduce inequality in the long run. Read More

Economic Mobility, Inequality, Fiscal Policy, U.S. Economic Growth, Welfare

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioPeriodic Payment of the Earned Income Tax Credit

Stephen D. Holt, June 05, 2008, The Brookings Institution

Many low-income working families would benefit from a streamlined ability to access the proceeds of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) throughout the year as they pay for ongoing expenses like housing, child care, and transportation. The federal government should consider adopting a model for direct periodic payment of the EITC, as most other countries with in-work tax credits provide. Read More

Earned Income Tax Credit, Inequality, Taxes, Working Poor, Children & Families

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioMetro Raise: Boosting the Earned Income Tax Credit to Help Metropolitan Workers and Families

Alan Berube, David Park and Elizabeth Kneebone, June 05, 2008, The Brookings Institution

Metro Raise: Boosting the Earned Income Tax Credit to Help Metropolitan Workers and FamiliesSlowed economic growth and rising prices for necessities like food, transportation, and child care threaten to exacerbate the challenges already facing America's low-income workers and their families. The federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) could do more to help close the growing gap between stagnant wages and rising prices. "Metro Raise" demonstrates how an expanded and modernized EITC would benefit families and communities in the nation's major metropolitan areas. Read More

Earned Income Tax Credit, Inequality, Taxes, Working Poor, Children & Families

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioBridging the Gap: Refundable Tax Credits in Metropolitan and Rural America

Elizabeth Kneebone, April 14, 2008, The Brookings Institution

Bridging the Gap: Refundable Tax Credits in Metropolitan and Rural AmericaIn this report, Elizbeth Kneebone examines the changing distribution of Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) recipients across large cites and suburbs, smaller metro areas, and rural communities throughout the country. While taxpayers in large cities and rural areas were the most likely to claim the EITC in 2005, more than one-third of EITC filers lived in the suburbs of the nation’s largest metropolitan areas. Read More

Taxes, Earned Income Tax Credit, Income Distribution, Working Poor

RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY

Save to My PortfolioThe Costs of Benefit Delivery in the Food Stamp Program

Julia B. Isaacs, March 2008, Economic Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture

This study by Brookings expert Julia Isaacs compares the Food Stamp Program with eight other public assistance programs across four measures of program effectiveness—administrative costs, error payments, program access, and benefit targeting. Read More

Earned Income Tax Credit, U.S. Poverty, Children & Families, Working Poor, Public Health

In Brief

The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is a largely successful component of American labor and antipoverty policy, increasing the ability of workers in low-paying jobs to support themselves and their families. Work remains to improve the EITC’s effectiveness including expanding eligibility and increasing participation among those already eligible.

EITC interactive data >>

Featured Experts

Alan Berube

Alan Berube

Senior Fellow and Research Director, Metropolitan Policy Program

Alan Berube is a senior fellow and research director of the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program. A former policy advisor to the U.S. Treasury Department, he is an expert on metropolitan demographics, low-wage workers, and urban poverty.
Read More

Ron Haskins

Ron Haskins

Senior Fellow, Economic Studies

A former White House and congressional advisor on welfare issues, Ron Haskins co-directs the Brookings Center on Children and Families. An expert on preschool, foster care, and poverty—he was instrumental in the 1996 overhaul of national welfare policy.
Read More

Bruce Katz

Bruce Katz

Vice President and Director, Metropolitan Policy Program
The Adeline M. and Alfred I. Johnson Chair in Urban and Metropolitan Policy

Bruce Katz, vice president and founding director of the Metropolitan Policy Program, regularly advises national, state, regional and municipal leaders on policy reforms that advance the competitiveness of metropolitan areas.
Read More

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Spotlight

TopicEducation

The economic and political well-being of any democracy requires a well-educated citizenry. Brookings’s work has extended beyond the K-12 bookends to include pre-school interventions and issues in higher education. Experts are tackling fundamental issues on the role of education in the national and global economy.

ExpertEswar Prasad

Eswar Prasad, who holds the New Century Chair in International Economics, is a senior fellow in Global Economy and Development. He is the Tolani Senior Professor of Trade Policy at Cornell University and was previously head of the Financial Studies Division and the China Division at the IMF.

TopicHealth Care

Brookings is committed to producing innovative policy solutions to our nation’s most difficult challenges. The country may face no more important domestic policy challenge than the much-needed reform of our health care system. Through an institution-wide effort, Brookings delivers new ideas and offers policy solutions to improve health care both at home and globally.

TopicMigration

Migration is an issue that bridges Brookings’s expertise in domestic and foreign policy. In the United States, reforming immigration policy remains a subject of intense political debate. Globally, the unprecedented movement of people across borders raises issues in both industrialized countries and the developing world.

ExpertMartin Neil Baily

Martin Baily, a former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, focuses on issues of globalization, productivity and competitiveness, Social Security reform and U.S. economic policy.

ExpertSarah A. Binder

Sarah Binder is an expert on Congress and legislative politics.  She is completing a project on the politics of advice and consent, and is at work on the politics of how Congress responds to financial crises.

Policy CenterCenter on Children and Families

The Center on Children and Families studies policies on the well-being of America's children and their parents and seeks a more effective means of addressing poverty, inequality and lack of opportunity in the United States.

Policy CenterJohn L. Thornton China Center

The John L. Thornton China Center develops analysis and policy recommendations to help address key long-term challenges, both in terms of U.S.-China relations and China's internal development.

ExpertRobert Puentes

Robert Puentes focuses on the broad array of policies and issues related to metropolitan growth and development. He is an expert on transportation and infrastructure, urban planning, growth management, suburban issues and housing.

Policy CenterCenter on the United States and Europe

The Center on the U.S. and Europe is dedicated to the study of Europe and U.S.-Europe relations. It involves American and European experts in an active program of research, analysis, and debate.

ExpertVanda Felbab-Brown

Vanda Felbab-Brown focuses on the national security implications of illicit economies and strategies for managing them. She is a security studies professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.

ProgramGovernance Studies

Governance Studies explores political institutions of the United States and other democracies to assess how they govern, how their practices compare and how citizens and public servants can advance sound governance.

ProgramMetropolitan Policy Program

Redefining the challenges facing metropolitan America and promoting innovative solutions to help communities grow in more inclusive, competitive and sustainable ways.

Research Project21st Century Defense Initiative

The 21st Century Defense Initiative produces cutting-edge research, analysis, and outreach that address some of the most critical issues facing leaders shaping defense policy in the coming century. The initiative focuses on three core issues: the future of war, the future of U.S. defense needs and priorities, and the future of the U.S. defense system

Research ProjectAfrica Growth Initiative

The Africa Growth Initiative conducts high-quality policy research and analysis focused on attaining sustainable economic development and prosperity in Africa, while amplifying the voice of African researchers in policy-making and planning.

Research ProjectBudgeting for National Priorities

The Budgeting for National Priorities project promotes greater fiscal responsibility by developing new ideas, educating the public and finding common ground among experts and policy-makers.