A recent study challenges the common belief that income support programs like SNAP reduce employment, finding that for individuals with a work history, receiving SNAP benefits can actually increase long-term employment.
This report describes how the government can use widespread social media feedback and begin to build long-term measures to center people’s experience as an important component of policy design
There were over 25 million Medicaid disenrollments in 2023, but national enrollment remained significantly above pre-pandemic levels at over 56 million, with notable state-level variations and near-recovery of child enrollment.
A panel of experts discuss the application of civil rights protections to emerging AI technologies, highlighting potential harms, the need for inclusive teams, and the importance of avoiding technology-centric solutions to social problems.
The Sprint 2 Report: Michigan UI Claimant Experience by Civilla and New America examines challenges in Michigan’s unemployment insurance (UI) system and provides human-centered design recommendations to improve accessibility, clarity, and user experience.
The team conducted experiments to determine whether clients would be responsive to proactive support offered by a chatbot, and identify the ideal timing of the intervention.
The team developed an AI-powered explanation feature that effectively translates complex, multi-program policy calculations into clear and accessible explanations, enabling users to explore "what-if" scenarios and understand key factors influencing benefit amounts and eligibility thresholds.
This guide, directed at poverty lawyers, explains automated decision-making systems so lawyers and advocates can better identify the source of their clients' problems and advocate on their behalf. Relevant for practitioners, this report covers key questions around automated decision-making systems.
At Rules as Code Demo Day we heard from Song Hia of the NYC Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity and Ethan Lo of the NYC Office of Technology and Innovation who demoed the NYC Benefits Platform Screening API which provides machine-readable calculations and criteria for benefits screening that power the ACCESS NYC screening questionnaire. This makes it easier for NYC residents to discover multiple benefits they may be eligible for. The City is now extending the API to support the new MyCity platform, a one-stop shop for all services and benefits.
This reporting explores how algorithms used to screen prospective tenants, including those waiting for public housing, can block renters from housing based on faulty information.
