This brief estimates of benefits, costs, interactions with other means tested programs, and impact on poverty for the paid family and medical leave program.
This article emphasizes the need for local leaders to prioritize disability equity in advancing upward mobility, addressing systemic barriers that hinder disabled individuals' escape from poverty.
This Urban Institute report explores the impact of benefit cliffs, plateaus, and trade-offs on families receiving public assistance, examining how changes in earnings affect access to essential benefits like SNAP, Medicaid, and housing subsidies.
This resource examines how improvements in customer service experiences in public benefit programs like Medicaid, CHIP, and TANF can help better meet enrollees’ needs and build trust in government.
Disparities in Economic Impact Payment (EIP) receipt during the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affected low-income households, communities of color, and individuals without tax filing histories.
This analysis explores the potential reduction in poverty rates across all U.S. states if every eligible individual received full benefits from seven key safety net programs, highlighting significant decreases in overall and child poverty.
This guide outlines how states can use TANF funds to provide direct cash assistance to families, particularly through flexible mechanisms like nonrecurrent short-term benefits (NRSTs).
The Pandemic Electronic Benefits Transfer (P-EBT) program was launched as an effort to address the loss of access to free and reduced-price school meals due to widespread school closures at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. As schools reopened in a shifting mix of fully virtual, hybrid, and inperson formats and families lacked consistent access to school meals, these benefits were extended through the 2020–21 school year and were highly valuable to families in buffering the full extent of food insecurity they may have faced during this uncertain time. However, the complexity of administering this program was a fundamental barrier in providing timely support to families, who ultimately went without benefits for at least half of the school year. In this report, we dive into the challenges state administrators faced in launching this new program during the 2020–21 school year and reflect on considerations for the future.
This report describes key elements of the American Rescue Plan Act and how it would reduce the projected poverty rate for 2021. Various projections regarding the effects of the policy are described in this report.
This Urban Institute report identifies strategies to improve young people’s access to public benefits through targeted outreach, benefit navigation, cross-organizational partnerships, and streamlined eligibility processes.
This Urban Institute report highlights how immigrant and mixed-status families continued to avoid safety net programs in 2023 due to lingering fears around the public charge rule.
