This report outlines key lessons and recommendations from Code for America's collaboration with the Voluntary Income Tax Assistance program, which served over 800,000 clients via GetYourRefund.org.
Passing a major new social program like paid family and medical leave (PFML) is only the first step in creating change. To achieve real impact, PFML programs must be well implemented — and as more and more states pass PFML programs, the urgency of such good implementation has never been higher. In 2019, New America staffed a discovery sprint team to explore New Jersey’s pioneering PFML program, using a mixture of beneficiary interviews, data analysis, and business processing mapping. Based on that research, this report outlines key implementation learnings for administrators in other states, focusing on: (a) communicating about PFML, (b) outreach strategies, (c) applications and processing, and (d) IT infrastructure.
An interview with Wendy De La Rosa, assistant professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. De La Rosa discusses how the concept of “psychological ownership” can encourage people to take up benefits they are eligible for.
The IRS is arguably the single most critical benefits administrator in the country, given its responsibility for tax credit-based relief programs, and COVID-19 relief payments. Despite these programs’ incredible progress in reducing poverty, and despite great strides by the IRS to implement them successfully, accessing IRS benefits remains too difficult for many low-income families. This report presents a comprehensive agenda to increase benefit coverage rates, simplify Americans’ interactions with the IRS, and decrease the portion of IRS benefits diverted to third parties.
Rent relief distribution in 2020 was slow and inequitable, because local programs instituted strict eligibility criteria beyond what was required by the CARES Act. As a result of these hurdles, incomplete applications were a major barrier to distributing funds. This report describes the rent relief challenges during the pandemic, as well as a few possible fixes to help the next round of aid distribution.
Part of the $1.9 trillion recovery package that Biden signed into law includes a $1 billion grant to the Technology Modernization Fund. The fund’s purpose is to help federal agencies upgrade their cybersecurity and modernize their technology. The TMF is a chance for federal agencies to move toward a responsive model of government, where people quickly and easily access the resources they need.
The purpose of this document is to outline possible technical approaches to supporting a cash assistance program. The report aims to both capture individual approaches as well as overarching insights taken from across the approaches taken by different organizations.
Code for America describes its work building GetCTC, an e-filer that allows people to file simplified tax returns as specified in the revenue procedure required for the Child Tax Credit.
The New Practice Lab partnered with students of the Stanford Public Interest Technology (PIT) Lab to understand how the Racial Equity Framework can shape research by actively identifying anti-Blackness, racial biases, and inequities that exist in public policy. This article documents the findings of the Stanford PIT Lab as they researched how the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) design affects communities of color.
Nava partnered with the State of California’s Employment Development Department to build and deploy two digital services to assist Californians seeking unemployment benefits, in just three months.
