The Urban Institute Through the Years

1968-1972 | 1973-1977 | 1978-1982 | 1983-1987 |
1988-1992 | 1993-1997 | 1998-2002 | 2003-2007

April 1968 — A blue-ribbon commission of government officials and civil leaders, set up by President Johnson, charters a non-profit non-partisan research institute to look at America's cities and urban populations.

You have launched something America has needed and wanted for a long time. It is a new Urban Institute... the work the Institute will do--the studies and the evaluations and the free and searching inquiries--will build the strongest foundation upon which we can renew our cities and transform the lives of people.
- President Lyndon B. Johnson, April 26, 1968

1968-72 — Laying the Foundation

As computer technology revolutionizes research, the Urban Institute begins developing models that could predict how various types of households might experience and respond to such policy proposals as welfare reform, national health financing, and elementary and secondary educational finance.

June 1970 — The first major Institute project examines how four departments—Labor; Housing and Urban Development (HUD); Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW); and Office of Equal Opportunity (OEO)—evaluate performance in fifteen programs. Their recommendations lead to the installation of a comprehensive evaluation system for social programs.
February 1971 — A UI report on elementary and secondary education programs for disadvantaged children emphasizes the need for technical assistance models appropriate to various educational settings.
1972 — A basic micro-simulation model, called a Transfer Income Model (or TRIM), is created. By projecting changes in age, composition, births, deaths, and family formation and dissolution, a researcher can predict changes in labor force participation rates, employment levels, income, and wealth. The model lives on as TRIM3, a methodological workhorse used in the mid-1990s to estimate the costs and impacts of federal health care reform and welfare reform proposals, among others.
1972 — A Cable Television Information Center forms to help local governments handle complex new franchising arrangements. This spins off into an independent nonprofit corporation in 1980.

1973-77 — Studying the Effectiveness of Programs and Policies

The recession of the early 1970s lends urgency to the Institute's research on poverty, employment, and social services. Hard times also heighten interest in new work on tax reform and government efficiency. Disgruntled taxpayers become more interested in fact-based analyses than in economic theory or partisan conviction.

1973 — While deepening the understanding of poverty, the Urban Institute becomes the first to forecast the problems posed by the rapid rise in the number of female-headed households and teen mothers.
1974 — Researchers start predicting ten-year changes in household moves, as well as the quantity and quality of urban housing available and the impact of restrictive building regulations on housing prices—critical information for city planners and policymakers.
1975 — Amid mounting concern over rising Medicaid costs, the Institute assesses the state-level impacts of inflation and unemployment on the delivery and use of health care services. Inflation in the prices of health services—not an increase in the number of people eligible for Medicaid—is identified as the principal factor behind rising costs.
1976 — In the wake of New York City's financial crisis, the Institute examines the cost-effectiveness of city service delivery, compensation for municipal workers, and such hidden deficits as pension obligations and infrastructure decay.
1977 — A study of the Work Incentive Program (WIN) finds that welfare recipients not enrolled in WIN found jobs on their own as quickly as WIN enrollees. Given that fact, the Institute recommends focusing WIN on job training instead of job placement.
1977 — Researchers project the size and composition of the female labor force through the next decade, with attention to the implications for macroeconomic policy, childcare needs, and other policy issues. They find that several million more women are likely to be working or looking for work by the year 1990 than anticipated.

1978-82 Tracking the Trends and Influencing Practice

By 1978, the Urban Institute had advised government agencies under the Nixon, Ford, and Carter administrations. Besides informing many debates, including those over welfare reform and both the creation and early performance of the Congressional Budget Office, the Institute sees many of its findings make their way into practice. Most notably, researchers influence national transportation policy by demonstrating that using cars, buses, and taxis more efficiently would make better economic sense than investing in commuter trains and advanced technologies.

1978 — After the permissible mandatory retirement age is raised to 70, researchers find that both Social Security and pension plans give aging workers strong incentives to retire early. Related studies turn up more policy grist: the income of the elderly has been slipping since the mid-1970s; urban revitalization schemes often displace the elderly poor, and nursing home patients whose bills were paid for by Medicaid could not count on getting the same access or treatment as others.
1979 — Social Security and welfare programs constitute the largest slice of the federal budget. The Institute, using earlier modeling work, can project Social Security and private pension benefits to 2020. Researchers can also sketch how various retirement program proposals might boost or shrink benefits and change costs.
1980 — An Urban Institute Press book on national health insurance points out the advantages of state-administered insurance plans and of limits on hospital and doctors' fees. Another study shows how cities are coping with federal and state cutbacks of Medicaid.
1981 — The Institute tracks the impact of landmark Food Stamp program legislation on recipients.
1982 — The Changing Domestic Priorities project is launched to monitor and analyze how people, places, and institutions fare under the Reagan administration's policies.
1982 — As federal grants and contracts become harder to obtain in the new political climate, foundations and corporations account for most new funds. This shift also boosts research dissemination—made easier by the rapidly developing communications revolution.

1983-87 — Examining the Effects of Devolution and a Shifting Economy

The time becomes ripe for policy experimentation at all levels of government. After 40 years of growth, social services and benefits come under the scrutiny of taxpayers and legislators. Willingness to experiment expands the need for independent policy analyses. The Institute balances the roles of analyst and evaluator, getting the work out in time to inform fast-moving debates.

1983 — The Institute evaluates tax policy and scrutinizes the investment incentives built into the current tax code. Analysts find that the code favors smokestack over high-tech firms, already the economy's leading edge.
1983 — Tracking "devolution," as responsibility for the social safety net shifts from the federal to state and local governments, the Institute finds that poor states lost the most federal dollars as education funding takes the form of block grants and that program survival depends more on politics than on the size of state coffers.
1984 — As part of the Institute's assessment of sweeping policy changes under the Reagan administration, researchers give President Reagan high marks for revitalizing the national debate on policy, rebuilding military strength, making the tax system more efficient, and boosting public confidence in the presidency. But he gets low marks on developing a durable bipartisan governing coalition, bringing the poverty rate down, and containing the national debt.
1984 — The Institute publishes six guides that consolidate expertise on urban capital management. Widely used in U.S. cities, the books also are translated into Japanese and influence metropolitan Tokyo's infrastructure-reinvestment program.
1985 — The Urban Institute becomes the first to count the number of Americans without health insurance, which helps make mending this rent in the nation's social safety net a national priority.
1985 — UI researchers modify the TRIM model to assess how different groups would fare under various tax-reform proposals. Within two years, the Housing Market Simulation model covers most regions of the country. Simulations of housing market dynamics are fine-tuned for six metropolitan areas.
1987 — The Institute conducts the first credible national survey of America's homeless, giving policymakers the only reliable data on who, and how many, lack permanent shelter.
1987 — The Ford Foundation cites contributions to methodology in an evaluation of Urban Institute's first two decades.

1988-92 — Broadening Research to Address Changes in America's Social Fabric

Analytic tools for public policy research are far more sophisticated and powerful than ever. The new technology makes the job easier, but information overload sometimes clouds thinking about the nation's problems. In this new milieu, the pressure to strategically collect and interpret data and to apply our institutional knowledge to new research intensifies.

1988 — As the poverty rate climbs to 10 percent, the Institute redoubles research on poverty. Also, UI convenes nine related policy seminars that help define the nation's housing needs for the next decade and reviews proposals for meeting them.
1989 — President Bush announces he will be the "education president." With a renewed national interest in schools and learning, the Institute finds that improved schooling for workers is the government's best defense against welfare dependency and the widening income gap.
1989-90 — UI studies on older Americans call attention to the cost benefits of preventative health care and group housing with services. Researchers also remind policymakers that the elderly, as a group, are better off than the nation's children, and that nearly all domestic budget growth in the prior decade has been for Social Security and Medicare, not for programs focused on children.
1990 — At the first Roundtable on the President's Budget and the Economy, leaders from Congress, the media, government, and policy and advocacy groups take a critical look at the administration's policy and budget priorities. It becomes an annual event.
1992 — The Institute helps the Russians launch the Institute for Urban Economics in Moscow, where economists are creating a legal basis for housing reform, finding new ways to finance housing, and setting up pilot programs to put the best of these ideas into practice.
1992 — When violence rips through south Los Angeles, the Institute's research helps urban officials understand what is happening, why, and what might bring more opportunity and safer streets to inner-city residents.
1992 — UI conducts press and legislative briefings on tax policy changes over the previous decade and holds workshops on growing income inequality, urban antipoverty strategies, and ways to nurture young African-American men.

1993-97 — The Information Age Spurs Research on Efficiency and Impacts

The call for "reinventing government" gives the Institute a chance to build on proven strengths: performance measurement and managing for results. As states become incubators for innovation, researchers work locally to evaluate pilot projects, design data systems, consider costs, compare best practices, and monitor progress.

1993 — UI advises Vice President Gore's National Performance Review Board on performance indicators and other methodologies for calibrating and measuring government's performance.
1993 — The Federal Government Performance and Results Act embodies administrative principles developed by the Institute and a handful of other research organizations.
1993-96 — Federal "waivers" from health care and welfare rules proliferate. One study examines initiatives in nine states using Medicaid funds to expand insurance coverage and health services. Early results indicate that states can gear up quickly to cover uninsured groups and to switch beneficiaries to managed care, but that such changes must be phased in to minimize confusion. Study demonstration projects in Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, Utah, and Vermont reveal how effectively states are moving welfare recipients into jobs.
1994 — UI assumes maintenance of the Federal Justice Statistics Center for the U.S. Department of Justice. Managing and integrating seven massive databases, the Institute's new Center on Justice Policy begins issuing statistical reports, including the annual Compendium of Federal Justice Statistics, and answering congressional requests for rapid analyses.
1996 — The Institute receives a grant to deepen understanding of nonprofit and philanthropic organizations, and to build and share databases tracking their activities and evolution. The Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy is created to house this multi-pronged work.
1996 — Following passage of landmark welfare reform, the Institute undertakes its biggest research project yet—Assessing the New Federalism—to monitor and analyze the well-being of American children and families as states assume more responsibility for health care, income security, social services, and job-training programs for low-income Americans.

1998-2002 — Unmasking Social Stresses that Persist in Good Times — and Bad

An exuberant stock market, low unemployment, and consumer confidence influence social policy in the late 1990s. Political debate centers on what to do with surplus revenues. Tax relief is one answer promoted by the successful presidential candidate in the 2000 election. Yet, just one year later, the economy's strongest expansion ends, unemployment rises, and state revenues start a downward slide.

1998 - Research on the nation's capitol city ranges widely. A study of healthcare services for low-income and elderly D.C. residents finds that those groups over-rely on nursing homes and hospitals. The Institute warns-accurately, as it turns out-that rapid changes in the healthcare marketplace could threaten the survival of Washington's safety net hospitals unless the D.C. government develops and enforces a policy on caring for the city's many uninsured.
2000 - We completed work on our comprehensive nonprofit database-the nation's largest resource on the not-for-profit sector, with some 400 dimensions detailed for each organization.
2001 - The Tax Policy Center is launched with the Brookings Institution to inject facts, objective analyses, and clearheaded perspectives into the often divisive, ideologically driven debate over tax policy. Using an upgraded tax model, the tax experts test and compare the impacts of various tax policies and proposals.
2001 - Another new initiative starts, this one on prisoner reentry. UI researchers examine the challenge of helping some 1600 former inmates per day reestablish themselves in their families and communities, and find jobs. This work complements our research on drug courts, domestic violence, sentencing practices, teen curfews, the gun market, and at-risk youth.
2001 - In the wake of September 11th, the Institute helps shape the national debate over an economic stimulus package.
2002 - Assessing the New Federalism begins preparing for Congress' renewal of landmark welfare-reform legislation. Researchers release their findings on reform's impact on incomes, family structure, welfare-to-work, immigration, childcare subsidies, health care coverage, and other issues in a book, Welfare Reform: The Next Act.
2002 - Wide-ranging work on children's welfare and vulnerable populations turns up critical findings. For instance, nearly two-thirds of children in care live with relatives who aren't their parents. UI researchers begin evaluating this new trend, called "kinship care."

2003-2007 — Offering New Policy Ideas Amid an Economic and Demographic Shift

In 2003, federal revenues relative to GDP fell to their lowest level since 1950. Persistent budget deficits meant figuring out how to do more with less—fiscal pressures that will only continue as the population ages and demands more of Social Security and Medicare. Our research helped policymakers identify the nation's most urgent needs and craft solutions. We responded quickly to such sudden crises as the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and continued our work on long-standing problems from rising health care costs to child welfare to tax fairness.

2003 - The Urban Institute Press publication of Federalism and Health Policy caps five years of broad-ranging work on how health care for low-income people is financed. The book also lays out our systemic reforms aimed at solvency and efficiency.
2003 - An Urban Institute annual report on housing conditions and trends in the District and its suburbs finds that, after decades of decline, demand for housing is rebounding, and new homes are being built. This turnabout is helping revitalize many of the city's neighborhoods but also squeezes low-income residents.
2005 - We pooled our expertise to address the challenge of rebuilding New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. We offered policymakers critical assessments and innovative strategies on health care, education, housing, employment, culture, social services, and federal-state relations.
2006 - We launched the National Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research (CALDER) to mine the new, rich state databases emerging out of the education accountability movement. Our work offers new insights into school policies and student achievement.
2006 - Our proposals on health insurance reform contributed to Massachusetts' experiment with universal health care coverage. A year later, we found that the number of uninsured had fallen by nearly half and employer-sponsored coverage hasn't shrunk. Access to health care has increased and financial burdens and medical debt have dropped.
2007 - We wrapped up our seven-year Hope VI study, tracking relocated residents of housing developments slated for demolition and revitalization. While many former residents are living in safer neighborhoods, others are still stuck in distressed public housing-a finding that underscores the need to continue seeking solutions.
2007 - Ned Gramlich's Urban Institute Press book Subprime Mortgages: America's Latest Boom and Bust examines the origin and consequences of the subprime mortgage market. The book, a bestseller in its third printing, became an indispensable resource for policymakers and the press trying to make sense of the subprime crisis. Several of Gramlich's recommendations were adopted by the Federal Reserve Board to tighten mortgage-lending standards.