Latest Urban Institute Reports

Eighteen education policy experts put the past decade's surge in high-school reform efforts to the test in Saving America's High Schools from the Urban Institute Press. Led by coeditors Becky Smerdon and Kathryn Borman, the team of authors size up national reform trends and draw on at least five years of research in Baltimore, New York City, Chicago, Ohio, and North Carolina.

The National Foreclosure Mitigation Counseling (NFMC) program is a special federal appropriation, administered by NeighborWorks America, that is designed to support a rapid expansion of foreclosure intervention counseling in response to the nationwide foreclosure crisis. This report presents the results of preliminary analyses that attempt to measure the effects of the NFMC program on counseled homeowners. Overall, our analysis suggests that the program is having its intended effect of helping homeowners facing loss of their homes through foreclosure.

Short time compensation (STC or work sharing) is a labor adjustment measure designed to reduce or eliminate reliance on layoffs when firms need to reduce hours worked. It spreads the reduction in hours among a wide pool of workers and provides partial unemployment compensation (UC) for the reduced hours. This paper examines STC with attention to experiences in Canada and Germany as well as the United States. It also suggests ways to increase STC use in the United States.

George Galster explains how children are harmed by growing up in predominantly poor neighborhoods. He also recommends ways to improve federal and state housing programs to avoid high concentrations of poverty. George Galster is an Urban Institute Affiliated Scholar and the Clarence B. Hilberry Professor of Urban Affairs at Wayne State University.

This brief examines the characteristics of the children who were eligible for Medicaid/CHIP in 2007. The results show that while participation rates were high in both Medicaid and CHIP, some 5 million remained uninsured despite being eligible for coverage. Participation rates, which were found to vary across areas, have likely increased given recent declines in the number of uninsured children. The brief also shows that while interest in public coverage is high among low-income parents, many do not know not know that their child is eligible for Medicaid/CHIP, do not know how to apply, and/or find the application process difficult.

This policy brief summarizes the findings of a larger report on racial-ethnic diversity in California's nonprofit sector (see www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=411977). It documents the extent to which California's nonprofit boards, staff, and executive leadership are racially and ethnically diverse, and analyzes diversity by an organization's size, type, funding patterns, and geographic location within the state. The brief examines how California nonprofits with diverse leadership have been affected by the current economic downturn, and presents three models for measuring diversity using different definitions of organizational diversity.

Decisionmakers in California and across the country are facing critical challenges related to diversity. But until now, there has not been a comprehensive picture of how California's nonprofit sector has responded to this demographic transition. This report, based on a representative sample of California's 501(c)(3) organizations, documents the extent to which California's nonprofit boards, staff, and executive leadership are racially and ethnically diverse. It analyzes diversity by an organization's size, type, funding patterns, and geographic location within the state, and examines how California nonprofits with diverse leadership have been affected by the current economic downturn. The report also presents three models for measuring diversity using different definitions of organizational diversity.

Latinos, California's largest minority population, are the most underrepresented group of color in the state's nonprofit sector, according to the first systematic study of racial and ethnic diversity in California's nonprofits.

Many families with moderate earnings pay 20 percent or more of their income for health insurance. By Congressional Budget Office estimates, a family making $54,000 a year can expect a moderate-cost insurance policy to cost about $14,700 in 2016. True, employers often contribute a big chunk of the total. But most economists believe that the family really pays by accepting lower cash wages.

The Washington Times. America's days of economic dominance are numbered because we don't save. The government is borrowing like crazy, and households aren't doing much better. The personal savings rate -- the share of after-tax income that people set aside for a rainy day -- has been falling like a stone since the early 1980s.