Accurate, Focused Research on Law, Technology and Knowledge Discovery Since 2002

Category Archives: Poverty

The Emoji States of America – a new way to present government data

I admit to not being and emjoi aficionado, so to make up for this apparent deficit, I offer you The Emoji States of America – via Axios Visuals Editor Lazaro Gamio: “This visualization is a modified version of Chernoff Faces, a technique that maps multiple statistical values to the features of a face. Because it’s… Continue Reading

CDC – African American Health: Creating Equal Opportunities for Health

Cunningham TJ, Croft JB, Liu Y, Lu H, Eke PI, Giles WH. Vital Signs: Racial Disparities in Age-Specific Mortality Among Blacks or African Americans — United States, 1999–2015. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. ePub: 2 May 2017. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm6617e1. “The death rate for African Americans dropped 25% from 1999-2015, but they are still more likely… Continue Reading

Companies Stashing the Most Money Overseas

24/7 Wall St – “The U.S. economic system encourages cost-cutting at every stage of business. While taxes are a yearly expense for small businesses, working families, and individuals, large U.S. companies avoid billions in taxes each year on cash held in offshore bank accounts. The current level of global wealth inequality, which is widely expected… Continue Reading

2017 Index of Global Economic Freedom

“For much of human history, most individuals have lacked economic freedom and opportunity, condemning them to poverty and deprivation. Today, we live in the most prosperous time in human history. Poverty, sicknesses, and ignorance are receding throughout the world, due in large part to the advance of economic freedom. In 2017, the principles of economic… Continue Reading

Bank Accounts for the Unbanked: Evidence from a Big Bang Experiment

Chopra, Yakshup and Prabhala, Nagpurnanand and Tantri, Prasanna L., Bank Accounts for the Unbanked: Evidence from a Big Bang Experiment (February 12, 2017).  Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2919091 “Over 2.5 billion individuals around the world are unbanked. How they can be brought into the formal financial system is a question of policy and academic interest. We… Continue Reading

Defending the Indefensible: Chairman Pai’s Lifeline Reversal Will Widen the Digital Divide

Follow up to previous posting – FCC Chairman rescinds policies and rulemaking to expand Internet service to low income households – Submitted by Benton Foundation on behalf of Gigi Sohn on February 9, 2017: “To my great surprise and delight, the recent move by the Federal Communications Commission’s new majority to revoke the designations of… Continue Reading

Research – Basic Facts about Low-Income Children in America

National Center for Children in Poverty Report January 2017 – “Among all children under 18 years in the U.S., 43 percent live in low-income families and 21 percent—approximately one in five—lives in a poor family. This means that children are overrepresented among our nation’s poor; they represent 23 percent of the population but comprise 33… Continue Reading

CRS – Social Security: The Lump – Sum Death Benefit

Via FAS – CRS report – Social Security: The Lump-Sum Death Benefit, Wayne Liou Analyst in Social Policy. February 2, 2017. “When a worker who is insured by Social Security and living with a spouse dies, the spouse is entitled to a lump-sum death benefit of $255. If there is no such spouse, the payment… Continue Reading

FCC Chairman rescinds policies and rulemaking to expand Internet service to low income households

“Last Friday, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai rescinded close to a dozen policies of the FCC, including rulemakings on expanding the program providing Internet service to low income households, rulings on several TV stations’ violations of political file rules and further restricting TV shared services and joint sales agreements. Chairman Pai also announced the… Continue Reading

Changes in Family Wealth, 1989 to 2013

Changes in Family Wealth, 1989 to 2013 – January 18, 2017 Presentation by Nadia Karamcheva, an analyst in CBO’s Microeconomic Studies Division, to the Savings and Retirement Foundation in Washington, D.C. “From 1989 to 2013, family wealth grew at significantly different rates for different segments of the U.S. population, and the distribution among the nation’s families… Continue Reading

NYT – Trump’s Health Plan Would Convert Medicaid to Block Grants

Robert Pear – Trump’s Health Plan Would Convert Medicaid to Block Grants, Aide Says – “President Trump’s plan to replace the Affordable Care Act will propose giving each state a fixed amount of federal money in the form of a block grant to provide health care to low-income people on Medicaid, a top adviser to… Continue Reading