The Roosevelt Institution
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The World in 2050
Paul Rich, President, Policy Studies Organization
The articles in this special issue of RPR are quite interesting, but doubly so because one can almost guarantee that their authors will be around in 2050 and we hope that they will follow up on their prognostications and concerns in that far time. The reason we predict that they will be around and about is not that they are all possessed of some magic elixir, but rather than they are the young members of a new policy phenomenon called the Roosevelt Institution on university campuses, a policy organization for students. --> [more]
The Renter Squeeze: Minority and Low-Income Renters Feel Pressures from Housing Boom and Weak Labor Market
Nathaniel Loewentheil, Roosevelt Instititution, and Christian E. Weller, Center for American Progress
The housing market boom over the last decade has been welcomed by most Americans as a positive economic phenomenon, with beneficial effects on families and neighborhoods. However, this housing boom, while benefiting homeowners, has hurt America's renting population, a population among which minorities and the poor are vastly overrepresented. As rents have risen, renters have been forced to commit a greater percentage of their resources to simply keeping their homes, and thus found it difficult to invest in their own properties. Steady or falling incomes have exacerbated this bind, while a worsening public education and transportation system has added to the burden, particularly for poor and minority renters. The Federal government has failed to respond to this growing crisis, instead choosing to cut or curtail major renter-assistance programs.
Hedonic Estimation and Policy Significance of the Impact of HOPE VI on Neighborhood Property Values
Edward Bair and John M. Fitzgerald, Bowdoin College
HOPE VI was designed as a program to revitalize distressed public housing. This study uses hedonic methods to test whether projects that are rebuilt with HOPE VI funds have a positive effect on surrounding property values. Comparisons are made between HOPE VI and other types of public housing programs using data on property values by census block groups from the 2000 census. We find that HOPE VI had a statistically significant positive impact on surrounding property values on the order of 8–10% for every quarter-mile closer that a housing unit was located to the development. Other public housing developments were found to have little if any effect on property values.
Voter Disenfranchisement and Policy toward Election Reforms
Anne Kiehl Friedman, Stanford University
How did poverty, race, population density, and other demographic characteristics affect disenfranchisement in the 2004 presidential election? I argue that there are two types of disenfranchisement: partisan disenfranchisement, which targets Democrats, and structural disenfranchisement, which targets members of low-status groups. Drawing demographic data from the United States census in 2000, and voting data from the secretaries of state websites, I use a negative binomial regression to correlate these variables with the incidence of voter disenfranchisement as collected by the Election Incident Reporting System, for the three "swing" states of Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, with the "safe" states of California and Texas as controls. The results of this analysis indicate that disenfranchisement increases with population density, Black population, Democratic loyalty, and as the margin of victory decreases. Income and education also correlate with an increase in reported incidents of disenfranchisement, but that likely reflects the failings of self-report data.
Policy Implications of Culturally Based Perceptions in College Choice
Jennifer A. Zimbroff, Stanford University
Capable students from disadvantaged backgrounds frequently fail to take advantage of the full range of viable college options available to them. Opportunity issues—for example, deficiencies in college and testing preparedness, in college counseling, in teacher expectations, and in knowledge about admissions and scholarships—comprise the frequently cited reasons. This article seeks to explore alternative explanations in the realms of social identity threat, values threat, collectivistic versus individualistic self-construal, group identity, and optimal distinctiveness. A five-part questionnaire, given to 85 seniors at a disadvantaged high school will ascertain the relevance of these self-defining factors in limiting college choices of disadvantaged students. The results possess significance for improving access to higher education for the disadvantaged.
Gender Role Ideologies and Marriage Promotion: State Policy Choices and Suggestions for Improvement
Deborah A. Harris and Domenico Parisi, Mississippi State University
The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) lists marriage as one of the major strategies for reducing welfare dependency among clients of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Program along with work requirements and time limits. President George W. Bush has allocated over $240 million to the individual states to create programs to promote and sustain marriages, with specific attention given to encouraging marriage among the low-income, welfare-reliant population. We suggest that this policy is based upon a specific gender ideology that seems to ignore the reality of the lives of poor women with children and may be, as some critics suggest, an attempt at "legislating patriarchy." In this work, we trace the social changes that shaped this ideology, present the options the states have taken to encourage marriage, discuss flaws in the philosophy and implementation of these policies, and provide suggestions for improving program design.
Once Upon a Time in Volcán, Costa Rica: Integrating Values into Watershed Management and Poverty Alleviation
Mollie Chapman, Stanford University
The purposes of this article are twofold. One is to make recommendations on a possible course of action for a small town in Costa Rica. The other is to examine the relationship between policy and values, in search of a method of integrating values into policy decisions that can be more broadly applied. The method uses narratives to define common values and science and economics to apply these values most efficiently. The process of defining values through narratives uses a relation-based organizing framework through which trust can be built and empowerment attained.
Orphan Living Situations in Malawi: A Comparison of Orphanages and Foster Homes
Brigitte Zimmerman, Stanford University
Orphans have become an increasingly large percentage of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa due to the AIDS epidemic. Debate ensues about more supportive living situations for these youth, with most research supporting foster homes over orphanages. This article compares these two situations in the country of Malawi, considering how the two systems meet material needs, psychosocial needs, and those needs created by the constraints of the nonprofit environment in Malawi. Interviews were conducted with 50 orphans, nine orphanage and foster system administrators, five foster and group home caregivers, five health care workers, and five community members. All interviewees were asked questions about the children's routine, educational experience, residence characteristics, responsibilities, free time, health care, and future prospects. Administrators and parents were also queried about the management and organization of the programs, and health care workers were asked additional questions about the orphans' health care and supplies for it. It was found that Malawian orphans placed in orphanages have an advantage over those placed in foster homes along the dimensions of lodging, health care, food quantity and variety, clothing, and school supplies. Additionally, children in orphanages have more autonomy, and have a broader concept of their future potential. Orphanage residents view their caregivers as compassionate and loving. Finally, it was found that orphanages are more efficient in providing care and at exchanging information with other organizations. They are also easier to replicate for use in other areas than are community-based programs. The article concludes with a discussion of the policy implications of these findings and directions for future research.
Effects of Exchange Rate Regime on IMF Program Participation
Robert Trudel, Yale University
This article investigates the effect of a domestic policy choice, the exchange rate regime, on countries' interaction with an international institution, their participation in International Monetary Fund (IMF) lending agreements. I hypothesize that the effect of the level of international reserves on a country's probability of participation in an IMF program depends on the exchange rate regime. A low level of international reserves threatens unfavorable economic and political outcomes only in countries that maintain a fixed exchange rate regime. The level of reserves may thus be a significant determinant of participation in IMF programs only for countries that maintain a fixed exchange rate regime. I use a dynamic univariate probit model of IMF program participation to assess empirically the effect of reserves in countries that maintain fixed, intermediate, and floating exchange rate regimes. The empirical results support my hypothesis: reserves have a significant effect only in countries that maintain a fixed exchange rate.
Acknowledgements
First, we would like to express our gratitude to David Merchant, Paul Rich and the Policy Studies Organization for giving the Roosevelt Institution this opportunity. Second, we would like to thank the following individuals for their innumerable contributions without which this special issue of Review of Policy Research would not have been possible. For your faith and service you have our deepest gratitude.
Daniel Appelman
Jared Bernstein
Chris Breiseth
Sophia Brill
Dan Carol
Diane Chin
Andrew Cox
Chrissie Coxon
Helen Danilenko
John Donohue
Albert Fang
Ted Fertik
Leslie Finger
John Gedmark
Dani Gilbert
David and Nancy Grant
Morris Graves
Scott Grinsell
Lisa Seitz Gruwell
Carol Heimer
Kevin Hilke
Mary Hughes
Mattie Hutton
Margot Isman
Suzanne Kahn
Kapil Kulkarni
Nate Loewentheil
Stephan Loewentheil
Hon. Zoe Lofgren
Nick Moscow
Milton Podolsky
Vilas Rao
Andy and Deborah Rappaport
Anne Eleanor Roosevelt
Steven Rosenzweig
Stanley Sheinbaum
Jessica Singleton
Melissa Sterry
Mark Steitz
Arthur Stinchcombe
Kai Stinchcombe
Michelle Suski
Dorothy Vanderbeck
Quinn Wilhelmi
Lauren Young