Research

Published Research
Education

Head Start Origins and Impacts

Authors: Chloe Gibbs, Jens Ludwig, Douglas L. Miller ed., Martha J. Bailey, Sheldon Danziger

Many believe that the War on Poverty, launched by President Johnson in 1964, ended in failure. In 2010, the official poverty rate was 15 percent, almost as high as when the War on Poverty was declared. Historical and contemporary accounts often portray the War on Poverty as a costly experiment that created doubts about the ability of public policies to address complex social problems.

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Published Research

The Diffusion of Policy Diffusion Research in Political Science

Authors: Craig Volden, Erin R. Graham, Charles R. Shipan

Over the past fifty years, top political science journals have published hundreds of articles about policy diffusion. This article reports on network analyses of how the ideas and approaches in these articles have spread both within and across the subfields of American politics, comparative politics and international relations.

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Published Research

The Effects of California's Paid Family Leave Program on Mothers' Leave-Taking and Subsequent Labor Market Outcomes

Authors: Christopher J. Ruhm, Maya Rossin-Slater, Jane Waldfogel

This analysis uses March Current Population Survey data from 1999-2010 and a differences-in-differences approach to examine how California’s first in the nation paid family leave (PFL) program affected leave-taking by mothers following childbirth, as well as subsequent labor market outcomes. We obtain robust evidence that the California program more than doubled the overall use of maternity leave, increasing it from around three to six or seven weeks for the typical new mother – with particularly large growth for less advantaged groups. 

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