Showing papers in "Journal of Policy Analysis and Management in 2010"
TL;DR: This article conducted a meta-regression analysis of all econometric studies examining privatization of water distribution and solid waste collection services and found no systematic support for lower costs with private production.
Abstract: Privatization of local government services is assumed to deliver cost savings, but empirical evidence for this from around the world is mixed. We conduct a meta-regression analysis of all econometric studies examining privatization of water distribution and solid waste collection services and find no systematic support for lower costs with private production. Differences in study results are explained by differences in time period of the analyses, service characteristics, and policy environment. We do not find a genuine empirical effect of cost savings resulting from private production. The results suggest that to ensure cost savings, more attention be given to the cost characteristics of the service, the transaction costs involved, and the policy environment stimulating competition, rather than to the debate over public versus private delivery of these services. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
420 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the principal-agent model is used as a focal theoretical frame for synthesizing what we know, both theoretically and empirically, about the design and dynamics of the implementation of performance management systems in the public sector.
Abstract: We use the principal-agent model as a focal theoretical frame for synthesizing what we know, both theoretically and empirically, about the design and dynamics of the implementation of performance management systems in the public sector. In this context, we review the growing body of evidence about how performance measurement and incentive systems function in practice and how individuals and organizations respond and adapt to them over time, drawing primarily on examples from performance measurement systems in public education and social welfare programs. We also describe a dynamic framework for performance measurement systems that takes into account strategic behavior of individuals over time, learning about production functions and individual responses, accountability pressures, and the use of information about the relationship of measured performance to value added. Implications are discussed and recommendations derived for improving public sector performance measurement systems. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
249 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigate measures of poverty that rely on indicators of household net worth and provide fresh cross-national evidence based on data from the Luxembourg Wealth Study, and assess two approaches: incom e-net worth m easures and asset-poverty.
Abstract: Poverty is generally defined as incom e or expenditure insufficiency, but the econom ic condition of a household also depends on its r eal and financial asset holdings. T his paper investigates measures of poverty that rely on indicators of household net worth. W e review and assess two m ain approaches followed in th e literature: incom e-net worth m easures and asset-poverty. We provide fresh cross-national evidence based on data from the Luxembourg Wealth Study.
249 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors use non-monetary indicators of deprivation to understand how poverty and social exclusion arise and how to identify those experiencing poverty and understand how it comes about, both in framing the question and in empirical application.
Abstract: Non-monetary indicators of deprivation are now widely used in studying poverty in Europe. While measuring financial resources remains central, having reliable information about material deprivation adds to the ability to capture poverty and social exclusion. Non-monetary indicators can help improve the identification of those experiencing poverty and understand how it comes about. They are most productively used when multidimensionality is explicitly taken into account, both in framing the question and in empirical application. While serious methodological and measurement issues remain to be addressed, material deprivation indicators allow for new insights in making poverty comparisons across countries and analyzing changes over time. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
217 citations
TL;DR: The authors found that having a classmate with an emotional problem decreases reading and math scores at the end of kindergarten and first grade by over 10 percent of a standard deviation, which is one-third to one-half of the minority test score gap.
Abstract: Over the last decade, the federal government has directed schools to provide educational instruction for students with special needs in general education settings to the extent possible. While there is mixed evidence on the effects of these inclusion policies on the students with special needs, research examining potential spillovers of inclusion on non-disabled classmates has been scarce. There is particularly little research on the effects of inclusion policies on classmates during early elementary grades. This paper begins to fill in this gap by using a nationally representative, longitudinal survey of kindergartners. Cross-sectional results suggest that having a classmate with an emotional problem decreases reading and math scores at the end of kindergarten and first grade by over 10 percent of a standard deviation, which is one-third to one-half of the minority test score gap. To control for nonrandom sorting of students to schools, as well as students to classrooms, this paper uses school-level and then student-level fixed effects. Results from the preferred empirical models suggest a decrease of approximately 5 percent of a standard deviation in math and reading scores, though the reading results are less robust. The results also indicate moderate racial and gender differences in the effects. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
132 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors analyzed the only case in which road pricing was decided by a citizen referendum on the basis of experience with a specific pricing system and found that when they have experienced first-hand the out-of-pocket costs and time savings, they are prepared to adopt freely policies that reduce congestion on urban motorways.
Abstract: Studies of the “stated preferences” of households generally report public and political opposition by urban commuters to congestion pricing. It is thought that this opposition inhibits or precludes tolls and pricing systems that would enhance efficiency in the use of scarce roadways. This paper analyzes the only case in which road pricing was decided by a citizen referendum on the basis of experience with a specific pricing system. The city of Stockholm introduced a toll system for seven months in 2006, after which citizens voted on its permanent adoption. We match precinct voting records to resident commute times and costs by traffic zone, and we analyze patterns of voting in response to economic and political incentives. We document political and ideological incentives for citizen choice, but we also find that the pattern of time savings and incremental costs exerts a powerful influence on voting behavior. In this instance, at least, citizen voters behave as if they value commute time highly. When they have experienced first-hand the out-of-pocket costs and time savings of a specific pricing scheme, they are prepared to adopt freely policies that reduce congestion on urban motorways. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
118 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigate how participation in the Early Assessment Program, which provides California high school juniors with information about their academic readiness for college-level work at California State University campuses, affects their college-going behavior and need for remediation in college.
Abstract: In this paper we investigate how participation in the Early Assessment Program, which provides California high school juniors with information about their academic readiness for college-level work at California State University campuses, affects their college-going behavior and need for remediation in college. Using administrative records from California State University,–Sacramento and the California Department of Education, we find that participation in the Early Assessment Program reduces the average student's probability of needing remediation at California State University by 6.1 percentage points in English and 4.1 percentage points in mathematics. Rather than discouraging poorly prepared students from applying to Sacramento State, EAP appears to lead students to increase their academic preparation while still in high school. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
113 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors deal with the simulation of such a policy change to sharpen the distributional picture and show that indirect taxes are in any case less progressive than other components of the tax system, making the proposed measure a regressive one.
Abstract: Shifting the tax burden from labor to consumption is proposed in many developed countries as a way to make the tax system more incentive compatible. This article deals with the simulation of such a policy change to sharpen the distributional picture. Expenditures are imputed into the EUROMOD microsimulation program. Then social security contributions are lowered and the standard VAT rate is increased to maintain government revenue neutrality. The main conclusions are that (1) indirect taxes are regressive with respect to disposable income but proportional or progressive with respect to total expenditures, and (2) indirect taxes are in any case less progressive than other components of the tax system, making the proposed measure a regressive one. A possible solution exists in increasing the progressivity of the remaining income tax. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
102 citations
TL;DR: The results may suggest that subsidized lunches induced children to attend school but displaced food consumption from other sources, and the program may have had short-run health effects that dissipated over time but that facilitated higher educational attainment.
Abstract: This paper estimates the effects of participating in the National School Lunch Program in the middle of the 20th century on adult health outcomes and educational attainment. I utilize an instrumental variables strategy that exploits a change in the formula used by the federal government to allocate funding to the states. Identification is achieved by the fact that different birth cohorts were exposed to different degrees to the original formula and the new formula, along with the fact that the change of the formula affected states differentially by per capita income. Participation in the program as a child appears to have few long-run effects on health, but the effects on educational attainment are sizable. These results may suggest that subsidized lunches induced children to attend school but displaced food consumption from other sources. Alternatively, the program may have had short-run health effects that dissipated over time but that facilitated higher educational attainment. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
102 citations
TL;DR: This paper examined how school-specific pressure associated with status and growth approaches to school accountability affect student achievement at different points in the prior-year achievement distribution, and found that the distributional effects of accountability pressure depend not only on the type of pressure for which schools are held accountable (status or growth), but also the tested subject.
Abstract: Although the federal No Child Left Behind program judges the effectiveness of schools based on their students' achievement status, many policy analysts argue that schools should be measured, instead, by their students' achievement growth. Using a 10-year student-level panel data set from North Carolina, we examine how school-specific pressure associated with status and growth approaches to school accountability affect student achievement at different points in the prior-year achievement distribution. Achievement gains for students below the proficiency cut point emerge in schools failing either type of accountability standard, with the effects clearer for math than for reading. In contrast to prior research highlighting the possibility of educational triage, we find little or no evidence that failing schools in North Carolina ignore the students far below proficiency under either approach. Importantly, we find that the status, but not the growth, approach reduces the reading achievement of higher performing students. Our analysis suggests that the distributional effects of accountability pressure depend not only on the type of pressure for which schools are held accountable (status or growth), but also the tested subject. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
100 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue on the basis of EU experience for a principle-based approach and explore the possible architecture of indicators of poverty and social exclusion in a multinational context.
Abstract: The measurement of poverty and social exclusion is analytically and operationally relevant at all levels of policymaking. Here our focus is on national governments making policy in a global or multinational context such as the European Union (EU). In this process, social indicators are playing a growing role, and we need to stand back and examine their construction and use. In this paper, we argue on the basis of EU experience for a principle-based approach and explore the possible architecture of indicators of poverty and social exclusion in a multinational context. We consider the implementation of a set of indicators and their contribution to the policy process. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: This article used an instrumental variable strategy to estimate the unbiased impact of the Governor's Teaching Fellowship (GTF) on the decisions of recipients to begin working in low-performing schools within 2 years after licensure program enrollment.
Abstract: This study capitalizes on a natural experiment that occurred in California between 2000 and 2002. In those years, the state offered a competitively allocated $20,000 incentive called the Governor's Teaching Fellowship (GTF) aimed at attracting academically talented, novice teachers to low-performing schools and retaining them in those schools for at least four years. Taking advantage of data on the career histories of 27,106 individuals who pursued California teaching licenses between 1998 and 2003, we use an instrumental variable strategy to estimate the unbiased impact of the GTF on the decisions of recipients to begin working in low-performing schools within 2 years after licensure program enrollment. We estimate that GTF recipients would have been less likely to teach in low-performing schools than observably similar counterparts had the GTF not existed, but that acquiring a GTF increased their probability of doing so by 28 percentage points. Examining retention patterns, we find that 75 percent of both GTF recipients and nonrecipients who began working in low-performing schools remained in such schools for at least four years. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: Findings imply that there may be substantial public and private benefits derived from providing additional elementary school counselors, and cross-state differences in policies provide descriptive evidence that students in states with more aggressive elementary counseling policies make greater test score gains and are less likely to report internalizing or externalizing problem behaviors.
Abstract: Recent empirical research has found that children's noncognitive skills play a critical role in their own success, young children's behavioral and psychological disorders can severely harm their future outcomes, and disruptive students harm the behavior and learning of their classmates. Yet relatively little is known about wide-scale interventions designed to improve children's behavior and mental health. This is the first nationally representative study of the provision, financing, and impact of school-site mental health services for young children. Elementary school counselors are school employees who provide mental health services to all types of students, typically meeting with students one-on-one or in small groups. Given counselors' nonrandom assignment to schools, it is particularly challenging to estimate the impact of these counselors on student outcomes. First, cross-state differences in policies provide descriptive evidence that students in states with more aggressive elementary counseling policies make greater test score gains and are less likely to report internalizing or externalizing problem behaviors compared to students with similar observed characteristics in similar schools in other states. Next, difference-in-differences estimates exploiting both the timing and the targeted grade levels of states' counseling policy changes provide evidence that elementary counselors substantially influence teachers' perceptions of school climate. The adoption of state-funded counselor subsidies or minimum counselor–student ratios reduces the fraction of teachers reporting that their instruction suffers due to student misbehavior and reduces the fractions reporting problems with students physically fighting each other, cutting class, stealing, or using drugs. These findings imply that there may be substantial public and private benefits derived from providing additional elementary school counselors.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors estimate the size and incidence of in-kind or "noncash" benefits from public housing subsidies, education, and health care for five European countries using comparable methods and data.
Abstract: International comparisons of inequality based on measures of disposable income may not be valid if the size and incidence of publicly provided in-kind benefits differ across the countries considered. The benefits that are financed by taxation in one country may need to be purchased out of disposable income in another. We estimate the size and incidence of in-kind or "noncash" benefits from public housing subsidies, education, and health care for five European countries using comparable methods and data. Inequality in the augmented income measure is dramatically lower than in disposable income, with the effects of the three components varying in importance across countries. Adapting equivalence scales to take proper account of differences in needs for health care and education across population members reduces the scale of the effect, but does not eliminate it. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: The authors study how the employment effects of enterprise zones vary with their location, implementation, and administration, based on evidence from California, using new establishment-level data and geographic mapping methods, coupled with a survey of enterprise zone administrators.
Abstract: We study how the employment effects of enterprise zones vary with their location, implementation, and administration, based on evidence from California. We use new establishment-level data and geographic mapping methods, coupled with a survey of enterprise zone administrators. Overall, the evidence indicates that enterprise zones do not increase employment. However, the evidence also suggests that the enterprise zone program has a more favorable effect on employment in zones that have a lower share of manufacturing and in zones where managers report doing more marketing and outreach activities. On the other hand, devoting more effort to helping firms get hiring tax credits reduces or eliminates any positive employment effects, which may be attributable to idiosyncrasies of California's enterprise zone program during the period we study. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: For example, this article assess the impact of the federal Pell Grant program, the G.I. Bill, and California's Cal Grant program on the net number of for-profit colleges per county.
Abstract: Concerns over rising college tuition and slow economic growth have brought renewed attention to the role of federal and state financial aid programs in opening access to education. Despite a large body of literature examining the effects of grant aid on four-year and public two-year college enrollment, for-profit colleges—particularly the vast majority that offer two-year degrees and certificates—have largely been ignored. Using panel data methods and a new administrative data set of for-profit colleges operating in California between 1989 and 2003, I assess the impact of the federal Pell Grant program, the G.I. Bill, and California's Cal Grant program on the net number of for-profit colleges per county. The results suggest that for both Pell and Cal Grants, increases in the per-student maximum award encourage for-profit entry. This relationship is particularly strong in counties with high adult poverty levels, where more students are eligible for aid. Further, these gains in the private sector do not appear to come at the expense of the public sector. Rather, public community colleges also experience enrollment gains as the generosity of Pell and Cal Grants increases, although this reaction appears to be weaker than the reaction of for-profits. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the impact of phone and Internet-based claiming on overall UI take-up, and found that the introduction of phone-and Internetbased claiming did not have an appreciable impact on overall UIs' takeup, nor did it lead to a shift toward recipients that are higher income or likely to be receiving the maximum benefit amount.
Abstract: Application inconvenience is one popular explanation for why many individuals do not receive the social benefits for which they are eligible. Applications take time and some individuals may decide that the financial benefits do not outweigh these time costs. This paper investigates this explanation using cross-state variation in administrative changes that made applying for unemployment insurance (UI) benefits substantially more convenient over the past decade. We find that the introduction of phone- and Internet-based claiming did not have an appreciable impact on overall UI take-up, nor did it lead to a shift toward recipients that are higher income or likely to be receiving the maximum benefit amount. These findings are inconsistent with a time- and transaction-cost explanation for low take-up, since remote UI claiming is less time intensive. This suggests that reducing application barriers alone may not be an effective tool for increasing program participation. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: This article analyzed the success of the conservation movement at holding referenda in areas with greater ecological value and greater likelihood of supporting conservation, finding that over three-quarters of the more than 1,550 U.S. referenda targeting open space passed.
Abstract: From 1998 to 2006, over three-quarters of the more than 1,550 U.S. referenda targeting open space passed. We analyze the success of the conservation movement at holding referenda in areas with greater ecological value and greater likelihood of supporting conservation. To do so, we first analyze the patterns in where referenda are held and in which finance mechanisms they employ. Controlling for these two selection patterns, we then investigate the factors determining the success of the referenda. Our findings suggest that conservation groups are pursuing a successful strategy, targeting communities with above-average probabilities of passing referenda and higher ecological value. Nevertheless, our results suggest that overlooked opportunities exist in minority and middle-class neighborhoods, in suburban fringe areas, and in the Southeast. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: It is found that the top 10 percent law affects flagship enrollment of Hispanic students eligible for the admission guarantee, as well as rank-eligible graduates from high schools where minority students predominate and from high Schools with the state average share of economically disadvantaged students.
Abstract: We use regression discontinuity methods on a representative survey of Texas high school seniors to discern the impact on flagship-enrollment behavior of the Texas top 10 percent law, which guarantees admission to any Texas public university to students who graduate in the top decile of their class. By comparing students at and immediately below the cut-point for automatic admission, we find that the top 10 percent law affects flagship enrollment of Hispanic students eligible for the admission guarantee, as well as rank-eligible graduates from high schools where minority students predominate and from high schools with the state average share of economically disadvantaged students. Our findings are robust to various model specifications and different bandwidth choices using local linear estimation.
TL;DR: The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) is a massive and complex data set that, in its raw form, provides information on the pounds of toxics released, rather than the risks these releases pose to human health as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) was expected to reduce health risks stemming from emissions of hazardous chemicals by increasing public pressure on polluters. However, raw TRI data fails to transmit accurate information fitted to the public's interest. TRI is a massive and complex data set that, in its raw form, provides information on the pounds of toxics released, rather than the risks these releases pose to human health, which is the true quantity of interest. Consequently, raw TRI data needs to be refined and interpreted in terms of health risks by its users, which requires analytical sophistication and substantial data processing. State governments have attempted to increase of the usefulness of the TRI to the general public via two types of policies: (1) selection and dissemination of raw TRI data for plants within the state, and (2) data processing activities producing more refined reports and further data analysis. This study assesses the effectiveness of those two policies, asking how much each contributes to the intended policy outcome of reducing health risks. Our results show that state-level data dissemination efforts lowered the total number of pounds of chemicals released, but had little effect on health risks. State-level data processing efforts, in contrast, did lead to significant reductions in health risks. We conclude that simple dissemination of the data was ineffective (and even counterproductive in some instances), and that the states' data processing efforts have played a critical role in achieving the TRI's intended policy goal by providing better information to end users. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: The Stages-of-progress methodology as mentioned in this paper identifies context-specific reasons associated with households' movements into or out of poverty, and explores the steps involved, and briefly presents key results.
Abstract: The Stages-of-Progress methodology helps identify context-specific reasons associated with households' movements into or out of poverty. Developed in 2002, it was used over the next seven years for examining the experiences of 35,567 households in 398 diverse communities of India, Kenya, Uganda, Peru, and North Carolina. This essay looks at the reasons that motivated the development of a different methodology for exploring poverty flows, explores the steps involved, and briefly presents key results. Large numbers of households have fallen into poverty in every context examined, but large numbers have also become persistently poor. Different reasons are associated, respectively, with escaping poverty and falling into poverty. Different policies are, therefore, required to deal with each of the two poverty flows. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: The authors examine the factors that have influenced a recent local policy trend in California: inclusionary zoning (IZ) programs require developers to make a certain percentage of the units within their market-rate residential developments affordable to low- or moderate-income households.
Abstract: Social scientists offer competing theories on what explains the policymaking process. These typically include economic rationalism, political competition or power struggles, and policy imitation of the kind that diffuses across spatially proximate neighbors. In this paper, we examine the factors that have influenced a recent local policy trend in California: inclusionary zoning (IZ). IZ programs require developers to make a certain percentage of the units within their market-rate residential developments affordable to low- or moderate-income households. By 2007, 68 percent of jurisdictions in the San Francisco Bay Area had adopted some type of IZ policy. We test the relative importance of economic, political, and spatial factors in explaining the rapid diffusion of IZ, across 100 cities and towns in the Bay Area. Consistent with an economic efficiency argument, results of hazard models provide some evidence that IZ is adopted in places with less affordable housing. However, political factors, such as partisan affiliation and the strength of affordable housing nonprofits, are even more robust predictors of whether or not a local government adopts IZ. There is no evidence of spatial diffusion in the case of IZ adoption; jurisdictions are not, on average, responding to the behavior of their neighbors. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: This paper examined the relationship between changes in non-custodial fathers' earnings and modifications in child support orders and found that the relationship is relatively weak and order changes are not proportional to earnings changes.
Abstract: The underlying theory behind child support guidelines implies that child support orders should change when the incomes of noncustodial parents change. This paper documents changes in noncustodial fathers' earnings over a five-year period and examines the relationship between the changes in earnings and modifications in child support orders. Using detailed longitudinal administrative data from Wisconsin, the authors examine the history of orders and earnings for fathers in couples who had their first child support ordered in 2000. A substantial proportion of fathers experience large changes in earnings, but relatively few of the associated child support orders are modified. Using discrete-time multinomial event history models that consider time-varying variables and control for censored observations, we find some evidence of changes in earnings being associated with changes in orders, all else equal, but the relationship is relatively weak and order changes are not proportional to earnings changes. The findings highlight the challenges and importance of developing policies that result in child support orders being more responsive to changes in fathers' incomes. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the noncustodial parent earned income tax credit (NCP EITC), a new type of credit recently enacted in New York and Washington, D.C. and proposed by Senator Bayh and then-Senator Obama in 2007.
Abstract: This paper examines the noncustodial parent earned income tax credit (NCP EITC), a new type of credit recently enacted in New York and Washington, D.C. and proposed by Senator Bayh and then-Senator Obama in 2007. The NCP EITC offers an earned income tax credit to low-income noncustodial parents who work and pay their full child support. This paper describes the rationale for this policy and provides national estimates of the benefits and costs of an NCP EITC under three alternative policy scenarios. It also discusses several key design and implementation issues.
TL;DR: In this paper, the effects of credit scores on residential sorting behavior using a novel mortgage industry data set combining household demographic, credit, and financial data with property location information and detailed community attribute data.
Abstract: Credit scores have a profound impact on home purchasing power and mortgage pricing, yet little is known about how credit scores influence households' residential location decisions. This study estimates the effects of credit scores on residential sorting behavior using a novel mortgage industry data set combining household demographic, credit, and financial data with property location information and detailed community attribute data. I employ the data set to estimate a discrete-choice residential sorting model. I find that credit scores significantly predict residential sorting behavior and models that do not account for credit score provide biased estimates of housing utilities for black households in particular. Simulation results show that increases in credit score are associated with increases in the consumption of higher-priced homes in more expensive school districts, higher-quality public schools, and proximity to urban/metropolitan areas. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors take advantage of a unique panel data set of all clients served by the South Carolina Department of Disabilities and Special Needs between 1999 and 2005 to investigate whether job coaching leads to stable employment in community settings.
Abstract: Providing employment-related services, including supported employment through job coaches, has been a priority in federal policy since the enactment of the Developmental Disabilities Assistance and Bill of Rights Act in 1984. We take advantage of a unique panel data set of all clients served by the South Carolina Department of Disabilities and Special Needs between 1999 and 2005 to investigate whether job coaching leads to stable employment in community settings. The data contain information on individual characteristics, such as IQ and the presence of emotional and behavioral problems, that are likely to affect both employment propensity and likelihood of receiving job coaching. Our results show that unobserved individual characteristics and endogeneity strongly bias naive estimates of the effects of job coaching. However, even after correcting for these biases, an economically and statistically significant treatment effect remains. © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.
TL;DR: It is suggested that access to SSI did not create work disincentives for noncitizen elderly women and that SSI restrictions have imposed financial hardship on those without any family support, many of whom perhaps cannot effectively increase their employment.
Abstract: This paper examined how the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, which banned Supplemental Security Income to the majority of elderly immigrants, affected their employment, retirement, and family incomes. The policy was found to be associated with a 3.5 percentage point (9.5 percent) increase in the employment and a 3.8 percentage point (7 percent) decrease in the retirement of foreign-born elderly men. Partly as a result of their employment response, SSI ineligibility and the consequent decline in SSI receipt did not have any statistically significant effects on the family incomes of elderly foreign-born men. Noncitizen elderly women, on the other hand, did not experience any increase in employment, and those without family support suffered a 10 to 17 percent decline in income. These findings suggest that access to SSI did not create work disincentives for noncitizen elderly women and that SSI restrictions have imposed financial hardship on those without any family support, many of whom perhaps cannot effectively increase their employment.