In the News - 2008

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The attitude in both the executive and legislative branches is reminiscent of the approach to the vicissitudes of life championed by Alfred E. Neuman of Mad Magazine: "What, me worry?" As a nation, we have entered the age of Alfred E. Neuman budgeting.

Washington Times
“What, me worry?”
April 7, 2008
By Bill Frenzel and Ron Haskins


HUGH PRICE: It's often said that blacks are canaries in the coalmine. It's what has happened to the children of the black middle class merely an early warning sign of broader dysfunction in the system that will begin to spread.

CNN
March 23, 2008 Sunday
SHOW: CNN SUNDAY MORNING 9:00 AM EST
Troubled U.S. Economy
and
March 21, 2008 Friday
SHOW: LOU DOBBS TONIGHT 7:00 PM EST

Having unmarried parents can be devastating for children who start out with no cushion in life. In 1999 congressional testimony, Isabel Sawhill of the Brookings Institution said that the increase in single-parent families—mostly due to unwed motherhood in the past few decades—"can account for virtually all of the increase in child poverty since 1970." A recent study found that the stress of early childhood poverty can literally damage developing brains.

Slate
“… And Baby Makes Two: Forget Juno. Out-of-wedlocks births are a national catastrophe”
March 20, 2008


To understand Canada's unique and vulnerable position, this week also gave us a handy new study by Julia Isaacs, Isabel Sawhill and Ron Haskins of the Washington-based Brookings Institution. They look at economic mobility - that is, the chances of escaping your economic circumstances.

According to a number of comprehensive studies analyzed by the authors, the United States, Britain and France have low rates of intergenerational mobility - that is, if you're born in the bottom rung of the ladder in those countries, you're more likely to stay there.

Globe and Mail (Canada)
March 1, 2008
“A taxing burden on Canada's 'American Dream'”

 A man in his 30s today has 12 percent less income, after adjusting for inflation, than a similarly aged American male did a generation ago, according to a study last year by Isabell Sawhill of the Brookings Institution and John Morton of the Pew Charitable Trusts.

National Journal's CongressDaily
February 28, 2008
“Balance of Payments: Homeland Insecurity”

 The increasing prevalence of unequal access to higher education for poor and minority students is contributing to a decrease in their economic and social mobility, concludes a study by three researchers at the Washington-based Brookings Institution, a public-policy think tank.

Education Week
“Education and Earning”
February 27, 2008

 According to research by the Brookings Institution, a respected Washington think-tank, social mobility is less likely in the next generation than it was in the 1950s and 1960s.

BBC News.com
February 23, 2008
“Fading mobility troubles Americans”

 "For the middle class and on down, their wealth has increased primarily because of housing value. So what is happening today is something to be concerned about," said Ron Haskins

Chicago Tribune
February 20, 2008
“Housing mess threatens to widen income gap”

''A growing difference in education levels between income and racial groups, especially in college degrees, implies that mobility will be lower in the future than it is today,'' said Ron Haskins, a former Republican official and welfare expert who wrote the education section of the report.…''The American dream of opportunity is alive, but frayed,'' said Isabel Sawhill

The New York Times
February 20, 2008
“Study Says Education Gap Could Further Limit Poor”

The bitter truth is they are a small minority. Too small to move the numbers, like the statistics compiled by Julia Isaacs of the Brookings Institution, in a 30-year-long Economic Mobility Project. Results of this long-term inter-generational economic mobility report are now out, and they are not favorable. They show that despite the gains of families we all know have succeeded against the odds, so many more aren't succeeding at all.

The Atlanta Tribune Magazine
February 2008
“A Devolving Generation”

Childhood obesity is one of the most urgent and serious health threats confronting our nation. During the last four decades, obesity rates have soared nearly fivefold among children between the ages of 6 and 11. More than one-third of children and adolescents are overweight or obese. As the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation warns, if our nation fails to reverse this ominous trend, we're in danger of raising the first generation of American children who will live sicker and die younger than the generation before them.
-Hugh Price and Oliver Sloman

Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Texas)
February 4, 2008
“Mobilizing to battle obesity among children”

Smiles are important, but so is discipline, according to Ron Haskins, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, a Washington D.C.-based public policy institute.

Manhattan Times
January 10, 2008
“Planting opportunity: Program uplifts welfare recipients”

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