Robert A Moffitt
Biographic Data
| ID | 1115489 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Robert A Moffitt |
| GIVEN NAMES | Robert A |
| FAMILY NAME | Moffitt |
| SIGNATURE | MOFFITT R A |
| AFFILIATIONS | Johns Hopkins University |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 97 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 22 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1979 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
The Effect of the Covid-19 Pandemic Recession on Less Educated Women’s Human Capital
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in major declines in employment of women. We provide projections of impacts of this reduction on less educated women’s future human capital framed within the traditional Mincerian model. We find that wage losses one year out from 2020 are relatively modest on average, generally less than 1%, with the largest for married women without children in the home. But losses are greater for young married women, mothers with …
Entitlements
A combination of demographic aging and diversification, volatile business cycle conditions, stagnant real wages, declining employment, and policy choices have increased the need to examine the adequacy of the U.S. social safety net. Is it accomplishing what it is designed to do? Can it weather a fiscal storm? Current "entitlement" programs are in almost all cases providing important assistance to U.S. families and are improving families' well-bei…
In Defense of the NSF Economics Program
The NSF Economics program funds basic research in economics across all its disparate fields. Its budget has experienced a long period of stagnation and decline, with its real value in 2013 below that in 1980 and having declined by 50 percent as a percent of the total NSF budget. The number of grants made by the program has also declined over time, and its current budget is very small compared to that of many other funders of economic research. Ov…
Welfare and Work
The Deserving Poor, the Family, and the U.S. Welfare System
Contrary to the popular view that the U.S. welfare system has been in a contractionary phase after the expansions of the welfare state in the 1960s, welfare spending resumed steady growth after a pause in the 1970s. However, although aggregate spending is higher than ever, there have been redistributions away from non-elderly and nondisabled families to families with older adults and to families with recipients of disability programs; from non-el…
Contrasting Calculations of Marginal Tax Rates
The Great Recession and the Social Safety Net
The social safety net responded in significant and favorable ways during the Great Recession. Aggregate per capita expenditures in safety net programs grew significantly, with particularly strong growth in the SNAP, EITC, UI, and Medicaid programs. The increase in transfers was widely shared across demographic groups, including families with and without children, and single-parent and two-parent families. Transfers grew as well among families wit…
Introduction to the Symposium on the Econometrics of Matching
February 01 2004 Introduction to the Symposium on the Econometrics of Matching Robert A. Moffitt Robert A. Moffitt Johns Hopkins University Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Robert A. Moffitt Johns Hopkins University Online ISSN: 1530-9142 Print ISSN: 0034-6535 © 2004 President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology2004 The Review of Economics an…
The Role of Randomized Field Trials in Social Science Research
One of the areas of policy research where randomized field trials have been utilized most intensively is welfare reform. Starting in the late 1960s with experimental tests of a negative income tax and continuingthrough current experimental tests of recent welfare reforms, randomized evaluations have played a strong and increasing role in informing policy. This article reviews the record of these experiments and assesses the implications of that r…
Understanding Poverty
Mothers' Transitions from Welfare to Work and the Well-Being of Preschoolers and Adolescents
Results from a longitudinal study of 2402 low-income families during the recent unprecedented era of welfare reform suggest that mothers' transitions off welfare and into employment are not associated with negative outcomes for preschoolers (ages 2 to 4 years) or young adolescents (ages 10 to 14 years). Indeed, no significant associations with mothers' welfare and employment transitions were found for preschoolers, and the dominant pattern was al…
The Negative Income Tax and the Evolution of U.S. Welfare Policy
The negative income tax proposed by Milton Friedman represents one of the fundamental ideas of modern welfare policy. However, the academic literature has raised two difficulties with it, one challenging its purported work incentives and the other suggesting the possible superiority of work requirements. In addition, work requirement approaches have gained ground in actual U.S. welfare policy over the last 30 years and the number of different pro…
Trends in the Transitory Variance of Earnings in the United States
We decompose the rise in cross-sectional variance of male annual earnings in the United States from 1969 to 1996 into permanent and transitory components. We find that the variance of permanent earnings began rising in the the late 1970s and has continued to rise in the 1980s. The variance of transitory earnings also rose in the 1980s but declined in the 1990s. There are lags in the earnings process which require a structural model to pinpoint th…
Policy Interventions, Low-Level Equilibria, and Social Interactions
several years has seen a revival. Unfortunately, little progress has been made on empirical estimation of such interactions and testing for their presence, on the development of policy interventions which work through social interactions, or on the evaluation of such interventions because several basic identification and estimation problems have not been seriously confronted. Nevertheless
Beyond single mothers
We investigate the extent and implications of cohabitation and marriage among U.S. welfare recipients. An analysis of four data sets (the Current Population Survey, the National Survey of Families and Households, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth) shows significant numbers of cohabitors among recipients of AFDC. An even more surprising finding is the large number of married women on welfare. We also…
It Takes a Nation
Health Care Coverage for Children Who Are on and off Welfare
Access to adequate health insurance is a key concern of families with children at all income levels. Since 1965, mothers and children on welfare have had health care coverage through the Medicaid program, which has provided a health care safety net for welfare recipients. Although most Americans are insured through their employers, families who leave welfare for employment often find themselves in jobs that do not offer health care coverage, addi…
The effect of employment and training programs on entry and exit from the welfare caseload
To policymakers, the major attraction of employment and training programs for welfare recipients is that they hold out the prospect that recipients can be moved off the rolls and to self-sufficiency in the private labor market, thereby decreasing welfare costs and caseloads. This article considers the possibility that such programs may also affect the attractiveness of welfare in the first place, either by making welfare less desirable because th…
Cohort Trends in the Lifetime Distribution of Female Family Headship in the United States, 1968–1985
We use the PSID Relationship File to estimate cohort trends in the lifetime incidence and duration of female family headship. Hazard (event-history) techniques are used to estimate movements into and out of headship, accounting for duration dependence and left-censored spells. The mean number of years spent in headship between ages 14 and 59 rose dramatically over the period. The increase arose from an increased number of headship spells, includi…
Welfare and Work Incentives
The Uses of Tobit Analysis
In this paper authors point out that the coefficients obtained from using Tobit-here called beta coefficients - provide more information than is commonly realized. In particular, authors show that Tobit can be used to determine both changes in the probability of being above the limit and changes in the value of the dependent variable if it is already above the limit$ and authors show that this decomposition can be quantified in rather useful and …
The Labor Market Replacement Effect of a Negative Income Tax
Tests the hypothesis that the negative effect of a negative income tax (NIT) on employment and output is muted to the extent that those who reduce their work effort are replaced by the unemployed. Factors that determine the size of the replacement effect; Explanation of the minimum impact of NIT on aggregate employment and output or on the rate of inflation at high levels of unemployment; Influence of the elasticity of labor demand on employment.…
The Great Recession and the Social Safety Net
The social safety net responded in significant and favorable ways during the Great Recession. Aggregate per capita expenditures in safety net programs grew significantly, with particularly strong growth in the SNAP, EITC, UI, and Medicaid programs. The increase in transfers was widely shared across demographic groups, including families with and without children, and single-parent and two-parent families. Transfers grew as well among families wit…
Beyond single mothers
We investigate the extent and implications of cohabitation and marriage among U.S. welfare recipients. An analysis of four data sets (the Current Population Survey, the National Survey of Families and Households, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth) shows significant numbers of cohabitors among recipients of AFDC. An even more surprising finding is the large number of married women on welfare. We also…
Trends in the Transitory Variance of Earnings in the United States
We decompose the rise in cross-sectional variance of male annual earnings in the United States from 1969 to 1996 into permanent and transitory components. We find that the variance of permanent earnings began rising in the the late 1970s and has continued to rise in the 1980s. The variance of transitory earnings also rose in the 1980s but declined in the 1990s. There are lags in the earnings process which require a structural model to pinpoint th…
Cohort Trends in the Lifetime Distribution of Female Family Headship in the United States, 1968–1985
We use the PSID Relationship File to estimate cohort trends in the lifetime incidence and duration of female family headship. Hazard (event-history) techniques are used to estimate movements into and out of headship, accounting for duration dependence and left-censored spells. The mean number of years spent in headship between ages 14 and 59 rose dramatically over the period. The increase arose from an increased number of headship spells, includi…
The Role of Randomized Field Trials in Social Science Research
One of the areas of policy research where randomized field trials have been utilized most intensively is welfare reform. Starting in the late 1960s with experimental tests of a negative income tax and continuingthrough current experimental tests of recent welfare reforms, randomized evaluations have played a strong and increasing role in informing policy. This article reviews the record of these experiments and assesses the implications of that r…
Health Care Coverage for Children Who Are on and off Welfare
Access to adequate health insurance is a key concern of families with children at all income levels. Since 1965, mothers and children on welfare have had health care coverage through the Medicaid program, which has provided a health care safety net for welfare recipients. Although most Americans are insured through their employers, families who leave welfare for employment often find themselves in jobs that do not offer health care coverage, addi…
Entitlements
A combination of demographic aging and diversification, volatile business cycle conditions, stagnant real wages, declining employment, and policy choices have increased the need to examine the adequacy of the U.S. social safety net. Is it accomplishing what it is designed to do? Can it weather a fiscal storm? Current "entitlement" programs are in almost all cases providing important assistance to U.S. families and are improving families' well-bei…
The Labor Market Replacement Effect of a Negative Income Tax
Tests the hypothesis that the negative effect of a negative income tax (NIT) on employment and output is muted to the extent that those who reduce their work effort are replaced by the unemployed. Factors that determine the size of the replacement effect; Explanation of the minimum impact of NIT on aggregate employment and output or on the rate of inflation at high levels of unemployment; Influence of the elasticity of labor demand on employment.…
The Uses of Tobit Analysis
In this paper authors point out that the coefficients obtained from using Tobit-here called beta coefficients - provide more information than is commonly realized. In particular, authors show that Tobit can be used to determine both changes in the probability of being above the limit and changes in the value of the dependent variable if it is already above the limit$ and authors show that this decomposition can be quantified in rather useful and …
Cohort Trends in the Lifetime Distribution of Female Family Headship in the United States, 1968–1985
We use the PSID Relationship File to estimate cohort trends in the lifetime incidence and duration of female family headship. Hazard (event-history) techniques are used to estimate movements into and out of headship, accounting for duration dependence and left-censored spells. The mean number of years spent in headship between ages 14 and 59 rose dramatically over the period. The increase arose from an increased number of headship spells, includi…
Welfare and Work Incentives
The effect of employment and training programs on entry and exit from the welfare caseload
To policymakers, the major attraction of employment and training programs for welfare recipients is that they hold out the prospect that recipients can be moved off the rolls and to self-sufficiency in the private labor market, thereby decreasing welfare costs and caseloads. This article considers the possibility that such programs may also affect the attractiveness of welfare in the first place, either by making welfare less desirable because th…
Health Care Coverage for Children Who Are on and off Welfare
Access to adequate health insurance is a key concern of families with children at all income levels. Since 1965, mothers and children on welfare have had health care coverage through the Medicaid program, which has provided a health care safety net for welfare recipients. Although most Americans are insured through their employers, families who leave welfare for employment often find themselves in jobs that do not offer health care coverage, addi…
Beyond single mothers
We investigate the extent and implications of cohabitation and marriage among U.S. welfare recipients. An analysis of four data sets (the Current Population Survey, the National Survey of Families and Households, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth) shows significant numbers of cohabitors among recipients of AFDC. An even more surprising finding is the large number of married women on welfare. We also…
It Takes a Nation
Policy Interventions, Low-Level Equilibria, and Social Interactions
several years has seen a revival. Unfortunately, little progress has been made on empirical estimation of such interactions and testing for their presence, on the development of policy interventions which work through social interactions, or on the evaluation of such interventions because several basic identification and estimation problems have not been seriously confronted. Nevertheless
Trends in the Transitory Variance of Earnings in the United States
We decompose the rise in cross-sectional variance of male annual earnings in the United States from 1969 to 1996 into permanent and transitory components. We find that the variance of permanent earnings began rising in the the late 1970s and has continued to rise in the 1980s. The variance of transitory earnings also rose in the 1980s but declined in the 1990s. There are lags in the earnings process which require a structural model to pinpoint th…
Mothers' Transitions from Welfare to Work and the Well-Being of Preschoolers and Adolescents
Results from a longitudinal study of 2402 low-income families during the recent unprecedented era of welfare reform suggest that mothers' transitions off welfare and into employment are not associated with negative outcomes for preschoolers (ages 2 to 4 years) or young adolescents (ages 10 to 14 years). Indeed, no significant associations with mothers' welfare and employment transitions were found for preschoolers, and the dominant pattern was al…
The Negative Income Tax and the Evolution of U.S. Welfare Policy
The negative income tax proposed by Milton Friedman represents one of the fundamental ideas of modern welfare policy. However, the academic literature has raised two difficulties with it, one challenging its purported work incentives and the other suggesting the possible superiority of work requirements. In addition, work requirement approaches have gained ground in actual U.S. welfare policy over the last 30 years and the number of different pro…
Introduction to the Symposium on the Econometrics of Matching
February 01 2004 Introduction to the Symposium on the Econometrics of Matching Robert A. Moffitt Robert A. Moffitt Johns Hopkins University Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Robert A. Moffitt Johns Hopkins University Online ISSN: 1530-9142 Print ISSN: 0034-6535 © 2004 President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology2004 The Review of Economics an…
The Role of Randomized Field Trials in Social Science Research
One of the areas of policy research where randomized field trials have been utilized most intensively is welfare reform. Starting in the late 1960s with experimental tests of a negative income tax and continuingthrough current experimental tests of recent welfare reforms, randomized evaluations have played a strong and increasing role in informing policy. This article reviews the record of these experiments and assesses the implications of that r…
Understanding Poverty
The Great Recession and the Social Safety Net
The social safety net responded in significant and favorable ways during the Great Recession. Aggregate per capita expenditures in safety net programs grew significantly, with particularly strong growth in the SNAP, EITC, UI, and Medicaid programs. The increase in transfers was widely shared across demographic groups, including families with and without children, and single-parent and two-parent families. Transfers grew as well among families wit…
Welfare and Work
The Deserving Poor, the Family, and the U.S. Welfare System
Contrary to the popular view that the U.S. welfare system has been in a contractionary phase after the expansions of the welfare state in the 1960s, welfare spending resumed steady growth after a pause in the 1970s. However, although aggregate spending is higher than ever, there have been redistributions away from non-elderly and nondisabled families to families with older adults and to families with recipients of disability programs; from non-el…
Contrasting Calculations of Marginal Tax Rates
In Defense of the NSF Economics Program
The NSF Economics program funds basic research in economics across all its disparate fields. Its budget has experienced a long period of stagnation and decline, with its real value in 2013 below that in 1980 and having declined by 50 percent as a percent of the total NSF budget. The number of grants made by the program has also declined over time, and its current budget is very small compared to that of many other funders of economic research. Ov…
Entitlements
A combination of demographic aging and diversification, volatile business cycle conditions, stagnant real wages, declining employment, and policy choices have increased the need to examine the adequacy of the U.S. social safety net. Is it accomplishing what it is designed to do? Can it weather a fiscal storm? Current "entitlement" programs are in almost all cases providing important assistance to U.S. families and are improving families' well-bei…
The Effect of the Covid-19 Pandemic Recession on Less Educated Women’s Human Capital
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in major declines in employment of women. We provide projections of impacts of this reduction on less educated women’s future human capital framed within the traditional Mincerian model. We find that wage losses one year out from 2020 are relatively modest on average, generally less than 1%, with the largest for married women without children in the home. But losses are greater for young married women, mothers with …
Economics (20 works) · Gender, Labor, and Family Dynamics (14 works) · Political science (11 works) · Sociology (11 works) · Welfare (9 works) · Demographic economics (8 works) · Public economics (7 works) · Labour economics (6 works) · Law (6 works) · Social Policy and Reform Studies (6 works)