Related UI Researchers

Publications on Family/Parents

Kids' Share 2008, a second annual report, looks comprehensively at trends in federal spending and tax expenditures on children. Key findings suggest that historically children have not been a budget priority. In 2007, this trend continued, as children's spending did not keep pace with GDP growth. Absent a policy change, children's spending will continue to be squeezed in the next decade.

Key Facts: Kids' Share 2008 summarizes findings from the Kids' Share 2008 report, which looks comprehensively at trends in federal spending and tax expenditures on children. Key findings suggest that historically children have not been a budget priority. In 2007, this trend continued, as children's spending did not keep pace with GDP growth. Absent a policy change, children's spending will continue to be squeezed in the next decade.

Children are a diminishing priority in the federal budget, a study from the Urban Institute and New America Foundation shows. If current spending and revenue policies continue, the children’s share of domestic federal spending-which excludes defense, non-defense homeland security, and international affairs-will be 13.8 percent in 2018, down from 16.2 percent in 2007 and 20.2 percent in 1960.

The Urban Institute partnered with local research organizations in three sites to learn more about children of incarcerated parents through the merging and analysis of local and state level criminal justice and human services data. The purpose of the project was to better understand the experiences and needs of children of incarcerated parents in each locality and to explore the involvement of affected families with the criminal justice, child welfare, and social welfare systems. This report presents findings from the sites and lessons learned regarding the merging and analysis of administrative data on this population.

Using PSID data from 1968 to 2005, we find that the volatility of family income has increased over time (a trend that is robust to a large variety of modeling choices) but the trend in individual income volatility is less clear. Measurement error cannot fully account for these facts, but the increasing covariance of individual incomes within the family (driven by increases in the correlation of head and spouse earnings, due largely to the increased proportion of families with two earners) can.