Urban across the Country

Urban’s researchers partner with state and local leaders to provide the evidence, tools, and support they need to improve lives and strengthen communities. This work includes strategic advising to translate research into action, program evaluations to measure effectiveness, and research and data analysis to inform decisionmaking. Our experts develop custom data tools and modeling to support equitable resource allocation and lead community-engaged research and convenings to ensure policies reflect local priorities.

Use this page to explore Urban’s work. Search by region to see examples of our research, and filter by evidence and products to narrow results by topic or type of work.

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State and community data tools
Explore our work by state
Research Report Mortgage Lending Discrimination
This volume sorts through the research evidence on mortgage lending discrimination to provide policymakers with a comprehensive and comprehensible review of the current state of knowledge on lending discrimination and to identify important questions that still need to be answered in order to
Research Report State General Assistance Programs 1998
General Assistance (GA) programs are cash and in-kind assistance programs financed and administered entirely by the state, county, or locality in which they operate. This report, based on a survey of the 50 states and the District of Columbia, provides an overview of states' GA programs as of the
Brief Dead-Broke Dads
[Washington Post] Recent reports from Washington that child support collections have increased by 20 percent in the past three years spell good news for some children. But many children are still being left behind. In 1997, 9 million children lived apart from their fathers and received no financial
Brief In Midst of Reform
The author challenges the practice of using caseload decline as a barometer of welfare reform success. He uses the National Survey of Americas Families to take a closer look at families at risk of poverty in Wisconsin. Among the conclusions: Wisconsin Works (W2) has produced a dramatic drop in cash
Brief What Counts?
This survey of Medicaid and CHIP agencies in all 50 states and DC finds that the effective Medicaid eligibility levels are generally higher than commonly believed because most state Medicaid programs disregard some portion of family income in determining eligibility. By contrast, standard CHIP
Research Report State Fiscal Systems and Business Cycles
This paper examines state revenues, expenditures, and economic cycles over a recent 18-year period. The authors ask what will happen to state welfare spending when the next recession occurs. The history of state revenues and expenditure during recessionary periods indicates that most states will
Brief Nonemployment
For most policymakers, the principal indicator of the labor force's relationship to the economy for the last 60 years has been the unemployment ratea measure that, while still useful, is not broad enough to reflect some of the important changes taking place in the labor force today. In particular