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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Explore our work by state
Research Report Income Support and Social Services for Low-Income People in Florida
The state reports describe the safety net and health care programs in place for low-income people on the eve of welfare reform. The reports also analyze the particular circumstances that are shaping the state's response to the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA)
Brief Administering Individual Accounts in Social Security
This paper explores the variety of structural and administrative arrangements that either have been proposed for individual Social Security account systems in the United States or have been adopted in other countries. It focuses on mechanisms used to move money from contributors to pension fund
Brief Contracting as a Mechanism for Managing Education Services
This policy brief describes key features of education services contracts between school districts and for-profit firms and discusses some management issues raised by these contracts. The information is based on the terms of 11 contracts and on interviews with the officials who shaped these contracts
Research Report Credit Programs for the Poor and Reproductive Behavior in Low-Income Countries
Group-based lending programs for the poor have drawn much attention recently. As many of these programs target women, an important research question is whether program participation significantly changes reproductive behavior and whether the gender of the participant matters. Using survey data from
Research Report Growth in Medicare Spending
As a prelude to analyzing the options for meeting the increasing demands on Medicare, this paper establishes some basic projections about the outlook for Medicare's beneficiaries over the next 25 years. The model described here starts with estimates of the overall Medicare program provided in the