scholarly journals The Great Recession and the Social Safety Net

2013 ◽  
Vol 650 (1) ◽  
pp. 143-166 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert A. Moffitt
Keyword(s):  
Income Distribution ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Poverty Line ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Social Safety Net ◽  
Demographic Groups ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
The Social ◽  
Per Capita

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 with more employed members and with fewer employed members. In the low-income population, however, the increase in transfer amounts was not strongly progressive across income classes, with transfers to those just below or above the poverty line increasing slightly, compared to those at the bottom of the income distribution. This was mainly because of the EITC program, which provides greater benefits to those with higher family earnings. The expansions of SNAP and UI benefitted those at the bottom of the income distribution to a greater extent.

scholarly journals Heterogeneity in the Impact of Economic Cycles and the Great Recession: Effects within and across the Income Distribution

2015 ◽  
Vol 105 (5) ◽  
pp. 154-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marianne Bitler ◽  
Hilary Hoynes
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Family Type ◽  
Social Safety Net ◽  
Demographic Groups ◽  
Economic Cycles ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
The Social ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
The Impact

In this paper, we examine the effects of economic cycles on low-to moderate-income families. We use variation across states and over time to estimate the effects of cycles on the distribution of income, using fine gradations of the household income-to-poverty ratio. We also explore how the effects of cycles affect the risk of falling into poverty across demographic groups, focusing on age, race/ethnicity, and family type. We conclude by testing to see whether these relationships have changed in the Great Recession. We discuss the results in light of the changes in the social safety net in recent decades.

Poverty and the Social Safety Net

2020 ◽  
pp. 520-534
Author(s):  
Manos Matsaganis
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Social Protection ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Economic Downturn ◽  
Social Safety Net ◽  
Fourth Section ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
The Third ◽  
Policy Responses ◽  
The Social

This chapter examines how the social safety net (the welfare state’s anti-poverty armour) evolved since the mid-1970s, and how it responded to, and was transformed by, the social emergency of the 2010s. Its structure is as follows. The first section discusses the state of Greek welfare before the financial crisis broke out. The second section considers the social implications of the Great Recession, focusing on the effects on family incomes of job losses, falling earnings, and higher taxes. The third section provides an account of policy responses under austerity, and the fourth section reviews the evidence on changes in poverty and social exclusion. The chapter concludes that the Greek welfare state, even though no longer chronically underfunded, was structurally unfit to cope with any serious economic downturn, let alone the deep and protracted crisis that hit the country in 2010. Moreover, the system of social protection emerging from the recession and the austerity differ significantly from the situation that preceded it: it is certainly leaner, considerably less robust in core policy areas such as pensions and health, but also probably more effective in protecting vulnerable individuals and households against poverty than at any time in the country’s history.

Changes in Safety Net Use During the Great Recession

2015 ◽  
Vol 105 (5) ◽  
pp. 161-165 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia M. Anderson ◽  
Kristin F. Butcher ◽  
Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Program Participation ◽  
Social Safety Net ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Net Use ◽  
Poverty Levels

We examine how participation in social safety net programs differs by income-to-poverty levels, and how that relationship changed after the Great Recession. We define income-to-poverty based on the average of 2 years of merged CPS data, and investigate program participation among households with income less than 300 percent of poverty. We find changes in both the level and distribution of safety-net program participation during the Great Recession, with SNAP expanding most at the bottom, the EITC expanding most in the middle, and UI expanding most at the top of the income ranges that we investigate; TANF did not expand.

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