Papers

In the United States, COVID-19 triggered a sharp economic downturn. Yet, the ensuing economic recovery was faster and stronger than nearly any forecaster anticipated due in part to the swift, aggressive, and creative fiscal and monetary policy response in the U.S. While the next recession most likely won’t be triggered by a pandemic, the response can be informed by lessons learned from the COVID-19 recession. 

Examines the use and value of nontraditional data sources, such as private payroll service providers and restaurant reservation services.

Examines the role of monetary policy in keeping interest rates low in the wake of a surge in federal borrowing to assess whether a similar increase in borrowing could be repeated in future recessions.

Examines the impact of the pandemic and related policy responses on children.

Looks at the nearly $1 trillion that the federal government provided to state and local governments.

Part I:  Reviews the aid offered those among the roughly 50  million homeowners with mortgages who struggled to make payments because of the pandemic. Part II: Reviews the aid offered those among the roughly 44  million renters who struggled to make payments.

Surveys the newly created federal subsidies and loans provided to businesses in the first year of the pandemic and also examine the additional lending and corporate bond purchases by the Federal Reserve.

Examines the more than $800 billion in cash that was distributed to all but the highest-income households in the three rounds of Economic Impact Payments (EIPs).

Reviews the substantial expansion of UI—supplementing state-provided benefits, expanding eligibility to those not traditionally eligible, and extending the duration of benefits.

Reviews the macroeconomic impact of the breadth of the economic policy responses that produced a recovery that, while stronger than generally anticipated and stronger than those of other advanced economies, has also been accompanied by an unwelcome increase in inflation.

A Hamilton Project analysis on how household balance sheets have evolved since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic finds that, in aggregate, households’ financial positions in 2022 are remarkedly improved relative to 2019.

Betsey Stevenson reviews what has happened to women’s employment and labor force participation in the recovery from the pandemic.

In a new economic analysis, Bradley Hardy, Georgetown University, and Trevon Logan, The Ohio State University, revisit their previous work for Hamilton Project and assess the economic recovery of Black Americans throughout the pandemic.

In these Economic Facts, the Hamilton Project reviews recent economic data to provide context for assessing the state of the economic recovery and highlight areas that remain short of a return to normal.

In a new framing paper, Mitchell Barnes, Lauren Bauer, Wendy Edelberg, Sara Estep, Robert Greenstein, and Moriah Macklin examine the U.S. social insurance system. They consider the social insurance system as a whole as well as its component parts, providing an overview of major federal programs in the areas of education and workforce development, health, income support, nutrition, and housing opportunity.

In this proposal, Elizabeth Davis and Aaron Sojourner of the University of Minnesota propose an ambitious vision to increase federal funding for Early Childhood Care and Education (ECE) to ensure every American family and child has access to high-quality affordable child care during the first five years of life.

In a new policy proposal, Tanya Byker and Elena Patel propose the creation of a federal Paid Parental and Medical Leave (PPML) program. The proposal would establish a partial wage replacement system, extended to all eligible wage employees, to supplement income during work disruptions due to the arrival of a child or due to a personal or a family member’s illness.

In this proposal Robert Collinson, Ingrid Gould Ellen, and Benjamin Keys propose a plan to support homeowners and renters to stabilize households and housing markets during future economic downturns. Their proposal would create new emergency rental assistance accounts for low-income households; implement an automatic, three-month forbearance period for vulnerable mortgage borrowers in response to elevated local unemployment; and establish a permanent tax credit exchange program that would allow states to exchange tax credits for direct subsidies at a fiscally neutral price when demand from tax credit investors falls.

In this proposal, Arindrajit Dube offers a comprehensive plan to reform and modernize the Unemployment Insurance (UI) system to reflect and align with the challenges of the current labor market. He recommends converting UI into a fully federal program; ensuring that more people who need UI are eligible; creating automatic triggers that extend the potential benefit duration when needed due to economic downturns; implementing more progressive replacement rates; and improving short time compensation, also known as “work sharing”.

Wendy Edelberg, Sara Estep, Stephanie Lu, and Emily Moss examine and offer new insights on the recent history of housing policy from the latter half of the 20th century to today, compare homeowner and renter experiences, and analyze housing assistance policies. The authors conclude that to increase housing stability, policymakers should improve housing policies to create better infrastructure and more-inclusive housing programs in addition to supplying additional funding.

In these Economic Facts, Hamilton Project reviews trends in women’s labor force participation and documents how mothers of children under age 13 have changed how they spend their time. These 10 economic facts detail some of the ways in which work, time, and caregiving have changed for mothers with young children from before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic through 2020 until early 2021.

In this economic analysis, Kristen E. Broady, Darlene Booth-Bell, Jason Coupet, and Moriah Macklin examine data on the 60 jobs that employ the most workers in the United States and have the highest and lowest susceptibility to automation in the next 10 to 20 years, with a particular focus on Black and Hispanic workers.

In this proposal, Harry Holzer outlines ways to boost students and workers in the American economy. He recommends enacting reforms to increase funding for the Higher Education Act of 1965, adding modest taxes on worker displacement, and creating a permanent version of the Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training (TAACCCT) grants to fund partnerships among community colleges, workforce institutions, and states. 

In this proposal, Richard Arum and Mitchell Stevens propose twin federal government initiatives to incentivize innovation in instructional delivery throughout the national postsecondary ecology, to bridge the divide between academia and the workforce system, and to accrete a cumulative science of adult learning.