About Us

1964

• In 1964, the U.S. was about two decades out of the Great Depression, the national poverty rate hovered around 19 percent, and President Lyndon Johnson was seeking ideas for a radical domestic program to inspire American voters — many of whom were still grieving the death of John F. Kennedy.
• At U-M’s Spring Commencement that year, President Johnson — the first sitting president to address commencement at the university — outlined a loose plan to declare “war” on poverty and create a “Great Society.” He was elected in a landslide that fall and set about making good on his promise.
• Congress responded by forming the Office of Economic Opportunity, developing policies designed to help the nation’s poor.

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1968

• In 1966 and 1967, in an effort to track whether its programs actually worked, the government targeted some 30,000 American households and embarked on interviews. Understanding the value of continuing to track people in poverty, the government researchers approached Jim Morgan, an economist with the U-M Institute for Social Research (ISR). This eventually led to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), the longest-running and most complete portrait of the economics of the American family.

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1968

• As the 7th United States Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, Wilbur J. Cohen was instrumental in developing both the New Deal and Great Society programs during the Johnson Administration. In December 1968, he wrote A Ten-Point Program to Abolish Poverty that future leaders used a blueprint for later legislation.
• After successfully helping to create the Social Security System, he came to U-M as a professor of social work. Wilbur returned to the university as Dean of the School of Education after his service in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations.

https://www.lib.umich.edu/faculty-history/faculty/wilbur-j-cohen

https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/ssb/v31n12/v31n12p3.pdf

1971

• A pioneer in interdisciplinary study, Max Heirich taught one of the university’s first courses specifically focused on poverty. The 1971 course, Perspectives on Poverty, used a “variety of methods to explore the phenomenon of poverty in an affluent society.”

1989 – 2015

• Sheldon H. Danziger launches the Research and Training Program in Poverty and Public Policy, which is the foundation for U-M’s National Poverty Center. The program provided mentorship and support for over 50 postdoctoral fellows and doctoral students on the causes and consequences of urban poverty.

1995 – 2002

• The National Institute of Mental Health, the Center on Poverty, Risk, and Mental Health operated for seven years expanding knowledge for research and practice on the relationship between poverty and mental health. The Center’s mission was to facilitate scholarship concerning the linkages between poverty and mental health; to develop a core faculty of social work researchers in this area; and to contribute to knowledge relevant for practice and policy.  

1997

• The Women’s Employment Study combines the insights of poverty researchers, epidemiologists, and social workers by analyzing the ways in which a broad range of labor market, mental health, physical health, and family problems affect a welfare recipient’s ability to obtain and retain employment overtime.
• Led by the National Poverty Center, the study examined women who resided in one urban county and received cash welfare in February 1997 through the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program.
• The study resulted in dozens of widely-cited journal articles, dissertation chapters and books. And results were replicated by other welfare policy researchers and influenced policy thinking about welfare mothers whose health and mental health problems kept them from working even when the unemployment rate was low.

2002 – 2016

• The National Poverty Center (NPC) at U-M’s Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy was established in the fall of 2002 as a university-based, nonpartisan research center. NPC conducted and promoted multidisciplinary, policy-relevant research, mentored and trained emerging scholars, and informed public discourse on the causes and consequences of poverty.
• The NPC encouraged and enabled younger scholars to develop interests, skills, and expertise in poverty research, many of whom have gone on to leadership positions across the country.
• Sheldon Danziger, currently the President of the Russell Sage Foundation, led the evolution of the National Poverty Center as the Henry J. Meyer Distinguished University Professor of Public Policy at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, Research Professor at the Population Studies Center, and Director of the National Poverty Center at the University of Michigan.

2007 – 2009

• Supported by the Rackham Graduate School, the Interdisciplinary Group on Poverty and Inequality provided a forum for graduate and professional students from all disciplines to discuss literature and to present original research on issues of poverty, inequality and disparity.

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2011

• Led by the School of Social Work, Learning Community on Poverty & Inequality promotes opportunities to link the research, policy and service, and teaching interests of faculty for whom poverty and inequality are some of the compelling core roots of their scholarship. 
• Michigan Recession and Recovery Study (MRRS) panel study to better understand how the Great Recession that officially lasted from December 2007 through January 2009, and the collapse of stock and housing prices during this period have affected the wellbeing of workers and families.

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2016

On October 5, 2016, the University of Michigan launches Poverty Solutions, a university-wide effort to explore and test models to ease the effects of poverty and broadly share that knowledge, while working with community groups and supporting active-learning options for students.

October 2016

• Poverty Solutions is launched and then-Associate Professor H. Luke Shaefer is named inaugural director. Julia Weinert, who is still Poverty Solutions managing director today, was one of two initial staff members who joined Shaefer in establishing the presidential initiative, which is housed at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy and builds on the work of the National Poverty Center previously located at U-M.
• PS provides support for a representative survey of Detroiters launched by the Detroit Metro Area Communities Study. It builds on the 53-year legacy of the Detroit Area Study, a hands-on training tool for U-M students from 1951 to 2004.

2017

January 2017

• First recipients of faculty grants and community-academic grants supported by Poverty Solutions and Detroit Urban Research Center.

February 2017

• Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate David Johnson, director of the U-M Panel Study on Income Dynamics at the Institute of Social Research, delivers a statement on the Supplemental Poverty Measure to the Congressional Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking.

June 2017

• Poverty Solutions becomes a partner in Washtenaw County’s Summer Youth Employment Program (later called SummerWorks), which provides internships and professional development opportunities for teens and young adults in Washtenaw County.
• Poverty Solutions Director Luke Shaefer and faculty affiliates Michael Barr, then the incoming dean of the Ford School; Trina Shanks, social work professor; and Bruce Pietrykowski, economics professor, among others, contribute to a discussion on the future of work, wages, and labor hosted by U.S. Congresswoman Debbie Dingell (MI-12) and her colleagues.
• Poverty Solutions hosts public engagement events on upward mobility in Detroit, making housing more affordable, addressing early-in-life disparities, youth employment programs, the possibility of the U.S. enacting a universal child allowance, and more.
• U-M’s Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation, the Detroit Health Department, and the Joy-Southfield Community Development Corporation, Inc. develop an innovative model for a Community Health Worker-led demonstration project in the Cody Rouge neighborhood, with three Medicaid health planners working in conjunction with neighborhood residents receiving professional development training. Supported by a community-academic grant from Poverty Solutions.

September 2017

• Poverty Solutions supports a $2 million Urban Collaboratory funded by U-M that brings together faculty experts in smart city technologies and urban design to collaborate with city leaders and residents in Benton Harbor, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Ypsilanti, and Ann Arbor.

December 2017

• Poverty Solutions partners with Munger Graduate Residences on its annual case competition to challenge students to consider how they would spend fictional seed money of $100,000 to address the root causes of poverty.
• Poverty Solutions launches its Michigan Poverty & Well-being Map to help policymakers, community organizations, and the public understand poverty in their communities. The map is updated annually.

2018

January 2018

• Susan Dynarski, a former U-M professor and Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate, testifies before the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, at a hearing titled “Reauthorizing the Higher Education Act: Financial Aid Simplification and Transparency,” discussing what lessons Congress can draw from loan repayment models in other countries.
• Poverty Solutions and the School of Social Work’s Community Action and Social Change minor partner to bring undergraduate students a poverty solutions certificate program.
• Announcement of recipients of second round of faculty grants and community-academic grants in partnership with Detroit Urban Research Center.

March 2018

• Poverty Solutions launches four-year agreement with the City of Detroit’s Mayor’s Office to support the Detroit Partnership on Economic Mobility, which includes a fellows program. The partnership, spearheaded by then Poverty Solutions Assistant Director of Policy Impact Patrick Cooney, focuses on housing, workforce development, health and well-being, and education.
• Poverty Solutions partners with U-M’s Urban Collaboratory to study how and where improvements to public transportation in Benton Harbor could help alleviate poverty in the city.
• Poverty Solutions joins 313Reads and Munger Leads When Munger Reads early literacy efforts in Detroit, offering data analysis and evaluation support.

April 2018

• Analysis by Poverty Solutions reveals students who have experienced homelessness have lower graduation rates and higher dropout rates than their housed peers. Poverty Solutions’ research on student homelessness will go on to inform changes to practices by school homeless liaisons and Detroit’s homeless shelter system.
• In response to preliminary findings from a 2017 community-academic research project on barriers to accessing the Poverty Tax Exemption in Detroit, Poverty Solutions partners with the U-M School of Public Health, Detroit Urban Research Center, and United Community Housing Coalition to develop a campaign to raise awareness of the tax exemption.
• The Detroit Metro Area Communities Study receives $761,000 from the Knight Foundation to expand its representative survey of Detroit residents.

May 2018

• Ashleigh Johnson, former community engagement coordinator at Poverty Solutions, convenes nonprofit agencies, foundations, and others from Wayne, Oakland, and Macomb counties to share new research, best practices, and innovative programs, and identify mutually beneficial opportunities for collaboration and coordination.

June 2018

• Karen Otzen Kling is hired as the City of Detroit’s affordable housing fellow, supported by Poverty Solutions’ Detroit Partnership on Economic Mobility. Kling’s work led to recommendations on ways to serve more people with available home repair funds. She later joined the Poverty Solutions staff as assistant director of strategic projects and policy impact.
• Poverty Solutions builds relationships in Lake County, Michigan, to learn more about how poverty affects the community, and share resources and data to support the work of local community leaders.
• Poverty Solutions shares findings from a 2017 faculty research project led by Lesli Hoey, of U-M’s Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, demonstrating that new work requirements for food assistance in Michigan adversely impact families in Washtenaw County and increase the burden placed on community groups that provide food and housing assistance.

September 2018

• U-M, Harvard partner on Equality of Opportunity project in Detroit.
• The inaugural Real-World Perspectives on Poverty Solutions speaker series brings to campus a diverse group of experts drawn from university, business, and community contexts to explore interdisciplinary real-world poverty solutions from a wide variety of perspectives. The annual fall speaker series, coordinated by Poverty Solutions Student Engagement and Outreach Manager Trevor Bechtel, is open to the public and serves as a one-credit course for students.
• Poverty Solutions partners with Food Finders, a nonprofit started by then-UM student Jack Griffin, to build a database of free food sources across the country.
• Older Black Americans are three times more likely to experience homelessness: A study co-authored by Boston College Professor Vincent A. Fusaro; Helen Levy, a research professor and Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate; and Poverty Solutions Director Luke Shaefer is published in Demography.
• Poverty Solutions hosts public engagement events on innovative programs for youth and young adults, transportation and economic mobility, how social services can reduce housing instability, and basic income as a poverty alleviation strategy.
• K-12 students in Michigan are among the nation’s most chronically absent, and homeless students are at particular risk, according to a new analysis from Jennifer Erb-Downward, director of housing stability programs and policy initiatives at Poverty Solutions.
• Better implementation of state law could improve housing stability for Detroit homeowners: Poverty Solutions shares findings from research on access to the Poverty Tax Exemption in Detroit led by Alexa Eisenberg, a former postdoctoral research fellow with Poverty Solutions; and Roshanak Mehdipanah, a Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate in the School of Public Health; in partnership with United Community Housing Coalition.
• Poverty Solutions begins working with Washtenaw County’s Office of Community and Economic Development to update its Opportunity Index, which maps a variety of metrics related to access to opportunity by census tract. Working closely with county officials, Poverty Solutions helps with revising metrics, revamping methodology, data analysis, and developing a narrative to help users make sense of the disparities revealed by the index.

2019

January 2019

• Announcement of third round of faculty grants and community-academic grants supported by Poverty Solutions and Detroit Urban Research Center.

February 2019

• Joshua Edmonds is hired as the City of Detroit’s digital inclusion fellow, supported by Poverty Solutions’ Detroit Partnership on Economic Mobility. He is also named the city’s director of digital inclusion. Edmonds laid the groundwork that led to a more than $27 million investment to narrow the digital divide during the pandemic in 2020.

March 2019

• Laura Urteaga-Fuentes is hired as the City of Detroit’s homelessness policy fellow, supported by Poverty Solutions’ Detroit Partnership on Economic Mobility. She developed clear policy and procedures for addressing homeless encampments in the city.
• Poverty Solutions hosts an engagement series titled “Workforce: Solving for Jobs, Mobility, and Poverty in an Era of Rapid Change.”

May 2019

• Poverty Solutions convenes the Midwest Mobility from Poverty Network, which connects university-based poverty research centers in the Midwest to share best practices and strategies to maximize impact.
• Former Poverty Solutions staffer Joshua Rivera testifies before the U.S. House Financial Services Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee to share findings from his analysis of the factors driving Michigan’s highest-in-the-country auto insurance rates. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer cited Poverty Solutions research when calling for auto insurance reform in 2019; in May, she signed a bipartisan auto insurance reform bill that included policy recommendations from Poverty Solutions.
• Michigan counties struggle to meet the need for opioid addiction treatment: Poverty Solutions shares findings from an analysis of drug treatment needs across the state, led by Amy Bohnert, associate professor at U-M’s Department of Psychiatry; with Jennifer Erb-Downward of Poverty Solutions; and Thomas Ivacko, then-executive director of the Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy at U-M.

June 2019

• Earned Income Tax Credit helps low-income moms live on their own: Poverty Solutions shares findings from research supported by a 2017 faculty grant and led by Natasha Pilkauskas, assistant professor of public policy at U-M.
• New report finds childhood homelessness is rising, much higher than state data show: Poverty Solutions partners with the Michigan League for Public Policy to analyze data and explore rates of homelessness among youth between birth and age 4.

August 2019

• Kristin Seefeldt, an associate professor of social work and public policy, joins Poverty Solutions as the new associate faculty director for educational programs.

September 2019

• Poverty Solutions publishes the Detroit Home Repair Resource Guide to help increase Detroiters’ access to available home repair programs. The guide was a response to an information gap identified through research on home repair needs in Detroit.
• Speakers involved in the Real-World Perspectives on Poverty Solutions fall series answer the question, “What does poverty mean to you?”

November 2019

• Wealth begets educational disparity: The Journal of Youth and Adolescence publishes findings from research supported by a 2018 faculty grant from Poverty Solutions. Led by Matthew Diemer, associate professor of educational studies, the study followed children over a 27-year period to shed light on how wealth influences learning outcomes.
• Luke Shaefer is named special counselor to the director of Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. The position builds on efforts to advise MDHHS on a set of poverty-related programs and policy recommendations Poverty Solutions undertook over the summer. Amanda Nothaft, director of data and analysis at Poverty Solutions, provides data analysis for MDHHS, and her evaluation of asset limit policies led to policy changes implemented Dec. 1, 2019, that simplified and streamlined access to critical benefits.

December 2019

• Detroit’s Eviction Machine: City of Detroit reviews link between tax auction, housing instability in response to a Poverty Solutions study led by Joshua Akers, then-assistant professor of geography and urban and regional studies at UM-Dearborn.

2020

January 2020

• Announcement of third round of community-academic grants in partnership with Detroit Urban Research Center.
• Former Poverty Solutions fellow Joshua Edmonds testifies before Congressional subcommittee on digital equity and internet adoption.
• New index ranks America’s 100 most disadvantaged communities: Poverty Solutions and Princeton University release findings from “Understanding Communities of Deep Disadvantage,” a research project begun in 2018 that includes the development of a new multidimensional index measuring disadvantage and exploration of the historical and present-day factors that drive deep disadvantage in certain regions.
• Chardae Caine is hired as the youth workforce development fellow for the City of Detroit, supported by Poverty Solutions’ Detroit Partnership for Economic Mobility. She provides the city and its stakeholders with research and support to develop and implement a comprehensive youth opportunity strategy.

March 2020

• The United States declares a state of emergency related to COVID-19. The spread of the virus and economic shutdown highlight underlying inequities in health care systems and employment. Poverty Solutions leans into its mission, documenting how the pandemic is impacting people with low incomes and pointing to evidence-based government interventions and policy responses that would make a difference.
• Luke Shaefer is appointed as the Ford School’s inaugural Kohn Professor of Social Justice and Social Policy.
• Poverty Solutions releases Michigan COVID-19 Pandemic Resource Guide. More than 7,100 people viewed the guide and service providers shared the information in their own resource guides.

April 2020

• As the first round of stimulus checks went out, Poverty Solutions analysis revealed people in deep poverty were at risk of a delayed or missing stimulus payment. Poverty Solutions worked with nonprofit design firm Civilla to create a website with clear guidance on how to access the stimulus checks, especially for people who do not typically file taxes because they have no income, do not have a bank account, or move frequently. Poverty Solutions went on to update the website with information on each round of stimulus checks.
• The Detroit Metro Area Communities Study finds 1 in 5 Detroiters will be out of money in 3 months due to COVID-19 crisis. DMACS Managing Director Sharon Sand and her team field a series of rapid-response surveys to provide timely insights into how COVID-19 and the related economic downturn affect Detroiters.

May 2020

• Detroit housing shortage, evictions set stage for COVID-19 housing crisis: A policy brief from Poverty Solutions provides analysis of Detroit’s current housing stock and makes recommendations to reduce evictions once the emergency moratoriums end.
• A study supported by a 2019 Poverty Solutions community-academic grant offers the first comprehensive review of eviction filings across Michigan. The Michigan Eviction Project, led by Robert Goodspeed, associate professor of urban and regional planning at U-M, in partnership with Legal Services of South Central Michigan, informed Poverty Solutions’ contributions to a working group with the governor’s office to establish a comprehensive $50 million eviction diversion program.

June 2020

• Coronavirus pandemic worsens food insecurity for low-income adults: Julia Wolfson and Cindy Leung of the U-M School of Public Health share findings from their study of household food security, supported by a 2020 Poverty Solutions faculty grant.
• Poverty Solutions hosts “The Poverty Narrative: A Midwest Perspective” virtual series. Spearheaded by former Poverty Solutions Communications Director Kristen Kerecman and current Communications Director Lauren Slagter, the series brought together journalists and academic researchers from across the Midwest to discuss ways to promote more in-depth, impactful, and solutions-oriented coverage of poverty-related issues.
• A new report from DMACS, Detroit Future City, and the New Economy Initiative reveals Detroiters’ perceptions of entrepreneurship and economic opportunity.

July 2020

• Poverty Solutions publishes the first of a series of policy briefs tracking material hardship levels during the pandemic and the impact of income support in the form of stimulus checks and expanded unemployment insurance.
• The Midwest Mobility from Poverty Network, led by Poverty Solutions, awards six grants totaling $150,000 for projects to improve economic mobility and address the impact of COVID-19 throughout the Midwest.

August 2020

• Shaefer testifies at a virtual Congressional briefing to discuss opportunities to enhance the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit.
• Poverty Solutions publishes an analysis of the extent to which jobs available in Detroit and the tri-county area match the skills and attributes of Detroit residents. This work — led by former PS staffers Pinghui Wu and Joshua Rivera with Samiul Jubaed, senior data and policy analyst at Poverty Solutions — builds on previous evaluation of barriers to work among Detroiters and the potential for a publicly subsidized employment initiative to address those barriers.
• The American Enterprise Institute publishes new research by Shaefer and Rivera that examines Employer Resource Networks, an innovative model where local networks of employers collectively provide work support services to their entry-level workforces, with the goal of enhancing productivity and retention.

September 2020

• A new report from Poverty Solutions titled “Investing in Us” lifts up more than a decade’s worth of input from Detroit residents on how to increase economic mobility and decrease poverty in their city. Afton Branche-Wilson, then-assistant director of community initiatives at Poverty Solutions, led the research team that included leaders from 10 nonprofits.

October 2020

• Poverty Solutions and Center for Social Solutions partner to award more than $260,000 for research on combating racism. Former Poverty Solutions Administrative Coordinator Armeka Richey facilitates the grant process and contributes to a committee that reviews the initiative’s other grant programs and recommends ways to ensure the poverty-alleviation research also addresses structural racism.
• Student research assistants help develop a new #BankBlack interactive map that makes it easier for people to identify Black-owned banks and credit unions across the country in an effort to leverage Black economic power and overcome the racial wealth gap. This partnership between BankBlackUSA and U-M students continues in the coming years.
• Poverty Solutions is one of three organizations across the country contributing to a new “Education Leads Home” Data-to-Action Playbook that will offer guidance on how to use student homelessness data to advocate for better support for youth without a stable place to live.

December 2020

• After pivoting to virtual programming and launching a mentorship program in 2020, SummerWorks staff — led by former SummerWorks and Strategic Projects Manager Zoe Erb — create a mentoring guide to share lessons learned and help individuals and organizations foster productive professional relationships with young adults.

2021

January 2021

• Washtenaw County Prosecutor Eli Savit launches the Prosecutor Transparency Project in partnership with the ACLU of Michigan, the University of Michigan Law School, and Poverty Solutions to uncover potential racial inequities through the collection and analysis of data regarding decisions made by the prosecutor’s offices in Washtenaw, Oakland, and Ingham counties.
• The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s Just Futures Initiative grant competition awards two $5 million grants to U-M. The “Crafting Democratic Futures” project will explore community-based reparations solutions for African American and some Native American communities, led by U-M’s Center for Social Solutions with support from Poverty Solutions, University Musical Society, and other U-M units.
• Poverty Solutions releases a report by Afton Branche-Wilson and Patrick Cooney on the financial well-being of Detroit residents. United Way for Southeastern Michigan goes on to develop a $2 million, multi-year innovation challenge that will provide support for organizations working to address the barriers to financial well-being identified by Poverty Solutions research.

February 2021

• New research supported by Poverty Solutions and led by former Postdoctoral Fellow Alexa Eisenberg shows a $1 million home repair grant program in Detroit has helped homeowners with low incomes complete major home repair projects that improve the quality and safety of their housing and increase their chances of remaining in their homes long term.

March 2021

• DMACS continues to field rapid-response surveys that show how the pandemic impacts Detroiters and how their perceptions of the COVID-19 vaccine and experiences with unemployment have changed over time. A later wave of the survey asks about perceptions of policing and crime.

• Poverty Solutions hosts its second Poverty Narrative virtual event series, dedicated to a deeper understanding of the connections between structural racism and poverty.

April 2021

• Washtenaw County launches its new Opportunity Index, developed in partnership with Poverty Solutions. Spearheaded by former Data and Evaluation Manager Natalie Peterson, the index maps key data points across five categories — health, job access, economic well-being, education and training, and community engagement and stability — to measure how the location of people’s homes in Washtenaw County impacts their access to opportunity.
• Poverty Solutions launches its redesigned website that makes it easier for people to get involved with the initiative, explore research by key issue area, and follow the latest news. Former Web Developer Liz Smith is key to implementing the redesign.
• A new website from Poverty Solutions offers step-by-step guidance for parents to ensure they receive the expanded Child Tax Credit. The website had more than 13,000 views by the end of 2021, and Poverty Solutions would go on to join a Detroit coalition coordinating outreach efforts to ensure eligible parents claim the tax credit. Luke Shaefer is among a group of poverty scholars who have contributed significant research on the potential for an expanded child tax credit that follows the design of a child allowance to reduce child poverty rates in the U.S.

May 2021

• New research supported by Poverty Solutions’ Confronting and Combating Racism grant program offers insights into the location, nature, and perpetrators of anti-Asian hate incidents that occurred in the U.S. during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Virulent Hate Project is led by Melissa Borja, assistant professor in U-M’s Asian/Pacific Islander American Studies Program.
• Jennifer Erb-Downward testifies before the U.S. House Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education about her research on the educational challenges faced by students who do not have a stable place to live.

June 2021

• The Michigan Eviction Project, led by U-M faculty and housing attorneys with support from Poverty Solutions, finds the number of eviction cases filed between April and December 2020 represented a 65% decrease from the number of cases filed during those months in 2019. Their new report offers insights into how Michigan can maintain the low eviction rates achieved during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Poverty Solutions’ latest analysis of material hardship levels during the pandemic and the impact of the federal government’s response is the focus of a New York Times article and goes on to be cited by dozens of news outlets across the country as well as the White House Press Office.
• Poverty Solutions announces a grant opportunity to support Detroit organizations running economic mobility programs that implement recommendations made in the 2020 report, “Investing in Us: Resident Priorities for Economic Mobility in Detroit.” Church of Messiah Housing Corporation, Journey to Healing, Urban Neighborhood Initiatives, and Wayne Metropolitan Community Action Agency are later announced as recipients of the $10,000 grants plus technical assistance from Poverty Solutions.

July 2021

• An expert in survey research and public opinion analysis, Mara Cecilia Ostfeld joins Poverty Solutions as associate faculty director of communications. She is also a faculty lead at DMACS and an assistant research scientist at the Ford School.
• Poverty Solutions hosts a Detroit working group to hear about residents’ experiences with land contracts as part of a Community Experts Initiative that convenes community leaders with lived and experience confronting poverty to share insights and resources to help generate new ideas for action. Poverty Solutions’ Karen Kling and Leonymae Aumentado presented findings from a policy brief they co-authored with Enterprise Community Partners on ways to better regulate land contracts.
• In a study supported by a 2020 faculty grant from Poverty Solutions, researchers find 10% of Detroit’s population lives in “triple burdened” census tracts with higher than average rates of poverty, housing cost burden, and incomplete plumbing. The research was led by Sara Hughes, a former environmental policy analyst at U-M’s School for Environment and Sustainability.

Summer 2021

• Karolina Ramos is hired as the City of Detroit workforce development fellow, supported by Poverty Solutions’ Detroit Partnership on Economic Mobility. She supported the city’s implementation of the American Rescue Plan Act.

August 2021

• Poverty Solutions publishes “The Educational Implications of Homelessness and Housing Instability in Detroit” databook, which offers insights into the under-identification of students experiencing homelessness in Detroit and the connections between homelessness and chronic absenteeism; school transfers; graduation, dropout, and school discipline rates; access to public assistance; and likelihood of entering the foster care system. Jennifer Erb-Downward, lead author of the databook, goes on to serve as a panelist at a virtual discussion of student homelessness in Detroit co-hosted by Poverty Solutions and Chalkbeat Detroit.

September 2021

• Poverty Solutions Associate Faculty Director Kristin Seefeldt leads an interdisciplinary team from U-M that receives a $300,000 grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to train local residents and U-M students to provide one-on-one technology support to Detroit entrepreneurs. The project aims to better understand the types and complexity of technology support that small businesses need.
• Luke Shaefer testifies about the impact of pandemic relief programs at a hearing before the U.S. House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis.

Fall 2021

• Cydney Gardner-Brown is hired as an American Rescue Plan Act implementation junior fellow supporting digital inclusion and workforce development initiatives at the City of Detroit. Her position is supported by Poverty Solutions’ Detroit Partnership on Economic Mobility.
• Fall 2021 marked the five-year anniversary of Poverty Solutions, a university-wide initiative aimed at preventing and alleviating poverty through action-based research. Over those five years, we have undertaken hundreds of projects with faculty and students across the university, established powerful community partnerships throughout the country, and demonstrated the meaningful impact of connecting research to policy and practice. See the 2021 Impact Report.

October 2021

• While most eligible families received the expanded Child Tax Credit and used it to cover the costs of essential household expenses, a new survey indicates that more than 1 in 10 eligible families have not received the credit and were either uncertain about how to claim it or did not know why they did not receive it. Poverty Solutions partnered with Propel to field the survey and analyze results.
• Emergency federal dollars for the unemployed during the COVID-19 pandemic bolstered health care spending as jobless rates skyrocketed, according to a new study by Luke Shaefer with Michael Evangelist, former graduate student research assistant at Poverty Solutions, and Pinghui Wu, a former Poverty Solutions postdoctoral fellow.

November 2021

• Luke Shaefer gives the inaugural Hermann and Amalie Kohn Professorship in Social Policy and Social Justice Lecture on lessons in using evidence to fight poverty.

December 2021

• Following up on prior research that informed Michigan’s 2019 auto insurance reform, new analysis by Poverty Solutions finds the reform law contributed to an 18% drop in average premium costs from 2019 to 2020—the steepest decline in the country over that time period. However, Michigan still has the most expensive auto insurance in the U.S., and a 2019 law has failed to reduce disparities in cost by race and geography. Poverty Solutions makes policy recommendations for addressing those disparities.
• Poverty Solutions joined Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and researchers from Wayne State University to present findings from a new report that suggests the 2020 U.S. Census may have significantly undercounted Detroit’s population. An undercount of this magnitude would result in a significant reduction in the federal financial resources that Detroiters and Michiganders receive.

2022

February 2022

• New analysis by Poverty Solutions finds high school-aged youth experiencing homelessness report higher rates of attempting suicide, being forced to have sex, misusing prescription pain medication, and pregnancy than their housed peers. Transgender youth are especially at risk of experiencing homelessness and being estranged from a parent or guardian. The policy brief makes recommendations for how the shelter and health care systems can better meet the needs of youth experiencing homelessness.
• United Way for Southeastern Michigan launches a five-year Financial Well-Being Innovation Challenge to solicit, pilot, and scale ideas for improving the financial well-being of Detroiters. Research by Poverty Solutions informed the developmet of the challenge, and Poverty Solutions staff and research assistants played a pivotal role in providing technical assistance for selected pilot teams and evaluating the impact of their programs.

March 2022

• Patrick Cooney, Luke Shaefer, and Samiul Jubaed continue their series of policy briefs analyzing households’ material hardship levels in the wake of the pandemic. The latest analysis found households were in a better financial position, on average, at the end of 2021 than in 2019, despite widespread joblessness and economic uncertainty. The financial stability was due to the unprecedented, cash-based safety net response by the federal government during the pandemic.

May 2022

• Detroit Metro Area Communities Study continues its representative survey of Detroiters to learn more about their financial situations and attitudes about the COVID-19 vaccine.

June 2022

• The City of Detroit, Enterprise Community Partners, and Poverty Solutions co-authored and published the Detroit Land Contract Buyer Guide that offered step-by-step guidance on how to connect with resources, identify predatory or fraudulent situations, and successfully purchase a house via land contracts. Prior research by Poverty Solutions and Enterprise Community Partners found land contracts are a valuable tool to achieve homeownership, but buyers often lack the support they need to navigate the purchasing process successfully.
• Poverty Solutions researchers led by Alexa Eisenberg analyzed court data and found nearly 90% of eviction cases filed in Detroit during the pandemic came from landlords whose properties were not in compliance with the city’s rental ordinance. Eviction case filings are on the rise in 2022, signaling the potential return to a cycle of mass evictions.

July 2022

• With about half of Washtenaw County’s $71 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds allocated, Poverty Solutions researchers evaluated the county’s spending priorities to offer new insights on strategies to maximize long-term impact and promote equity with the one-time spending.
• Jeffrey Morenoff, professor of public policy and sociology, Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate, and research professor at U-M’s Institute for Social Research; testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs on the magnitude and implications of the undercount of Detroit’s population in the 2020 Census. Poverty Solutions supported an evaluation of the 2020 Census count in Detroit.

August 2022

• The Make It Home program designed to help tenants in Detroit to purchase their homes helped 85% of participants sustain homeownership for four years, an important milestone as owners may start to see the wealth-building benefits and other advantages of homeownership after at least five years of ownership. The Make It Home evaluation was supported by Poverty Solutions and conducted by Roshanak Mehdipanah, associate professor of health behavior and health education, and Margaret Dewar, professor emerita of urban and regional planning at U-M.
• Poverty Solutions staff Jennifer Erb-Downward and Lauren Slagter collaborated with Detroit Phoenix Center to develop a series of communications workshops for its Summer Leadership Academy on owning your narrative, defining your point of view, using data to support your point, and crafting advocacy statements. Detroit Phoenix Center is a nonprofit that serves youth who have experienced homelessness or housing instability.
• A $70,000 grant will enable Natasha Pilkauskas and Katherine Michelmore, both associate professors of public policy; with H. Luke Shaefer, the Hermann and Amalie Kohn professor of social justice and social policy; to examine how the expanded Child Tax Credit impacted low-income households’ experience of material hardship, debt, savings, and employment, with a focus on racial disparities in receipt of the tax credit. They published their findings later in 2022. 

September 2022

• The Transportation Security Index is a novel measure of transportation insecurity developed by researchers co-led by Alexandra Murphy, assistant professor of sociology at U-M and Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate. Their research finds nearly one-quarter of adults age 25 and older in the United States experience transportation insecurity, meaning they are unable to move from place to place in a safe or timely manner. Poverty Solutions provided a seed grant to support the development of the index.

October 2022

• Betsey Stevenson, an economist at the University of Michigan’s Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, begins publishing Rapid Insights analysis of the monthly jobs reports from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, with support from Benny Docter, then senior data and policy analyst at Poverty Solutions.

November 2022

• Alexa Eisenberg, then a postdoctoral research fellow at Poverty Solutions, and Kate Brantley, then a graduate student research assistant at Poverty Solutions, found that with pandemic-era protections expiring, eviction filings in Detroit rose from historic lows to 75% of the pre-pandemic rate as of June 2022.
•  Poverty Solutions developed the Updated Michigan Child Development and Care Subsidy website, in partnership with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, to support child care providers in completing the necessary steps to accept the subsidy. Michigan made a number of changes to its child care subsidy program in the past year, and the website provides information on how to accept the subsidy, the licensing process, payment rates and more. This builds on research to better understand why more families do not access and use Michigan’s Child Development and Care Subsidy.
• National nonprofit SchoolHouse Connection, in partnership with Poverty Solutions, released a report that found 311,961 children under age 3 are estimated to be experiencing homelessness across 20 U.S. States, and only 7% are enrolled in an early childhood program.

December 2022

• Mara Ostfeld, who was then the associate faculty director of communications at Poverty Solutions, was named the inaugural research director of the Center for Racial Justice (CRJ) at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy.

2023

January 2023

• Poverty Solutions is named a member of the Michigan Unemployment Insurance Agency’s Modernization Workgroup, which will advise the UIA on significant improvements in how it can better serve Michigan workers and employers.
• Terri Friedline, associate professor of social work and faculty affiliate of Poverty Solutions, published a policy brief on how public banking could address Chicago residents’ complaints about private banks and lenders.
• As police departments and activists look for strategies to reduce excessive use of force by police, new research from Poverty Solutions’ Trevor Bechtel, Mara Ostfeld, and Luke Shaefer shows limited data, lack of transparency and irregular implementation of reforms make it difficult to determine which approaches are effective.

February 2023

•  Lisa Lapeyrouse, associate professor in the Department of Public Health and Health Sciences at the University of Michigan-Flint, and her partners launched Beyond Rhetoric, which outlines the process that Flint leaders and public health researchers followed to respond to racism as a public health crisis. The project aims to support other municipalities and organizations in addressing the links between racism and health outcomes. Poverty Solutions provided seed funding for this project through its 2020 Confronting and Combatting Racism faculty grants.
• National nonprofit SchoolHouse Connection and Poverty Solutions released searchable data profiles that make available—for the first time—data on child and youth homelessness at the county and congressional district levels, as well as the national, state, and school district levels. The data profiles raise awareness of the scale and impact of homelessness on children and youth and underscore the need for action to meet their needs.

April 2023

• The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine selected H. Luke Shaefer, then Ford School associate dean for academic affairs, Hermann and Amalie Kohn Professor of Social Justice and Social Policy, and director of Poverty Solutions, to chair the committee on Research Agenda for Improving Economic and Social Mobility in the United States.
• The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation announced its intent to grant up to $15 million over three years to support the launch of Rx Kids, an innovative initiative to provide direct cash payments to mothers in Flint during pregnancy and throughout the first year of a child’s life. The program is led by Dr. Mona Hanna at the MSU College of Human Medicine and Luke Shaefer of Poverty Solutions.

May 2023

• The new Program for Equity in Adolescent and Child Health (PEACH) is supported by C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital, along with 10 clinical departments across Michigan Medicine, as well the Michigan Institute for Data Science, Office for Health Equity and Inclusion, Poverty Solutions, and Precision Health.

June 2023

• A new study conducted by the Wayne State University College of Education’s Detroit Partnership for Education Equity & Research (Detroit PEER) in partnership with Poverty Solutions found that students experiencing homelessness and housing instability are severely under-identified by Detroit schools. The study found that between 11-16% of Detroit students faced homelessness or housing instability in 2021-22, but as many as 3 in 4 of these students were not identified by their schools as homeless.
• The City of Ann Arbor city council selects Poverty Solutions to design, implement, and study the city’s guaranteed income pilot program for entrepreneurs and gig workers with low incomes.
• A new analysis by Alexa Eisenberg and Kate Brantley of Poverty Solutions revealed that pandemic-era emergency rental assistance did not guarantee housing stability for many Detroit tenants. At least $8.2 million in federal emergency rental assistance funds were spent at single-family properties in Detroit where landlords still moved to evict tenants within six months of payment.

July 2023

• The perspectives of Michigan’s local government, public safety, and prosecutorial officials on factors associated with racial justice, public safety policies, and insights on police-community relations in local communities will be the focus of a new two-year study funded by the Joyce Foundation and led by the U-M’s Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy (CLOSUP) and Poverty Solutions.

August 2023

• Mapping poverty in America: Poverty Solutions Director Luke Shaefer’s new book explores “The Injustice of Place”. The book draws from research based on the Index of Deep Disadvantage developed with researchers at Princeton University.
• New research from Poverty Solutions and Wayne State University’s Detroit Partnership for Education Equity & Research (PEER) analyzed survey data with responses from more than 1,400 Detroit parents plus in-depth interviews with 20 parents identified as homeless or housing unstable. A policy brief summarizes themes from the parents’ experiences and offers policy recommendations that would promote housing stability and help ensure Detroit children have an equitable opportunity to learn.

November 2023

• Poverty Solutions and the Opioid Prescribing Engagement Network (OPEN) partnered to create a map of Michigan that shows demographic information with a connection to Opioid Use Disorder. John Bulat, data and policy analyst at Poverty Solutions, worked on the map, which also highlights three county clusters that have been especially affected by the opioid epidemic.

2024

January 2024

• Flint makes history with the launch of Rx Kids, the first citywide maternal and infant cash prescription program in the nation.
• One hundred Ann Arbor entrepreneurs, gig workers, and other independent workers with low incomes received their first guaranteed income payments of $528 as part of the Guaranteed Income to Grow Ann Arbor (GIG A2) pilot program.
• More than 50 lawyers, policymakers, students, and coders from around the country convened over two days at Innovation Workshop 2024: Debt to tackle the pressing issue of debt collection and its impact on Michigan’s families and legal system. Poverty Solutions hosted the student-led event.

February 2024

• The Prosecutor Transparency Project released findings from a multi-year analysis of racial disparities in the prosecutorial system in Washtenaw County. The Prosecutor Transparency Project — a collaboration between the Washtenaw County Prosecutor’s Office, the ACLU of Michigan, the University of Michigan Law School, and the University of Michigan’s Poverty Solutions — seeks to analyze potential racial disparities in decisions made by the Washtenaw County Prosecutor’s Office.

April 2024

• A comprehensive new study led by Jeffrey Morenoff, a professor and associate dean at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy and professor in the Department of Sociology and Population Studies Center, and released by Poverty Solutions concluded that Black homeowner-occupants in Detroit amassed $2.8 billion in added home value between 2014 and 2022, which represents an 80% increase during that time.

May 2024

• As child care providers, parents, policymakers, and researchers wrestle with how to address Michigan’s child care shortage and make the business model work, child care workers – many of whom are parents too – get caught in the middle. Resarch by Poverty Solutions and North Central Michigan College points to potential solutions.
• The burgeoning housing crisis affecting Michigan and much of the nation is addressed in a new report by the University of Michigan in partnership with the Michigan State Housing Development Authority. Roshanak Mehdipanah, an associate professor at U-M’s School of Public Health, director of Housing Solutions for Health Equity, and Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate, spearheaded the analysis.

June 2024

• Detroit Metro Area Communities Study and Michigan Metro Area Communities Study conduct representative surveys to learn more about Michigan residents’ views on immigration, priorities for federal government and local government, intentions to vote in the 2024 elections, and attitudes about the presidential candidates.

July 2024

• Poverty Solutions supported the publication of a series of reports from Detroit Metro Area Communities Study that analyzed how Detroiters’ perceptions of their neighborhoods shifted after Strategic Neighborhood Fund investments.
• Research from Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate Alexa Eisenberg and Kate Brantley, a research area specialist at U-M’s Housing Solutions for Health Equity, documents the far-reaching costs of eviction filings for Pennsylvania tenants who had eviction cases filed against them but experienced a “best-case scenario” in court, meaning they had legal representation and their cases were dismissed, withdrawn, or won.
• Social transfer programs have significant geographic differences in spending that help to reduce income gaps between rich and poor regions of the United States, according to a new study by Poverty Solutions faculty affiliate Robert Manduca, published in Social Service Review.

August 2024

• A study published in Demography by Natasha Pilkauskas and Katherine Michelmore, associate professors of public policy and Poverty Solutions faculty affiliates, and Nicole Kovski, a former U-M postdoctoral fellow now at the University of Wisconsin, found that a temporary, pandemic-era expansion of the Child Tax Credit improved housing affordability for families with low incomes.

September 2024

• Kristin Seefeldt was named acting faculty director of Poverty Solutions for the 2024-25 academic year while inaugural faculty director Luke Shaefer is on sabbatical. Seefeldt, who has served as associate faculty director of Poverty Solutions since 2019, has established a national reputation for her contributions to U-M’s poverty research agenda over the past three decades.
• Significant racial and gender disparities exist in U.S. crime victim compensation programs, revealing Black and Indigenous people as well as survivors of gender-based violence face unique challenges in obtaining financial support, according to a new policy brief by Jeremy Levine, associate professor of organizational studies. The Center for Racial Justice and Poverty Solutions supported the policy brief.

October 2024

• Poverty Solutions to support new NIH health equity research hub at U-M led by the School of Public Health and directed by Justin Heinze and Roshanak Mehdipanah.

November 2024

• Karen Kling, H. Luke Shaefer and Betsey Stevenson with Poverty Solutions co-author a report on the economic and health impacts of paid parental, caregiving, and medical leave. The report was commissioned by the State of Michigan to inform evidence-based conversations around the merits and potential limits of a paid family leave policy.
• Poverty Solutions supports a student-led civic design workshop that reimagines Michigan eviction court forms.

December 2024

• Looking at programs from more than 140 countries, a new study published in The Lancet concludes that large-scale, government-funded child cash transfer programs improve child health outcomes. The study was co-authored by Luke Shaefer of Poverty Solutions with Dr. Mona Hanna of Michigan State University; David Harris, Columbia University and UNICEF Innocenti Global Office of Research and Foresight; Dominic Richardson, The Learning for Well-being Institute in Amsterdam, Netherlands; and Miriam Laker, GiveDirectly in Kampala, Uganda.