Low-Income Populations

This report provides welfare dependence indicators through 2019 for most indicators and through 2020 for other indicators, reflecting changes that have taken place since enactment of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) in 1996.

Prescriptions dispensed for antipsychotics in nursing homes and assisted living facilities increased since the beginning of the pandemic, with 20.8 thousand dispensed in 2020 compared to 20.5 thousand in 2019. This represents a 1.5% increase in total prescriptions since the beginning of the pandemic despite lower resident census levels in long-term care facilities (LTCFs).

This brief identifies methods and emerging strategies to engage people with lived experience in federal research, programming, and policymaking. It draws on lessons learned from federal initiatives across a range of human services areas to identify ways that federal staff can meaningfully and effectively engage people with lived experience. Related Products:

Participation in the social safety net varies widely across programs—from 15 percent among eligibles for subsidized child care (CCDF) to over 75 percent for Medicaid/CHIP and EITC.  Participation differs by race and ethnicity, yet patterns are not consistent. In general rates differ more across programs than between race-ethnic groups.

The COVID-19 crisis has disparately harmed low-income households. Across the United States, systemic inequalities in employment, wage-earning, health, and well-being have been strained for sub-populations facing poverty or near-poverty conditions.

This brief discusses the perspectives of a group of working parents on receipt of federal benefits. Based on focus groups, it examines program design and implementation, participation barriers, and factors that could help working parents more readily reach financial independence. Highlights are:

In focus group discussions with 44 working parents receiving assistance from one or more federal programs, many parents shared the view that increasing earnings involves a number of risks. Participants described the sequence of possible risk events as follows:

This infographic illustrates the intersection of environmental justice with human services policies and programs. It presents key facts about how participants in human services programs are particularly affected by environmental injustice, and the ways in which these programs can help mitigate the effects of environmental issues, including climate change.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had an unprecedented economic and social impact on Americans, with particularly harsh effects on people in certain race and ethnic groups. Public programs intended to address these needs have also had uneven reach, with many less likely to benefit families of color.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused an unprecedented economic crisis with inequitable effects. Overall employment figures mask the disparate impacts on some communities of color, women, and low-wage workers. These groups were more likely to lose jobs, reduce hours worked, or withdraw from the labor market.