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I'm olivia golden
and it's my responsibility to moderate the panel that in an hour will bring coherence
and focus and an agenda
to everything you've heard so far so that's our goal
I want to say thank you before we start to HHS and the administration for children and
families OPRE
for mounting this terrific conference and I want to say thank you to the speakers and the panelists
I certainly haven't been to every session but the ones that I’ve been to have been extraordinary
and I also want to say thank you to the
attentive and energetic people in attendance
I actually didn't guess we’d have anywhere near this number for a last
session after this intensive a period of time so
thank you
so our goal in this hour is to draw this rich conference together and to leave you with focused issues
lessons frameworks
and perhaps even an agenda that you can take back to your work
we have quite different perspectives among us on this team but
overall our goal is to
answer three questions
the first is
what are in our admittedly
idiosyncratic perspectives but
what are the most important lessons
the second is
given this unique moment in time
what did these lessons imply for policy and programs
a lot of the conversation at the conference has been about this moment
so what do we know that ought to shape our actions going forward
and the third question is given this unique moment
what are the next research steps what should researchers be doing
based on what we know already and attempting to inform today going forward
to make sure that we have a lively discussion of these issues
we’ve decided on a format
where each of my colleagues is committed to keeping their opening statement to five
minutes
and then we're going to plunge into a discussion among ourselves to
showcase some of the key issues
we will see if we have time for questions from the floor that we’ll all try to represent
some of the questions that we've been hearing
and then we’ll try to conclude and wrap up
and get you out of here at the end time
of the conversation
I do want to say a couple of sentences about who each of us is there was an
just so you know what perspectives you're getting
there was a session
this morning I think
it was Jack Tweedie - is he still here
somewhere
who said that there were three kinds of people – people who have to make decisions about policy and programs
researchers and intermediaries
and most of us on this panel have been two or three of those things in our own lives
and across the panel we’ve been all of them
just tell you very quickly who’s here
Ron Haskins
who has been essentially involved in the development of welfare reform as staff
director to the house ways and means human resources subcommittee of course then he was a
policymaker or a staffer to policymakers
before and after that a researcher and currently a senior fellow at the brookings institution
and senior consultant at the Annie E. Casey Foundation
Margaret Simms who’s my colleague now at the Urban Institute I think we are three offices apart on
the same hallway
but we have to come here to talk about have time to talk about we're learning
she’s an institute fellow at the Urban Institute she directs the low-income working families program
she was previously Vice President of the joint center for political and economic studies
and has enormous experience as a researcher and author
on a whole range of topics about employment and
training education poverty and particularly effects on African Americans and minority
business development
and Mark Greenberg who directs the georgetown university center on poverty and inequality in public policy
has been a senior fellow at the center for American progress and previously served
as executive director of caps task force on poverty
where he had to
not only I think there’s a fourth kind of person it’s not just people who make decisions or do research its people who
enable large complicated groups of different perspectives
to make decisions and he too is an expert on a wide range of programs
and for those of you who don't know me I have been
in all three of those roles over my career I’m an institute fellow at the Urban Institute
I was formerly assistant secretary at the administration for children and families
at the local level I ran the district of columbia’s department of child and family services
in new york state was the director of state operations
and just to do a commercial announcement although I’m going to come back to it substantively
later on
on july first I have a book coming out from the urban institute press called reforming child
welfare and a lot of the perspectives there have informed how I've been thinking about what we’re doing today
so we’re going to turn to
those three questions
I want to say one more thing to set the context which is
we’re talking about
lessons that have particular applicability at this unique moment in time
so what characterizes this moment in time
and all of my colleagues will have views about that that there have been views in the sessions
but I just want to mention a few things that I've heard over and over I think are really
important
this is a moment obviously of deep economic recession
with potentially long-lasting effects on low-wage workers on children on families
on people we care about deeply so there's a lot of suffering is one characteristic of this moment
its also a moment with deep state budget effects from that recession
and it’s a moment with a large federal response I think the largest
federal domestic policy investment of my professional life time in the recovery act
and of course an activist agenda around a range of issues of importance to us
including health reform
it may be a moment that’s unique politically I think my colleagues will have perspectives on
that of how
the recession and the response have affected that
and it’s a moment when who the children and families are
has changed a lot from if we had had this conference ten years ago
in particular about a quarter of low income kids are the children of immigrants
and that’s greater among the youngest children and finally it's a moment when we have a lot of new knowledge
built over the past decade and reported at this conference
but we also have stark remaining gaps
in knowledge so i'll leave the rest of that
to the discussion
and I will start by asking for our first five minute presentation from Ron Haskins
well I'm glad to be on this panel
because the only way you can summarize a a three day conference in five minutes
is to make simplistic points
and that is my specialty
and to further embellish my reputation I’m going to be a one minute man I’m going to make five points in five minutes
first one is I think it was very wise
of the conference planners to open with a session on large scale experiments I'm sure that
it bored a lot of people to death
but it is really important it is a remarkable thing that has happened
I’m old enough to remember when
people had lots of arguments about whether programs work because they had no idea if they worked
and when you don't have any data you don't know what really works you can say anything you like
and it’s pretty hard to refute the claims so
it they had made a big difference we've actually have knowledge we know things that work things
that don't work
and I think there's a lot of evidence that it’s had
an impact on the political process we now have
wonderful federal web sites like the what works clearing house
a part of the department of education
that tell you approaches and methods that have been used and actually have random assignment experiments and they work
I’m a member of
a group called the coalition for urban evidence-based policy
and they pass word on what works and what doesn't and often get in trouble doing that
and then last and most important
OMB for several years now
they'll be variously watches in the new administration if they continue to have a system called part
in which they tend to carefully evaluate every federal program now most of them now obviously that will be random assignment but
you cannot have accountability without good data and you can can't have good policy without
good accountability so large
experiments are extremely important
and like on to this point the second presentation yesterday morning
but Waldman about federal interagency group that produces the childrens report
is also spectacular
I will bet you that if you did a survey and you told a random sample of Americans
that you know of a case where a bunch of those pointy-headed bureaucrats in Washington DC- got together
and without spending any money figured out a way
to produce a report
that basically was a report card on the status of the nation's children they would not believe
you
and yet that happened they do spend some money now but they started on a shoestring
it's really a remarkable achievement I think it’s a great report it is a report card
on the status of children in America and it's a wonderful thing
third point I think Ellwood and others at this conference were extremely wise to emphasize
I think the most important development in public policy in the united states in social policy in the united
states it’s at least
the war on poverty in nineteen sixty five and that is
that we do have bipartisan agreement that mandatory work is important
but that we need work support so we have to have Medicaid we have to have child care we have to have cash
supplements CITC
now the child tax credit
which has developed even since ninety six
so we do have a wonderful approach I think
that needs to be broadened and strengthened
and that is a very important agenda and never mind a recession and what the
current situation is over the long run
helping more people work - forcing them to if necessary and supplementing their income this is a
very good approach and it is common for what I think is a permanent reduction of poverty
among children
and female headed families were still twenty percent
below where we were
in
ninety three before welfare reform passed
speaking of single parents I think this is the fourth point
Ellwood also emphasized this
I was not able to go to the other sessions I know this has been
a very important
part of the conference
but I think family structure is critical it’s
probably even more important in the long run than work
we have huge problems in our country
and I would say without question I’ll remind again the recession is a permanent condition
unless we do something about the percentage of our kids who are in female-headed or single-parent
families
we will not make great progress
against poverty
poverty in especially female-headed families has always been five or six times greater
than in married couple families
so without any government program we could reduce the poverty rate by thirty percent like
that if we had the same
percentage of our kids in married couple families as we did in nineteen seventy
so there's a
the family structure’s very important I think in this case we’re nowhere on knowledge
or we have very little
and in this regard i'd hope the new administration
certainly they will allow the random assignment experiments from the Bush administration and continue to learn
a lot starting this year I believe there’ll be publications
but I hope they also
leave the hundred million dollars in place
because we need to have a movement in the country where people are out there on the country’s side
trying to figure out
what they can do to support
married couple families
and their ability to rear their
children
when you compromise which we certainly do let’s give them more services
and finally
the worst point of all and not
too much discussion about this
at least when I was here and that is the federal budget
it is completely unsustainable we all say that now like it’s a mantra but it is
and we are now disproportional by the Chinese and by the Saudis and
by the Japanese I think that’s a bad situation to be in we’re about to add a trillion dollars a year as
far as the eye can see and then it's going to go up
as the baby boom retires and Medicare continues so at some day we're going to have a huge
problem and children’s programs will suffer
when that happens thank you. Margaret
well I’m going to resist using my five minutes to refute half of what Ron said
you cant – I made five points
I will pick up on one of his points about work and that is
that over the past ten years we thought of welfare or the dynamic change in welfare
is a focus on work that we expect people to work if they can
and a lot of the sessions in this conference have looked at work and work effort in programs
to increase
attachment to the work force
so what have we learned
I wouldn’t say that
I’ll give
three points
for the most part we could get people jobs if the economy is expanding
we know - second we know less about how
to keep them employed or how to help them get ahead
nevertheless
many families are making ends meet and others are managing by use of debt or Russian
roulette that is
paying
skipping paying
one bill this month and hoping it doesn't hurt you
but that doesn't in any sense mean that we're achieving self-sufficiency
so
I think that if we want to talk about what we need to spend more time on in this
area and that is
how to
keep people employed
and how to help them move to the next level particularly at scale
we heard I think in the first couple of sessions some
things that would suggest there are ways or avenues that we could pursue
one is to think about stacking credentials which
several people talked about
and another which I thought was very intriguing that Mary Jo Bane raised which was the
point of learning from experiences in other countries
because
that's something that we tend not to do which is to look abroad we
think of ourselves as being so unique in the way we’re structured with our federal
system
and on other matters that we would say
oh well we’re
so different we can’t learn from them or we’re more advanced or whatever
as Ron pointed out this is a challenging time to try new things the economy is in bad
shape
and the federal budget will be in even worse shape when we get through pumping out all the stimulus
money
I think Bob Greenstein pointed out that the budget conditions require us to
make
effective use of resources which
suggests that –no- we don't try
we don't suspend trying new things but we focus on
what things can be most effective
and I'm not sure we know the answer to that but this is certainly an opportune
time to experiment
there was a suggestion that new programs focused on low-wage workers could be
part of the next round of stimulus
certainly the discussion about who gets jobs under the first round of stimulus indicate
that
low-wage workers and women will be disadvantaged because of the nature of many of the jobs
in this
in this round of stimulus
what are we
see as challenges in terms of
how we move ahead
I think there's several of them I’ve only mentioned a couple
that were
themes in part of the conference –the change in the composition of the population
and how that affects
the way we think about training
immigrants, a large number of ex-offenders who will
be returning to
the labor market or hopefully returning to the labor market
I think we need to look more at some of the
ways in which employers
and nonprofits can be engaged in both helping people connect to the labor force
and moving into good jobs
I think there are several things about what we need to think about in revamping the public
programs
several sessions talked about
TANF and other programs that really don't teach participants things
that they need to know but teach them things they already know about getting a job
and so it’s kind of like saying well we keep inoculating them
for the same illness even though it doesn't work rather than trying a new treatment
emphasis on staffing and how important that might be
and I think we need to
be more
attentive to how the safety net
has been
needs to be restructured
it's not really structured for long and deep recessions nor is it
really structured in a way that helps people with erratic
work histories
so that it’s predicated on people with
long short periods of unemployment and long periods of employment
on the one hand and forth on the other hand
it’s for people who
don't work so we don't have a real good way of integrating
a truly supportive safety net for people
who have very episodic periods of employment
not through their own fault but often through the nature of their jobs
thank you very much. mark
thank you. so I had the opportunity to speak at an early session on Wednesday
so let me just say in starting out I still believe everything I said then
but I'm not going to repeat the comments that
I made then but I stand by them
so what i'd like to do for my five minutes is just
highlight several things I think were cross-cutting themes
across the sessions
and then specifically apply them in thinking about the time that we
the period that we're in right now
and in particular the relevance for the TANF emergency contingency fund and for looking
ahead to reauthorization
so three things that I would note in particular across
first we've heard repeatedly that
we have a new administration which is deeply committed
to evidence-based policy
we heard it directly from them
and we heard it indirectly from a number of people throughout
it provides extraordinary opportunity as I’ll talk in a moment I think it also
very directly poses some challenges
for states
in the time ahead
second
when we think about evidence-based policy of the question is well what kind of
evidence and
we did hear in the first session about the extraordinary contribution that experimental research
has made and I think
has made an enormous difference in effecting all kinds of aspects
of how we understand the world and think about what needs to be done
at the same time there are also significant limits to what we can learn from experimental research
both the fact that it may take five years to get the answer to something
that when we get the answer we sometimes know there was and impact
but we don't know necessarily what caused it
or how to apply it in other contexts
or how to
answer
the whole range of questions that programs face
on a day-to-day basis
so the recognition of the role of data
both administrative data
at the program level
data from census and other national data sources and the role that
that all potentially
plays in
addressing the day to day questions people necessarily face
finally
we heard from a number of speakers
that this is an important time for thinking big
about how do we connect welfare-to-work efforts to broader questions
about social mobility
that is this time in fact the game changer
for our economy
is it the case that we have sometimes seen modest impact because we have tested modest
innovations
so all those three points I think sort of all
present a context for looking ahead
so as we do look ahead
I would first highlight the
TANF emergency contingency fund
as you appreciate this is five billion dollars it does require
a non-federal contribution
but an opportunity to use for basic assistance longer term or short term benefits
and subsidized employment
to the extent to which
states
don’t use it – it will be extraordinarily difficult in reauthorization to ever make the case that you
need more money
in addition to that
it seems very clear that one of the discussions in the time period to come
in a period of economic downturn
how responsive is this program
and what is the role that it plays in a time of clearly increased need
so it is both a time for being responsive for building the evidence case
and for thinking big
because the experimental research doesn't give us a lot of guidance
about how to think about work-related strategies in a time of very high unemployment
but that is the challenge before us right now
there are a
whole set of other bodies
of work in history
that can help us in thinking about that
but it’s crucial to
to draw the resources at hand
to to build the experience
I would then finally say
as we look ahead
to reauthorization
that
because because the evidence is going to matter
as states put forward where they want to go next
it will be
crucial to put it forward in a context of saying and here's the evidence for why that makes
sense
and that specifically means
not just thinking about
about rigorous experimental data but what questions
ought to be on the table how can you better answer them
by describing who’s in your caseload
who's left your caseload
what the needs are for a broader universe
what approaches
have been most effective
What are the things that are really hard to do under current law
what is the case
for how you would change it and ultimately what are the things that you're prepared
to be held accountable for
so all that before us and I’ll look forward to the discussion
thank you very much
as you can tell already we don’t have a consensus view of the lessons
but we hope we’re going to illuminate to you some of the different perspectives
and I want to start with a question that
came up in different ways in everybody's remarks but most explicitly in Mark’s which is that
those of you in this room particular the state leaders
and researchers are going to be going back to an environment where you have to decide what to
do
in the midst of a deep recession
with high unemployment rates I was just on a panel where
the leader from Georgia the work force program talked about the over nine percent
unemployment rate
so I want to ask everybody on the panel
what do we know and from what sources
that you think should guide us in dealing with today's environment what do we know
for what kind of evidence is it from what kind of research
and how should we use it to guide us
and maybe start with margaret
I think the question is what do we know about which things what do we know about
how do we put people back to work well
clearly I think Mark
mentioned the emergency fund
that is the way in which for twenty cents you can get a dollar’s worth of
of spending in terms of putting people to work I think that’s
but that doesn't you know really solve
your long-term problem
and as it is a time
to think about
economizing so to speak on resources
it might be an opportune time to think about
reducing remaining barriers across
systems
that need to work together
not only in the short run but in the long run
Ron? the first and primary answer which is what actually will happen is people will muddle through
I don't think there are any easy answers I don't think there's anybody up here or any
other panel you could think of is going to say here are the three things to do and everything will
be fine will it won’t be fine it will be very difficult
and a lot of people are going to get hurt
a second thing is I agree with Margaret
get that
five to one match
come up with the twenty
percent somehow
maybe
I don't know the legal restrictions but foundations I know for sure there's some foundations
that are willing to help
and many of you may heard of that but there ought to be some way to get that money and states have
already become expert in figuring out
how to use TANF for everything in the world
so you won’t be
it won’t cramp your style very much if it’s TANF dollars
and the third thing is and very important and this is what I would really focus on like
a laser and all three members of the panel
will disagree with me and when they say so y’all will clap as you did a few minutes ago
cut spending!
governments
waste so much money and
this is a great time to cut spending so of course don’t do it on social programs
and nothing on it helps me but everybody else cut it
I'm tempted to push you on the last one because it's a it's probably different from what most
macro economists would say about the middle of a recession right you want to make the
argument that people should go back now in the states and cut spending? I certainly don't want the federal
government to do it I think they're I mean I don't think any of us
ok i'll speak for myself I do not have the credentials to say that the stimulus package
seven hundred and eighty
billion dollars is really going to do the trick
I have no idea I know economists are split on this
there are a lot of economists that think it doesn’t work
so I would
err on the side as Obama and others did of spending at the federal level if I were
a state I would take advantage of everything I could
but at the state level I think I would try to cut spending yeah
they have no other choice
unlike the federal government they have to balance the books
I think actually well we’ll offer our thoughts about that but
the other question that I want to ask about pushing you for a moment and then go back
to Mark is on the spending in TANF on the sort of relationship between the research and the
politics
you and I did a panel together for state legislators and states
commented
that even if it was the right thing to spend that money in a recession to put people back
to work
that they face political obstacles
perhaps paradoxically because of the consensus you describe that people had in their heads
that TANF ought to be small as their legacy of the past
what would you say to those people about what the research really shows okay the first thing
I would say never mind the research the first thing I would say is that the original
understanding when TANF passed
and there was a bipartisan agreement on this
that TANF can be both
a safety net program and a work program
and in fact at the last minute we had a big fight with democrats and republicans agreed
to put in the contingency fund and to fund it
with entitlement dollars
and states would you know in effect be kind of like a demi grant
so that shows that there was agreement that there should be a mechanism
that more people would come back on the rules during a recession and
i'll just cite one example I saw Don Winstead out there somewhere I mean
I don't think anybody here is prepared to argue that Florida has a wimpy little
program down there
and yet they have had an increase in the rolls and I don't think they're ashamed of that I think
that's what we should do during a recession
and I think it's
fine and excellent
that when they drafted
the new contingency fund
that they put
a work provision in there that you can
any state that wanted to could figure out how to give the money to people who are actually
working
and I think that's an extremely good thing I greatly regret that because the rolls went down
so much most states did not develop programs and there are some serious administrative burdens here
but I think this would be a good time to help people go to work they can use that money
for that purpose. Mark? sure
so first thing to emphasize is considering the relationship between TANF and the UI
the unemployment insurance
I I suspect most people would agree
that for someone who loses their job our first hope would be
that they ought to qualify for unemployment insurance if
at least in a fairly broad range of circumstances
and the importance of the unemployment insurance modernization act is that it
can and should and often is spurring a discussion in states
about
are the rules of our unemployment insurance system
appropriate
and are they currently
screening out
low wage workers
and parents in situations where they really ought to qualify for unemployment insurance benefits
so I would say for any of you and states
if you're not actively involved
in encouraging your state to look at its options under the modernization act you should be
having said that
the reality is
even under
better unemployment insurance rules
there are going to be a set of people who don't qualify
for those benefits
who lose their jobs
for reasons
that aren't going to heed to UI rules and
it does pose at that point the challenge for the TANF system in
addressing the circumstances
of that group
I do think the safety net function is critical and there is plainly a
question about why is it that food stamp rolls have gone up as they have and TANF rolls
have not
as to what states should do
in addition to providing basic assistance
I think the opportunity to explore different approaches to subsidized employment here
is crucial and as emphasized yesterday
there's a lot that can be learned from transitional jobs
but that's not the only model to think about
particularly at a time where with what we
need is counter-cyclical employment
it's also the case that
what we're hearing in the UI discussions is the recognition that for some people this
could be a really good time
to be getting the training they need
to help them be better prepared
for emerging jobs in the next economy and so
recognizing that within TANF despite the very strict rules of
participation rates
and that with creative use of funds that there should be opportunities for
potentially combining work and training
during this period so that families are both able to get by able to maintain connections
to work and able to upgrade
let me just make one comment about all of these reflections because I think they go to sort of the purpose
of this conference which is
we're all giving you our views about
what you should do in a situation that we don't have
recent
random assignment research about right the studies that have been presented at this conference
over the last that come from the last
fifteen years
are not about the specific situation that you're facing but I would just note that
that doesn't mean that these reactions were not informed by evidence and I just wanted
to spend a second
to note the kinds of evidence that I think
have come up in the in these comments and that are particularly important
one is looking to history and its serious research from the past that's been neglected
or
has been out of fashion and I thought the transitional jobs panel
where Cliff Johnson and Dan Bloom talked about looking
back through
world war two and back through CETA PSE and looking at
evidence about what we can do to put people to work that’s now suddenly more relevant as
is
international evidence
second to some degree
research evidence that comes from theories is relevant right the theory
that economists would offer that a downturn is a time for training
alternative views of
the theory about what we should be doing to stimulate the economy
I would note I’m particularly motivated by child development theory that says
the effects of what we're seeing right now could be long-lasting and therefore it's worth
a great deal of intervention to address it
and the final thing I want to say is that descriptive research
is incredibly valuable in this kind of situation Ron alluded to the role of data
there was a conversation in an earlier session about what we know about why people
are not on TANF and why it hasn't responded
well we may not totally be able to answer the why but we actually know a whole lot
about who’s
not on my colleagues
Pam Loprest and Sheila Zedlewski
did a paper that said people with a huge number of barriers to work
are very likely to be not on TANF and disconnected
one possible theory is programs are too complicated to stay on
that may not be what we want in the middle of a recession so
I want to note that
a variety of kinds of research are I think informing
people's advice to you about what to do in this moment
let me turn from that question to a
question that also got a huge amount of discussion which was whether this is a moment of opportunity
it's a difficult moment
but is it a moment of opportunity and we heard multiple views from the panel
with Mark arguing that it is a moment of opportunity Ron I think arguing about the
risks in the federal budget
let me just let everybody give a quick comment about what you see
as the opportunity to seize if there is one
and what you see as the big risk of this moment
who wants to start
go ahead Margaret
well I think the opportunity we've we've already mentioned that it's a
good opportunity for
people to get training
if we can
I think we know enough about
about it to get started in terms of being able to
train folks
I think it's in that regard it's an opportune time to think more about
the nontraditional ways in which
which which it might be done more reliance on working with employers
and employer based training
maybe thinking about some ways of building
building skills in increments to repeat some of the things that
that I've said
I want to come back again to Bob
Greenstein’s point because I think
that we've got a
short term
window where there's a lot of money
out there
or likely will be in terms of
federal support
and a long run period where things are likely to be less generous
so it seems that there are two things we should do during this period take advantage of it
while the money is there
because it will be needed for
for a better foundation for the future
and also to learn more
about
which things work
in less advantageous circumstances so that
when we think about what
funds
could or should be available
that they're used more effective
as effectively as possible use this moment both to spend and to learn
yes. in some ways. Mark?
brief comment and then Ron brief comment
sure so let me say I mean I I’ve already talked a bunch about opportunity I do just want to explicitly
say for state people you know
I appreciate especially those of you dealing with enormous budget deficits how hollow some
of this may sound
and
that in particular you know that in the context of the emergency contingency fund
I wish there wasn't the twenty percent
match I think that that doesn't help the situation
at the same time
it’s there those are the ground rules for operating under and for all the reasons that
we've
that we've talked about I think we've got to make the best of it
I do think that
as we
also look
ahead to reauthorization
that that is the opportunity there
not just
to talk about how do we fix the nuts and bolts around participation rates
but what do you want to do next
and what’s the vision for
the role that this block grant plays within
broader
safety net
poverty policy mobility policy
to be able to articulate it
and to be able to say it has to be
about more than dealing
with what’s now a relatively small share
of the poor with a
focus on reducing a caseload and it presents a challenge as what it is
but I think that's the conversation we have to have
Ron opportunity risk or both
okay mark me down as this is not a great time of opportunity
but still I think they're a few things that do make sense one is I’ve already said I
think is a great time for states to develop work programs
the vision
of ninety six welfare reforms is that
all the states would have
really strong work programs community work work experience as we called it in those days transitional jobs
whatever you want to call it
but they would have the administrative capacity
which we have shown over and over again is really crucial
so this is the time to try to develop that and to do it
with the federal dollar
you know four dollars for every dollar you spend
second as I’ve said cut spending
government's too big we're going to have to cut spending at both the state and federal
level we do not have any choice so we need to figure that out now’s a good time to start
on that
and then
in using the federal stimulus money the states have got to really think through
what happens at the end
of two years when the money goes down
they have to figure out ways to spend the money
that they're not
suddenly a bunch of kids are going to be out of child care
that would be a bad thing to do
and would actually
could impede a recover so
that needs to be thought through very carefully what scholars should do
I think there's a huge
scholarly issue here and it’s
what is a safety net during the time of high unemployment
I don't think we know the answer to that and
I think they're things we can do to help people get back in the work force more quickly
training is obviously one part of the answer but we need a lot broader thinking
and careful studies and now you know our lab is all set up out there we
have misery all around the country
so what are we trying to do what should we do
what do people do that works I think it's we really have a big need to be looking
at that we should spend some money doing that
let me use that as a springboard to a next to last question
about the opportunities for research to influence policy and politics there was some discussion
in a number of panels about the disconnect
more about the opportunities
Ron started off by saying that he thinks research has influenced policy
and I just want to ask everybody
for them for the perspective of people in this room
who are researchers at least in part of their time
is this a good time to influence is it a bad time is it a time when
policymakers elected and appointed are too busy to even pay attention or is it is it
a good time
I have some perspectives and have written some about this issue so I’m going to comment
as well but let me
let me see what my colleagues think
what does it take for research to influence policy and is this a good moment
go ahead. sure sure
so first I don't wish to sound pollyannish about this I mean we
know what we are encouraged by what we're hearing from the administration but
obviously politics plays a big role in the world too
and we've had less discussion about a
this evidence-based emphasis in congress
it's
you know what I would what i'd emphasize here
is that
research I think has its biggest impact
when it either tells people what they want to hear
or when it’s a situation
where people genuinely don't know the answer and genuinely are open
to learning it
it I think has it's least impact
when it
tells people things that they don't want to hear
or in situations where it in some ways goes contrary to the values that people bring
to the conversation
and I suspect people entirely appreciate this but
in a world where the administration congress everybody else is
overwhelmed by a large number of issues in a very
fast moving environment that
the ability to convey
research findings with
integrity clarity but
really quickly
is just crucial in order to be effective
the logic of this is that research should apply going down or coming up
I mean if you
have something that produces effects
then it should
that's what you don't want to cut
and in good times you want to spend more money on that kind of program so I think the logic
holds
whether congress is cutting things or expanding things
I do think there's a broader kind of a vision issue here for researchers and
for
people who think about policy and that is
and let me go back to that part
program that I
cited earlier
it would be good if going into a recession we knew the effects of all the programs the government is running
because in that way policymakers really would be able to decide
they've got to cut they're going to cut we know they're going to do that
and politics plays way too big a role in that if they actually have data and they were in the
habit of using data
they would cut where it would do the least damage
and some things could be cut that would probably do no damage
other than the more broader the broader point about government spending being a stimulus during
the economy
the government spends a lot of money that you
I'm thinking of agricultural spending for example
that other than this broader effect I think it’d
be good to cut but there's certainly a continuum of programs
this would be very bad to cut
this is not a time to cut education for example
although many states will
all the way down to things that
probably will not produce
big negative impacts if we cut them
the things that I would add about the role of research at this kind of moment coming back a little
bit from I had the chance to reflect on this for a piece on
research in early childhood
and I would say which maybe echoes Mark’s point a little bit that
unsettled moments even though researchers hate them researchers are typically by temperament
people who
like the world to be calm and without a lot of big conflict but in fact
high conflict high uncertainty moments are moments when people
are not totally confident about their prior views and are I think often open to research
I think that synthesis research has more effect often than single studies because
it enables people to know what
overall is thought
and I would say and this is a point that I think several people have mentioned
that in a time when
everything you're doing is experimental because its new and we haven't had an economic slowdown this deep in
our professional lifetimes
then the collection of data not cutting away resources
[inaudible] Margaret did I
fail to give you a chance to comment there
[inaudible]
is that better
okay I would add that
researchers
tend to have a
the view that
let's point out the limitations of the study rather than the strengths of the study and
I think this is the a time to kind of switch the emphasis
so it should be brief clear and
and highlights not lowlights
because lowlights don't help
policymakers very much
I'm reminded Ed Zigler once said that he was told when he first had to testify before
the congress that the problem with economists is they have too many hands meaning
on the one hand on the other hand on the other hand
or researchers in general and that he had to learn how to pull out what was
most important
Ed Zigler also said
once that we could
close one third of head start centers without noticing the difference I don't think he’d
say that during a recession
no and I also don't think he'd say that now that we have research about its benefits
but he definitely but we’ll come back to that topic i think he’d be more likely to say it now no he helped us design the research 0:44:43.819,0:44:44.669 the
one last question and then I think we're going to try to wrap it up and send you on
your way
we've talked about states
we’ve talked about researchers in general
but our hosts of this are OPRE
at the administration for children and families
and I wonder if we would have some parting advice for them for the federal agency
that's charged with delivering administering
and studying the core programs that we we have here any
I know we could talk about that for four days each but
just two one or two parting bullets of advice
for ACF. Mark brief
so first let me actually just along with others commend
OPRE for this conference which I think has been spectacular
I also think
actually particularly while many sessions were good
I thought that the session this morning
that provided the opportunity for
conversations
between state policy makers and researchers
was particularly strikingly useful
and I would say for OPRE in moving forward
exploring the opportunities to foster those conversations so it is a much more ongoing interactive
process. thank you. Ron
continue to emphasize the work agenda
and try to save as much of the marriage
spending as possible. Margaret
I would say to kind of pick up on a point that Mark said or you said about synthesis
work that
it that this has been a very informative and very useful conference but
for purposes of
policy and thinking about next steps it might be useful if there's a way of
pulling together some of the strands and
highlights about the work in a way that it can inform
people going forward
and I also was struck I’m not sure if this is was in your thought Margaret that the conference
did go well beyond the programs that ACF directly runs in the health session
in work force sessions and broader safety net sessions
and to me the agenda going forward and
an important role for a research agenda is to provide
coherence and a way for people who may operationally
be living in different worlds to think much more clearly about how their pieces fit
together
I’m going to try to
offer some concluding remarks that try to
tie together from my own perspective and pull in a little little more of the
children and family panels
but first let me offer the other panel members the chance to say
any last word that was stimulated for them by this discussion and let me ask people
not to repeat points they've already made but to add anything that at this point they feel
we didn't get to that’s important to get to. Ron
see you next year
okay. Margaret? ditto. the same
okay
I'm thinking that was applause for the richness of the prior comments not only for the
brevity of the current ones
so
I wanted to take the opportunity to pull together a few of the threads that particularly struck me
a couple overall points and a few points specifically about the children's agenda and then
close with some thoughts about research and policy
the first
point that I would make overall
is just that this is a time of very serious distress for low-income individuals for children
for families for communities and for states
I take very seriously the evidence that the effects
particularly for the most vulnerable particularly for children and young people but also for
low wage workers
likely persist for a long time and so to me
even though it’s easy
to jump to the question of programs or the question of
big picture opportunities or risks
it is crucial to start at the state and federal level
with the distress that’s being experienced and the question of what we can do to ameliorate
or to prevent future outcomes
the second thing is that like Mark I am also by nature an optimist
so I actually see a very big opportunity
in the federal response in the recovery act
and in other examples that suggests to me
a federal a much greater level of federal attention
to low-income kids and families health reform
and CHIP reauthorization obviously being very
big ones and ones that people in this room who care about children and families
and low income workers
should be figuring out how to connect to
and to me
in some ways the biggest opportunity is an unfrozen policy context that is
a world where a lot of what we thought we know have been blown up
is actually I think as I said a moment ago
a good world for researchers and policy thinkers and a world with opportunities for improvements
so those to me are the
are the big picture
I would say three things about the agenda for children and I didn't get to all
the sessions so these are partly my own reflections
and partly guided by the book that as I said I've just completed which focuses on the most
vulnerable child welfare
the first theme that I would highlight
is the opportunities for two generational solutions for programs and strategies
right now at the state level and the federal level
that address kids and their parents
that’s a theme
that we've known about for a long time in the child development world we know it matters
in many of the worlds
that study troubled families
the needs are very evident I was just in the youth panel
where the survey from NSCAW from the survey of
children who’ve encountered the child welfare system shows a very large proportion of those
children as adolescents being parents themselves
and raises huge issues about the need for two generational interventions
we also know some things from random assignment research about programs that work I just want
to build on
the mentions of early head start in earlier panels we know from that research for example
that there can be a positive cycle from two generational programs if you improve the well-being
of the children
that makes them easier to parent and that can improve some underlying circumstances for
parents so
we haven't we've known it as a theme for a long time
and the recovery act although I'm sure almost sure that this wasn't deliberate
offers resources that address both children's needs and their parents needs at the same time
in a way far more focused than the federal budget as a whole its way more oriented towards
children and
its way more oriented towards low income parents
and so the combination of resources for child care early head start head start schools
at the same time that you have resources for parents
is one that we should be
seizing in creative states and we should be studying for the future so two generational is one theme
the second theme which I’ll just mention briefly is that clearly
we have an opportunity for to advance on early childhood given the administration's
interest
and I just want to note that again in the light of this conversation about what
research is relevant
that we have a lot of research that we haven’t recently
been using fully as many of you know I have sort of a personal stake
in the early had start and head start random assignment research having chaired the groups
that develop them
that early head start kids are now in third grade we know from the fifth from the age
five evaluation
that some of the findings were looking
better and better for the most troubled kids we ought to be trying to find out what happens
to them in the school year
the head start evaluation is virtually unique
in telling us something not only about pilot programs
but about a huge
system it's a random sample of programs nationwide in a system that serves a million kids
and it tells us a huge amount about the control group kids what's happening in those early
childhood systems so
we have an opportunity we should mine the research
third big opportunity I would highlight for children is of course
health reform chip reauthorization and Medicaid
there was a very good panel in one of the breakout sessions
offering us lots of insights from what we know already
and I just want to give you the headline that everybody in this room who cares about low
income families or low-income kids
should be trying to find ways either in your state or nationally
to connect to the health world it’s a world that's in
transition
in the states with CHIP reauthorization and
potentially Medicaid choices and in the nation with health reform
and there are enormous opportunities in my book I got very focused for example on the
opportunities
if we can make treatment for depression which we know how to treat
in low-income parents
we can make that available we have potential for a big impact on children so I would just
urge you to push
last thoughts to tie together about the role of research and we've talked about some of
that here
why was this effective conference so important right now
because this is a moment
when past
pre views have been unfrozen
and what does that say about what you should do in the way of research in this time
the first thing is when decisions are being made quickly
it's crucial to use
the research we have effectively
and we’ve said some of that in this panel
but I just want to underline that we have more research than we think
and the reason for that is that people turn to research
when it answers a question they have in their head
and if their questions we haven't had for a while like what you do in a deep recession
what do you do if you have the opportunity to expand health coverage what are the most
high
payoff opportunities
if you have questions that you haven't had in the past
the research that relates to those can be buried in
in a library and you need to go get it I thought the PSE and transitional jobs panel
was very effective on that
Demetra Nightingale made a comment in the panel this morning
on the implementation research and how much it tells us
you have to look broadly across countries in fields and historically
to find the research you need
second theme and again this is one that I've been thinking about a lot for my book
is that this is a moment when research about implementation matters too we should be looking
not only at what we know about
results but about what we know about making our systems work the biggest example of what
we need to know right now I suspect for those of you
in states that are trying to gear up really fast to respond to recovery act deadlines
what do we know about gearing up effectively
about gearing up in ways that are cross agency and respond to the breadth and the opportunity
of the recovery act
what do we know about collecting data that will
galvanize effective response I would argue that we know some things about all those things
we can know more and we should know more
but that really matters
right now as well
next to last point about the research
is and I think
everybody said this I know Ron said it
this is a moment
to learn much more we should be using effectively what we
know
but it's also a moment to learn
I would highlight his point and I think
Mark made it too
that what we know quickly
say within the next
eighteen months to two years
shapes a very big set of decisions reauthorization decisions budget decisions so we have to be
planning some of our learning
not on a five-year time line but on a twelve
to eighteen to twenty four month timeline in that timeline we can be collecting a lot
of data
we can be tracking implementation
we can be experimenting in ways that give us early information
as states make different choices taking advantage of natural experiments and
the urban institute has done some thinking about what such an agenda would look like but
I know
others have as well
and I would just close by saying what I said a moment ago
that even though I suspect that both for the policy people and the research people in this
room
times of uncertainty and conflict can be uncomfortable that
in my view if you look back
and think about the moments of greatest
creativity the moments when
our ideas and our thoughts have paid off the most
it often is in those moments of uncertainty
and of conflict and
perhaps even moments that are a little bit frightening and I
want to close with a comment that somebody made to me in the very first months of the Clinton administration
when I was
bringing together focus groups to help me think about how to implement
family the family support legislation anybody here remember that
which was a first time attempt to connect the child welfare world and the community prevention
world
and we had focus groups about what to do
because it was a moment
when we didn’t know it all
and somebody said to me in one of the groups
Olivia are you frightened about this
and I said
I'm not sure I’m exactly frightened I mean I think the stakes are high I think we don't know
what to do and I’m kind of excited I don't think that I’m actually frightened
and he said to me
if you're not frightened you're not thinking big enough
and I found that a very helpful lesson
and I would pass it on not fear to the point of paralysis
but fear in the sense that we know the stakes are high
and that it's really important to choose the right thing
so thank you thanks for the opportunity to close this extraordinary conference and thanks to OPRE