In this update, we use more recent LODES data from 2018 to provide updated estimates of the number of jobs of residents at the census tract level. Residence Area Characteristics (RAC) data from LODES used in this analysis describe the characteristics of jobs summarized by the residence of the worker, here summarized at the census-tract level. These data replace the 2017 RAC data that were being used in previous releases of the tool. Data are updated from 2017 to 2018 for all states except Alaska, for which data are not available for either 2017 or 2018. We continue to use data from 2016 for tracts within Alaska. In previous releases of the tool, Worker Area Characteristics data (which are an input for RAC) were unavailable in South Dakota for 2017, so we used 2016 data to account for undercounts in the tracts surrounding and within South Dakota. These 2017 and 2018 data have now been backfilled, so we no longer use the older 2016 data for these tracts. As with previous releases of these data, no federal jobs are included in this analysis.

The nonprofit Urban Institute is a leading research organization dedicated to developing evidence-based insights that improve people's lives and strengthen communities. For 50 years, Urban has been the trusted source for rigorous analysis of complex social and economic issues; strategic advice to policymakers, philanthropists, and practitioners; and new, promising ideas that expand opportunities for all. Our work inspires effective decisions that advance fairness and enhance the well-being of people and places.

This deliverable describes the techniques developed in WP4 for protecting data and computations in the digital data market. In particular, the document focuses on the techniques developed for supporting controlled data sharing for collaborative queries and fine-grained data retrieval. The model and techniques described enable the involvement of the data market in the execution of queries over data stored either in plaintext or encrypted form, possibly delegating parts of the execution to external parties when economically convenient while fully respecting the security policies associated with data. During the query execution, data can be dynamically wrapped and unwrapped to regulate visibility over them. Fine-grained data retrieval is instead supported through the definition of a multi-dimensional index that is robust against inference exposure and supports the efficient execution of point and range queries over encrypted data. The experimental evaluation over a dataset with 3.2M data items shows that the multi-dimensional index performs well for query execution and requires limited storage at the client-side.

The Institutions for Mental Diseases (IMD) exclusion prohibits use of federal Medicaid funds to treat enrollees ages 21–64 in psychiatric residential treatment facilities that have more than sixteen beds. In 2015 the federal government created a streamlined application pathway for state waivers of this rule to allow Medicaid coverage for substance use disorder (SUD) treatment in residential facilities. Nine states received IMD waivers during the period 2015–18. Using data from the 2010–18 National Survey of Substance Abuse Treatment Services, we examined changes in residential and outpatient SUD treatment facilities’ acceptance of Medicaid and other types of health coverage, as well as self-pay arrangements and provision of charity care, after states’ adoption of IMD waivers. Acceptance of Medicaid increased 34 percent at residential treatment facilities and 9 percent at intensive outpatient facilities two years after waiver implementation. Delivery of medications for opioid use disorder did not increase in residential facilities post waiver but did increase to some extent in outpatient facilities. Our findings suggest that IMD waivers may be an important tool for advancing access to a full continuum of SUD treatment for Medicaid enrollees.

Objective: To examine the changes in health insurance coverage, access to care, and health services utilization among nonelderly sexual minority and heterosexual adults between pooled years 2013-2014 and 2017-2018. Data Sources: Data on 3223 sexual minorities (lesbians, gay men, bisexual individuals, and other nonheterosexual populations) and 86 181 heterosexuals aged 18-64 years were obtained from the 2013, 2014, 2017, and 2018 National Health Interview Surveys. Study Design: Unadjusted and regression-adjusted estimates compared changes in health insurance status, access to care, and health services utilization for nonelderly adults by sexual minority status. Regression-adjusted changes were obtained from logistic regression models controlling for demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. Principal Findings: Uninsurance declined for both sexual minority adults (5 percentage points, P <.05) and heterosexual adults (2.5 percentage points, P <.001) between 2013-2014 and 2017-2018. Reductions in uninsurance for sexual minority and heterosexual adults were associated with increases in Medicaid coverage. Sexual minority and heterosexual adults were also less likely to report unmet medical care in 2017-2018 compared with 2013-2014. Low-income adults (regardless of sexual minority status) experienced relatively large increases in Medicaid coverage and substantial improvements in access to care over the study period. The gains in coverage and access to care across the study period were generally similar for heterosexual and sexual minority adults. Conclusions: Sexual minority and heterosexual adults have experienced improvements in health insurance coverage and access to care in recent years. Ongoing health equity research and public health initiatives should continue to monitor health care access and the potential benefits of recent health insurance expansions by sexual orientation and sexual minority status when possible.

Asthma is one of the leading chronic airway diseases among children in the United States and across the world. Emerging evidence indicates that traffic-related air pollution leads to the onset of childhood asthma. In this work, the researchers estimated the number of incident asthma cases among children attributable to three common traffic-related air pollutants across the contiguous United States for the years 2000 and 2010, noting changes and trends in the burden of disease over this decade. Because burden of disease assessments typically rely on national-level incidence rates for the health outcomes of interest, the researchers also explored, in a nested sub-study, the impact of using a constant national-level childhood asthma incidence rate versus a more granular spatially varying rate at the state level. In this sub-study, the researchers focused on one pollutant and one year and estimated the burden of incident childhood asthma cases attributable to nitrogen dioxide (NO₂), a criteria pollutant and a good marker of traffic, in the contiguous United States. This report presents the first study to estimate the childhood asthma burden of disease on a national scale for the contiguous United States and also presents the results for the major 498 cities and every county in an interactive, accessible, and open-access manner. The researchers utilized the best available data sets and state-of-the-art research—using small-scale geographical units for both the census data and air pollution exposure estimation, and meta-analysis-derived exposure-response functions from the most recent and largest study that linked traffic-related air pollution to the onset of childhood asthma. The combination of this effort and using a standard burden of disease assessment framework enabled the researchers to estimate the burden of new childhood asthma cases attributable to NO₂, PM₂.₅, and PM₁₀ both separately and over a decade’s period. The attributable burden of childhood asthma dropped by 33 percent between 2000 and 2010. However, a significant proportion of cases can still be prevented. The researchers also estimated new state-specific asthma incidence rates for the contiguous United States. Using state-specific incidence rates versus a constant national incidence rate resulted in a small change in the NO₂-attributable burden of disease at the national level but had a more prominent impact at the state level, which may have important implications for monetary evaluation and the regulatory process.

We analyze the link between agricultural productivity growth and fertility rates, using the oil palm boom in Indonesia as an empirical setting. We find consistent negative effects of oil palm expansion on fertility during the period 1996-2016. This finding appears to be linked to rising farm profits that led to consumption growth, an expansion of the non-agricultural sector, increasing wage returns to education and higher school enrollment. Together, these findings suggest that agricultural productivity growth can play an important role in accelerating the fertility transition, as long as the economic benefits are large enough to translate into local economic development.

The U.S. Asian population is diverse. A record 22 million Asian Americans trace their roots to more than 20 countries in East and Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent, each with unique histories, cultures, languages and other characteristics. The 19 largest Asian origin groups in the United States together account for 97% of the nation’s total Asian population. Below are key findings about these Americans. (This analysis includes all those who identify their race as Asian alone or as part of a multiracial background, regardless of Hispanic origin. It is accompanied by updated fact sheets that describe key demographic and economic characteristics of each of Asian origin group, as well as by another analysis that details the diversity of origins within the Asian American population.)

The Connecticut Department of Housing, in conjunction with Connecticut Department of Social Services, commissioned this study of affordable and accessible housing in May 2020 to examine how strategic deployment of state resources could best meet the current and future housing needs of Connecticut’s vulnerable and low-income residents. This report provides the first comprehensive look at affordable and accessible housing needs in Connecticut. Prepared collaboratively by Fairfield County’s Center for Housing Opportunity, Urban Institute, Corporation for Supportive Housing, Data Haven, and Source Development Hub (the study team), the data presented here inform the following questions: Who lives in Connecticut, and what kind of housing do they occupy? Are affordable housing resources meeting resident needs? Are accessible housing resources meeting resident needs? What can Connecticut do to best meet the current and future housing needs of low-income households and households that include someone with a disability? Questions about affordable and accessible housing resources and needs are answered based on the present situation in the state and its counties and the study team’s projections of future needs. The concluding chapter provides policy and program recommendations for the state to address the affordable and accessible housing gaps identified in the analysis, as well as to improve the state’s ability to have reliable data for tracking progress toward housing goals and outcomes. The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 has indisputably highlighted the critical role that safe, stable, affordable, and accessible housing plays in the well-being of households and communities. The disparity in housing opportunity by income level, race, and zip code laid bare by the pandemic and economic turndown underscores the importance of data-driven policymaking and community planning and development. The study team hopes that our analysis, findings, and recommendations can guide Connecticut in a targeted, proactive, and holistic approach to ensuring the housing needs of all residents are met going forward. This report is written for a non-expert audience. Where it is necessary to use technical terms, those terms are explained in the text and exhibits. Additional definitions can be found in appendix A. Although counties do not have governing bodies, they are the primary unit of analysis because of their consistency over time, regional implications, and widely available aggregated data.

This dissertation studies spillovers in urban and housing markets. The first chapter studies the micro-structure of segmented local housing markets. With housing transactions data on 188 U.S. cities from 2000 to 2015, this chapter builds a workhorse model to study house price dynamics that includes supply side differences across cities. I show that heterogeneity in supply responses cross-sectionally is key to explain price changes overtime in an assignment model framework. The market clearing process in the assignment model operates in a vertically ranked order and matches the joint distributions of households and houses, generating two countervailing forces where demand spills upwards and supply is added from the top down. These two forces result in mismatch in demand and supply at some segments which causes general equilibrium spillovers to prices in other segments. I structurally estimate the spillovers, show they drive house price segmentation, and account for 8% of variation in prices on average. These findings p rovide n ew i nsights o n w ithin-market G E spillovers across price ranks in local housing markets, and help us understand how supply side housing policies could have substantial amplification effects beyond their targeted segments through this mechanism. The second chapter studies telecommunications infrastructure and productivity. Broadband Internet is considered an important determinant of economic and population growth. I estimate the effect of Internet infrastructure on the population and employment growth of U.S. cities over 20 years period after the Internet became widely available in the 1990s. I employ an instrumental variables strategy which uses AT&T Long Lines of 1960 to address the concerns that the location of Internet network is not random. I find t hat a 1 0% i ncrease i n a city’s I nternet i nfrastructure c auses about 1.7% i ncrease in its population and 2.4% increase in its service sector employment.

We quantify the joint impact of the China shock and automation of labor, across US commuting zones (CZs). To this end, we employ a multi-sector gravity model of trade with Roy-Fréchet worker heterogeneity across sectors, where labor input can be automated. Automation and increased import competition from China are both sector-specific; they lead to contractions in a sector's labor demand and a decline in relative income for CZs more specialized in that sector, amplified by a voluntary reduction in hours worked and an increase in frictional unemployment. The estimated model fits well with the aggregate performance of the manufacturing subsectors and with the variation across CZs in changes in average income, the hourly wage, hours worked, the employment rate and employment in manufacturing. The China shock contributes almost as much as automation to the distributional effect of the combined shock, but its impact on aggregate gains is less than half of automation's impact.

Using U.S. Census data fitted into a series of cross sectional quantitative models, this dissertation estimates how ethnoracialization molds immigrants’ socioeconomic outcomes, after controlling for their demographic and human capital endowments and the spatial context in which they live. Although extensive research exists on the relationship between human capital, income and social status and the unequal socioeconomic outcomes of immigrant groups, little attention has been given to how the ethnoracial heterogeneity within and between immigrant groups affects unequal outcomes. To contribute to fill this void, this dissertation presents three analyses that build on one another by exploring how ethnoracialization helps shape socioeconomic outcomes through time and space while paying particular attention to the interaction between country of origin, race, English proficiency, legal status, and the educational attainment of immigrants. The studies find evidence that strongly suggest the presence of structural ethnoracialization at the national, regional and metropolitan scales that mediates the economic integration of immigrants, especially those with high levels of education, into the U.S. economy. Specifically, results point to a patterned division of outcomes where immigrants from some Asian countries such as India and China are positively ethnoracialized, and consistently place at the top of all measured outcomes (income, socioeconomic status, occupational status, and skill-job matching probabilities), while Latin Americans, especially Mexicans and Central American, who tend to be negatively ethnoracialized, place at the bottom.

The 2019 novel coronavirus disease pandemic poses a serious threat. While its short-term effects are evident, its long-term consequences are a matter of analysis. In this work, the existence of long-lasting negative effects derived from exposure in utero to a great pandemic -1918 influenza pandemic- is analysed for the Argentine case. Outcomes of interest include educational achievement and unemployment status in adulthood -50 years after the pandemic. Based on a regression analysis, temporal differences in the spread of the pandemic and between close birth cohorts are exploited. The results indicate a significant reduction in educational achievement for people exposed in utero to the pandemic. In the region with the highest incidence of cases (Noroeste), this reduction is 0.5 years of education. There are no significant changes in the chances of being unemployed. In the context of climate change, these results constitute a call of attention for the implementation of child protection policies from gestation.

Workplace flexibility policies, which provide control over the timing and location of work, are a family-friendly resource that may facilitate increased father-child time. Yet, research on this relationship often focuses narrowly on “childcare time,” which not only overlooks the majority of time fathers spend with their children, but also neglects fathers’ accessibility to and responsibility for children as well as the co-presence of the mother. This limits our understanding of how flexibility policies might enhance family well-being and mitigate persistent gender inequalities. Using the 2017-2018 American Time Use Survey Leave Module, this study examines the relationship between flextime (control over start and end times) and flexplace (working from home) policies and different-sex partnered fathers’ time with children. Access to and use of flexibility policies are associated with more family time with children–when the mother is also present. This includes not only time in childcare but also other activities such as meals as well as supervision or accessibility. However, there are no differences in fathers’ solo parenting time. Ultimately, these findings elucidate a more comprehensive picture of how flexibility policies might shape father involvement, and complicate our understanding of the consequences of flexibility for family well-being and gender inequality.

This collection of essays examines two important episodes in the U.S. economic history. First two chapters explore health and economic legacy of pesticide revolution in the United States. Chapter 1 aims to understand how environmental legacy of modern farming will affect health of future generations and rural economies in the long term. To do so, I study historical lead and arsenic use in agriculture and their long-run effects on rural health and local economies. Combining historical farm data with death records for Pennsylvania farm households, I document farm-level exposure to lead and arsenic was linked to increased risk of mortality from cancers related to chronic arsenic exposure. I then show long-run health of individuals living in areas exposed to these substances in high levels was also impacted. Extending my analysis to 18 additional states, I find similar results. I provide suggestive evidence on relative decline in total farmland area, possibly due to increased soil toxicity, and in housing prices in affected areas after public became more aware of pesticides’ harmful effects. Chapter 2, co-authored with Maria Lucia Yanguas, explores how individuals react to new information about environmental quality. We investigate the effect of dissemination of environmental information on economic activity, exploiting the 1962 publication of environ- mental science book Silent Spring. We find that Silent Spring was associated with lower migration and farmland values in pesticide-intense areas, and ambiguous effects on house values. This supports the hypothesis that economic agents react to new information on environmental quality. Results are persistent over time. Chapter 3, co-authored with Eric Chyn and Bryan Stuart, studies the impact of the Great Migration on children. We use the complete-count 1940 Census to estimate selection- corrected place effects on education for children of Black migrants. On average, Black chil- dren gained 0.8 years of schooling (12 percent) by moving from South to North. Many counties that had the strongest positive impacts on children during the 1940s offer relatively poor opportunities for Black youth today. Opportunities for Black children were greater in places with more schooling investment, stronger labor market opportunities for Black adults, more social capital, and less crime.

Recent years have seen increased attention to the problem of hate crime, including such crime motivated by anti-gay bias. Although there is a growing body of research regarding the context of hate crime offending, there is a relative dearth of work investigating the community-level context of anti-gay hate crime. The current study investigates the community-level determinants of anti-gay hate crime in New York City from 2006 to 2010, using data obtained from the New York Police Department (NYPD)’s Hate Crimes Task Force (HCTF), one of the nation’s leading hate crime police units. Using a framework drawing on group conflict and criminological theories, the current study examines anti-gay hate crime as an outcome of gay visibility, social disorganization, and economic strain. It is hypothesized that greater gay visibility, as well as social disorganization and poor and worsening economic conditions over time will be associated with increases in anti-gay hate crime. Results show that gay demographics, measured by static visibility and increasing gay populations over time, are shown to consistently predict higher levels of anti-gay hate crime. Adding to the generally mixed findings on the role of economic conditions in explaining hate crime, this study also finds that anti-gay hate crime occurs in more disadvantaged communities and communities marked by poorer economic conditions. The findings show anti-gay hate crime to be an outcome of gay visibility, disadvantage, and poor economic conditions, indicating that anti-gay crime may be an angry response to the strains present in the community. The study concludes with a discussion of the findings and implications for policy makers and practitioners.

OBJECTIVES: Sleep has consistently been shown to have a dyadic nature among married older adults; however, less is known about the influence of a spouses' social characteristics on one's own sleep. Focusing on older adults, we examined the association between one's spouses' educational attainment and one's own sleep duration. METHOD: We used the 2004-2018 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) to analyze heterosexual married adults aged 50-84 (N = 89,180). Respondents reported typical sleep duration in a 24-hr period, which was categorized as short (≤6 hr), normal (7-8 hr), or long (≥9 hr). We fit multinomial logistic regression models predicting these categories of sleep duration and accounted for demographic, household socioeconomic characteristics, and health/health behaviors. Using interaction terms, we tested if the association varied by the respondent's gender and educational attainment. RESULTS: Older adults married to spouses with college or more education had significantly lower relative risk of short sleep than those whose spouses had some college, high school, or less than high school education, net of the covariates including their own education. The benefit of higher levels of spousal education was significantly more protective against short sleep for women and more highly educated older adults. DISCUSSION: Older adults married to spouses with high levels of education reported more favorable sleep durations, but this benefit was significantly stronger for women and the highly educated which has important implications for their aging. These findings suggest that social inequality may condition the dyadic nature of sleep for heterosexual married older adults.

Background: Spatial access has a direct effect on health service utilization in many settings. Distance to health facility has proven to affect family planning (FP) service use in many Sub-Saharan countries. Studies show that women who reside closer to facilities offering family planning services are more likely to use modern contraceptives. However, researchers often test the theory of distance decay. This study analyzed the significance of proximity to family planning services, service availability, and quality of family planning services on modern contraceptive use in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Methods: We used a pool of four rounds of facility- and population-based survey data in Kinshasa from PMA2020 between 2014 and 2016. We used GPS coordinates to calculate the distance between the health facilities and households. We tested if women who live closer to service delivery points with higher level of availability and quality are more likely to use modern contraceptives or less likely to have unmet need for contraceptive services. Results: 10,968 women were interviewed over four rounds of data collection. Our findings show that living closer to an SDP is not a determinant of modern contraceptive use or having unmet need for FP services. Lack of cognitive access, economic barriers, bypassing the closest facility, and sociocultural norms are strong barriers for women in Kinshasa to use modern contraceptives. Proximity to quality services did not necessarily result in increased FP use among women of reproductive age living in Kinshasa, thus suggesting that a bypass phenomenon may occur when obtaining modern contraceptive services. Conclusions: This study notes that barriers other than proximity to access may be substantial determinants of contraceptive use or unmet need. More research should be conducted that directly measures multidimensional components of access in order to interpret women’s contraceptive seeking behaviors in urban areas of Sub-Saharan Africa.

The national unemployment rate fell to 6.3% in January, but the Federal Reserve says that the unemployment rate for the lowest wage quartile of workers is closer to 23%. An analysis from the Fed using ADP payroll processing data shows that when dividing the labor force into four quartiles by hourly wages, the top-earning quarter has almost fully recovered its employment losses during the pandemic.