Last Week in Poverty: Food Policy, EITC Expansion and Financial Security for All

Here is Greg Kauffman's overview of efforts across the states to thwart poverty this week.

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So it’s important that New York City is launching an $11-million, four-year pilot program that will offer up to $2,000 a year over a three-year period to participants with earnings up to $26,800 per year. The pilot will include 6,000 participants—3,000 eligible to receive the expanded EITC and 3,000 forming a control group. It will be implemented and evaluated by MDRC, an education and social policy research organization that examines policies and programs affecting low-income people.

Massachusetts campaign for paid sick days and raised minimum wage: Nearly 1 million workers in Massachusetts—almost one-third of the state’s employees—are at risk of losing their wages and/or jobs if they have to stay home to care for themselves or a sick relative. On Wednesday, Raise Up Massachusetts, a statewide coalition working for earned sick time and an increase in the minimum wage, officially launched efforts to bring these two issues to the November 2014 ballot.

The ballot initiatives would raise the minimum wage from $8 to $11 an hour, and offer minimum wage workers forty hours of earned sick leave. It would be the first time that paid sick days would appear on the ballot as a statewide initiative.

Food Policy Action: I didn’t know about this group/resource, and I like it. From Food Policy Action: “Our mission is to highlight the importance of food policy and to promote policies that support healthy diets, reduce hunger at home and abroad, improve food access and affordability, uphold the rights and dignity of food and farm workers, increase transparency, improve public health, reduce the risk of food-borne illness, support local and regional food systems, treat farm animals humanely and reduce the environmental impact of farming and food production.”

Thank you: RESULTS, for honoring me this past weekend with the Cameron Duncan Media Award. It’s especially appreciated given your great history and track record of effectiveness—including, most recently, a terrific twenty-eight op-eds or letters to the editor regarding SNAP placed in local media by your volunteers—in just over a month!

Web Action:

Tell your Senators: Ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

Clips (compiled with Samantha Lachman):

“African Americans are still concentrated in neighborhoods with high poverty and still lack full access to decent housing,” Algernon Austin

“Ohio Diverts TANF Dollars to Crisis Pregnancy Centers…” Sheila Bapat

“Inequality, Mobility and the Policy Agenda They Imply,” Jared Bernstein

“Thoughts on the War on Poverty,” Jared Bernstein

“Implementation Strategies: Riding the Wave of Sick Days Laws,” Liz Ben Ishal

“$10.20 Per Hour Needed to Survive Even in America’s Cheapest County,” Jillian Berman

“Responses to ‘Congressional Hunger Games’,” Mariana Chilton, Peter Edelman, Billy Shore, Jim Weill, Deborah Weinstein

“Job Gains for Women in Recovery Are Mostly From Low-Wage Work,” Bryce Covert

“Food stamps are vital to lifting people out of poverty,” Sharon Davies