The Institute for Policy & Social Research is a faculty-driven research center supporting social scientists who focus on social problems and policy-relevant questions. IPSR fosters independent researchers and collaborative teams within our network of faculty affiliates and seven interdisciplinary research centers.
What's New
COVID-19 Research & Resources
The Institute for Policy & Social Research has been tracking the impact of COVID-19 on the state of Kansas and, as a public service, IPSR has created a website that provides resources for people to see how COVID-19 is affecting the state and its economy. This website includes research presentations by economics professor Donna Ginther (and director of IPSR) that explain how policy has an economic impact on the state. Other links provide background data on demographics and healthcare and broadband access. Please visit https://ipsr.ku.edu/covid19/ for regular updates as new information becomes available.
KU researchers part of program to give communities equal voice in switch to renewable energy
Researchers from the University of Kansas are part of a multi-institutional partnership to help ensure the United States’ ongoing transition to renewable energy and low-carbon technologies is just and provides equity and opportunities for communities on the front lines of the climate crisis. With $500,000 in funding from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the project, Just Energy Transitions and Place, will examine how place-based considerations should be incorporated in federal or state energy transition initiatives.
Link(s): https://news.ku.edu/2022/07/28/ku-researchers-part-program-give-communities-equal-just-voice-switch-renewable-energy
Access to food assistance program curbs child maltreatment, study finds
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) helps offset the costs for families who face food insecurity. It’s one of the most frequently accessed public programs, aiding more than 43 million people each month. But SNAP also provides an unanticipated benefit: preventing child maltreatment. Donna K. Ginther, with Patricia Oslund, Lindsay Jorgenson and Patricia Sattler, Michelle Johnson-Motoyama (formerly of KU), Rebecca Phillips, Oliver Beer and Starr Davis of Ohio State University and Yoonzie Chung of University of Maryland, wrote a new study. "Association Between State Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Policies, Child Protective Services Involvement, and Foster Care in the US, 2004-2016" found that states with more generous SNAP policies had fewer children involved in child protective services (CPS) and sent to foster care. It appears in the journal JAMA Network Open.
Link(s): https://news.ku.edu/2022/07/21/access-food-assistance-program-curbs-child-maltreatment-study-finds
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2794169
Donna Ginther awarded Regents Distinguished Professorship
The Kansas Board of Regents has named an accomplished economics scholar at KU as its next Regents Distinguished Professor. Donna Ginther, Roy A. Roberts Distinguished Professor of Economics and director of the Institute for Policy & Social Research, earned the new title at February's Kansas Board of Regents meeting. The purpose of the Regents Distinguished Professorship program is to attract and retain established scholars whose research projects augment the state’s economic and industrial development.
Link(s): https://news.ku.edu/2022/03/01/donna-ginther-awarded-regents-distinguished-professorship
Please visit IPSR's News page for more.
Research Spotlight
Research Released on the Cost of Not Expanding Medicaid in Kansas
The REACH Healthcare Foundation provided funding to IPSR to study the impact of failure to expand Medicaid on Kansans. The research brief and report show that Kansans are spending more state resources on Medicaid, health care spending is increasing at a faster rate, and employee premiums for health care are increasing faster in Kansas than in states that expanded Medicaid. County mill levies for hospitals have also increased. There are many unexpected costs resulting from the state’s failure to expand Medicaid.
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The 55th Edition of the Kansas Statistical Abstract is now available! The abstract is available EXCLUSIVELY online as a PDF file with individual pages available in Microsoft Excel and PDF. For more information and access to the data, please visit https://ipsr.ku.edu/ksdata/ksah/. The Kansas Statistical Abstract was featured in a radio spot on the Jayhawk Radio Network, tune in or click the button below to play the clip now:  |
SAVE THE DATE
Thursday, October 27, 2022
Please visit the conference site for registration. Additional details will be posted soon.Recent Publications
Ginther, Donna K., Davut Ayan, and David J.G. Slusky, The Unexpected Costs of Not Expanding Medicaid in Kansas, sponsored by the REACH Foundation, May 2022.Ayan, Davut, Donna K. Ginther, and David J.G. Slusky, Economic Costs to Kansas Due to State’s Failure to Expand Medicaid, sponsored by the REACH Foundation, May 2022.
The Governor's Council on Tax Reform, Final Report, January 2022.
Ginther, Donna K., Genna Hurd, Xan Wedel, Thomas Becker, and Patricia Oslund, The Status of Women in Kansas, sponsored by United WE, January 2022.
Ginther, Donna K, Nancy Cayton Myers, Thomas Becker, Lindsay Elliot Jorgenson, "Growing New Ventures and Jobs in Kansas: An in-depth Review of Entrepreneurship Activities and Policies in Kansas and How We Compare." Institute for Policy & Social Research, The University of Kansas (January 2020).
Maynard-Moody, Steven with Charles Epp and Donald Haider-Markel,“Beyond Profiling: The Institutional Sources of Racial Disparities in Policing,” Public Administration Review (forthcoming).
Maynard-Moody, Steven, “Punishing the Poor.” Book review essay, Social Service Review, vol. 90, no. 4 (Dec 2016).
Maynard-Moody, Steven with Michael Musheno, “'Playing the Rules’: Discretion Social and Policy Context”. In Peter Hupe, Michael Hill, and Aurélien Buffat, eds., Understanding Street-Level Bureaucrats (Bristol, UK: The Policy Press, 2016).
For other publications please visit our Publications Page.
Links on this page:
- ipsr@ku.edu