Increasing Families’ Incomes Helps Meet Children’s Needs and Reduces Child Welfare Involvement

CBPP Policy Brief by Victoria Hunter Gibney and Urvi Patel April 2026

Income Support Helps Families Meet Children’s Needs and Reduces Child Welfare Involvement

CBPP Research Report by Victoria Hunter Gibney and Urvi Patel July 2026

Housing Policy Debate

Expanding Access to Rental Assistance: What Do We Know and Where Do We Go From Here?

Research has shown that rental assistance is a powerful tool for addressing housing cost burden, instability, and other housing and non-housing outcomes. Rental subsidies can also be leveraged to increase…

Economic Security Project

Building Affordability: The Policy Agenda for America’s Housing Crisis

America’s housing crisis is the product of both broken markets — where restrictive zoning, underinvestment in public housing, and stagnant construction productivity have created a shortage of millions of homes…

The NYU Furman Center's Housing Solutions Lab

Cash assistance for housing: Debates, emerging evidence, and open questions

This paper from the NYU Furman Center’s Housing Solutions Lab explores the role of direct cash transfers in increasing housing access, with the goals of clarifying the state of research…

Housing Initiative at Penn

The Future of Rental Assistance: Lessons Learned from Implementing and Evaluating a Direct-toTenant Cash Assistance Program, PHLHousing+

This article examines a new rental assistance program in Philadelphia, called PHLHousing+, that disburses unconditional cash payments directly to tenants to eliminate their housing cost burden. The program is designed…

PHLHousing+

PHLHousing+ Research Documentation – Sample Wave Survey

Documentation of a sample wave survey used in the PHLHousing+ pilot in Philadelphia.

PHLHousing+

PHLHousing+ Research Documentation – Interview Protocols

A full documentation of the interview protocols used by the evaluation team on the PHLHousing+ pilot in Philadelphia.

Housing Initiative at Penn

Cash and Vouchers: The Impact of Different Forms of Rental Assistance on Housing Insecurity

Housing insecurity is at an all-time high for renters nationally. The Housing Choice Voucher program protects over 2.3 million households from housing insecurity, but many households offered a voucher cannot…

Housing Initiative at Penn

A Randomized Control Trial of a Cash Rental Assistance Program in Philadelphia, PA

PHLHousing+ is a direct-to-tenant, cash rental assistance program that began in Fall 2022 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The program provides monthly cash payments to 301 low-income families with children over nearly…

Policymakers’ Report

As more and more researchers release their findings, a complex picture of the impact of cash in the United States is emerging. Some studies show that cash moved particular outcomes in significant ways while other studies show that cash had no impact on those same outcomes. While advocates often highlight the more positive or exciting findings, it is critical to understand the full set of results and learn from pilots that find no impact or had unexpected results in order to better inform the field and policy.

Economic Security Project

Cash Transfers Improve Maternal, Infant, and Child Health Outcomes Memo

Black women are at highest risk of experiencing pre-term births, low birthweight, and maternal and infant mortality. Both the human and the financial costs are immense. As the U.S. continues to fall further behind, it’s clear a new approach is needed–and direct cash transfers show huge promise. This brief synthesizes key research findings and explores why investing more public dollars in cash could be transformative for infant and maternal health.