Experts on the economy and the labor market offer their reasons for optimism and pessimism going into 2016.
In 1968 the sociologist Robert Merton coined the phrase “The Matthew Effect,” drawing on a verse in the Gospel of Matthew: “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.” What makes me despair is how accurate this seems to be: Those who have a lot are getting more and more, and those without much are struggling, and perhaps even losing ground.
.. Over 25 years ago, William Julius Wilson famously observed that it is far worse to grow up in a poor neighborhood than it is to grow poor among mixed-income neighbors. Raj Chetty and his colleagues’ recent research with young adults whose parents participated in a housing mobility program called Moving to Opportunity shows this powerfully. If we simply change neighborhood context—moving families with young children from neighborhoods that are about 60 percent poor to neighborhoods that are even only somewhat less poor on average—you can change lives.
.. In 1980, half the world’s population was living below the extreme poverty line; that number has now fallen to 25 percent and continues to decline.