Robert Haveman, born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA, in 1936. Ph.D. from Vanderbilt University, Nashville. John Bascom Emeritus Professor of Economics at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Guest of the Rector (1 April 2007 – 30 June 2007)
IS AMERICAN HIGHER EDUCATION A VEHICLE FOR SOCIAL MOBILITY?
The main topic on which I worked is “Is American Higher Education a Vehicle for Social Mobility?” (with Timothy Smeeding and Kathryn Wilson). We completed a paper on this project for submission to a journal entitled: “Higher Education and Social Mobility in the United States: A Glimpse Inside the Black Box?” I also made progress on two other projects. The first: “The Impact of Indian Gaming on American Indian Poverty, Health and Risk-Taking Behaviors” (joint work with Barbara Wolfe). This work was designed to improve our understanding of one of the most central issues in health economics, medical sociology, and social epidemiology-the effect of income on health. We estimated models that relate a variety of health outcomes and health related behaviors to the presence and extent of gaming facilities; these results will be incorporated into a paper for submission to a health economics journal. The second project was: “Public Housing Subsidies and Economic Independence Among Low-Income Families” (joint with Barbara Wolfe and Thomas Kaplan). This research addresses the question of whether the receipt of a Section 8 housing subsidy voucher by low-income families in the U.S. promotes labor market success and economic independence. We made good progress in getting the data in final form and estimating models that simulate an experimental framework for identifying impacts.