New Blog Posts

  • Measuring the prospects of Newsom’s newest housing laws

    Measuring the prospects of Newsom’s newest housing laws

    Nathan Varnell is a staff writer and first-year MPA student. Housing affordability nationwide has reached historic lows in the past decade, and home ownership in West Coast states is almost completely inaccessible to Americans of median income or lower. California Gov. Gavin Newsom has taken a number of initiatives to grow the state’s housing stock,…

  • Op-ed: America’s Disability Programs Are in a Desperate State of Disrepair

    Op-ed: America’s Disability Programs Are in a Desperate State of Disrepair

    David Trimmer is a staff writer and a second-year MPA student. IntroductionIn the United States, approximately 8.2 million people collect benefits from Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), and 6.5 million people collect benefits from Supplemental Security Income (SSI) due to disability. SSDI provides benefits to workers whose disability prevents them from pursuing gainful employment while…

  • Join the Policy Perspectives team this year!

    To all new Trachtenberg students, welcome! And to all returning students, welcome back! We’re excited to kick off the 2022-23 school year and are especially looking forward to working with many of you this year on Volume 30 of our peer-reviewed print journal Policy Perspectives, our blog Brief Policy Perspectives, and our podcast WonkCast. There…

  • GW WonkCast S6E5: How do you solve a problem like climate change? A surprising proposal from the United States Securities and Exchange Commission presents one solution

    GW WonkCast S6E5: How do you solve a problem like climate change? A surprising proposal from the United States Securities and Exchange Commission presents one solution

    Join WonkCast host William Somes for a special interview with Garrett Kephart (MPP ’07) and Chris Smith (MPA ’86) from the Trachtenberg School Advisor Council. In this episode, William, Garrett, and Chris discuss a regulation proposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission to require corporations to disclose information related to their climate footprint, as well…

  • The Texas “Heartbeat Ban”: What it Means for the Future of Roe v. Wade

    The Texas “Heartbeat Ban”: What it Means for the Future of Roe v. Wade

    Emma Weiss is a staff writer for Brief Policy Perspectives and a first-year MPP student. On September 1, 2021, a Texas state law, inaccurately referred to as a “heartbeat ban,” prohibiting abortion once fetal “cardiac motion” is detected, went into effect. Senate Bill 8 (SB 8), originally signed into law in May, does not allow…