An article in American Sociological Review measures how changes in state-led antipoverty efforts via taxes and transfers have affected trends in inequality below the poverty line from 1967 to 2019.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
![Since the War on Poverty in the 1960s, the U.S. social safety net has shifted away from direct cash assistance for the lowest-income households and toward tax-based transfers targeted at working families with children. Previous research has assessed this shift by evaluating its effect on the national poverty rate. Doing so, however, overlooks how it may also have led to increased inequality among low-income households. We apply a decomposition framework to measure how changes in taxes/transfers and composition have affected trends in inequality below the poverty line from 1967 to 2019. Income inequality among the poorest households has been volatile since the 1960s, and changes to the American welfare state played a decisive role in expanding or reducing inequality below the poverty line. Unlike in previous decades, after the mid-1990s, the policies that most reduced poverty were also those that most increased inequality among the poor. [continued at link]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:wkn6xyybwo66kqni5ddxzjwj/bafkreiascdgds4wwdyseogfgjk5qy56wtswoyzjlx24lxgyis47wm4z77i)
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![This essay proposes a novel paradigm for a political theory of climate justice: wages for earthwork. Indigenous peoples have disproportionately contributed to the sustainable stewardship of the natural world through ecological systems of governance, which I theorize as “earthwork.” Proponents of climate reparations have focused on reparations for unequal climate damages from emissions. By contrast, I propose “wages” or reparations to Indigenous peoples for debt owed to them for their devalued climate work. This framework makes use of an analogy to the 1970s feminist wages for housework movement, which sought to reveal the exploited and yet indispensable character of systematically devalued work rendered natural and invisible. I contend that (re)valuing earthwork must also be central to projects aimed at decolonizing climate justice, that is, anticolonial climate justice. [cont. at link]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:wkn6xyybwo66kqni5ddxzjwj/bafkreifyd3yaq2hjkudj4fuqekbx2roliieqzlgdrfdsp52mqncydpbr5e)
![Social scientists routinely characterize religious influence in electoral politics as conservative and left-wing parties as fundamentally secular. Against these claims, I argue that the relationship between religion and electoral politics is shaped by the redistributive beliefs and preferences of religious leaders, who can become valuable allies of left-wing parties. I evaluate this argument in Brazil following the appointment of Pope John Paul II, leveraging as-if random variation in municipalities’ exposure to progressive Catholic bishops. I show that bishops who actively supported state-led redistribution were essential to the electoral success of the left-wing Workers’ Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores [PT]). Voters in municipalities with longer exposure to these bishops supported the PT at higher rates. (continued at link)](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:wkn6xyybwo66kqni5ddxzjwj/bafkreideiufzwcijqq3lbmpt56nfz6k5smouy2daeikapxc47ngd7s4awq)
![Dropout has been identified as a significant problem among military populations seeking psychotherapy (Goetter et al., 2015; Hoge et al., 2014), yet an overall estimate of its exact prevalence and predictors does not exist. The aims of the current meta-analysis were to estimate outpatient psychotherapy dropout rates for this population and evaluate potential moderators of this event. In total, 283 articles—comprising data from 719,465 U.S. service members and veterans—met all inclusion criteria and were included in the meta-analysis. The average weighted dropout rate for all outpatient therapies was 25.6%, 95% CI [22.4%, 29.2%], and prediction interval [1.9%, 85.9%]. Furthermore, dropout was 27.0% for cognitive behavioral therapies (CBTs), 25.3% for trauma treatments, 27.6% for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), 28.9% for individual therapies, and 9.8% for intensive outpatient settings. Findings from metaregression analyses using mixed-effects models indicated that higher dropout was linked with the following after accounting for other moderators: younger age, CBTs, nonmanualized approaches, VA versus Department of Defense settings, individual versus group therapies, and weekly versus intensive outpatient formats. Dropout was not linked with other client, therapist, treatment, and research variables. Taken together, dropout estimates were obtained for a range of military populations and treatment characteristics, including theoretical orientation, presenting concern, setting, and therapy formats. These estimates may provide potential benchmarks for therapists, administrators, and policymakers serving military populations. Leveraging dropout prevention strategies with at-risk groups highlighted in this study may enhance mental health care outcomes for this high-need population.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:wkn6xyybwo66kqni5ddxzjwj/bafkreibtbyosyjqij5qpfghsdvtz3icr7mfs3bklh7zjsge5ajhawpdyna)
