All Published NJSPL Reports
Discipline Inequity and Segregation in New Jersey’s High Schools
By Elisabeth Kim, PhD. The most segregated high schools in New Jersey often have the highest suspension rates. For example, this is the case for schools that serve large percentages of students of color (90%+) [...]
What Influences Differences in New Jersey’s Municipal Tax Rates?
by Michael Lahr, Tia Azzi, and Maia de la Calle, Rutgers Economic Advisory Service It is vital for New Jersey policymakers to understand what affects municipal tax rates. In this brief, we analyze local government [...]
Does the Decision to Allow Local Cannabis-Related Businesses Impact Home Sale Prices?
by Michael S. Hayes, Associate Professor, Rutgers University-Camden and Prakash Kandel, Ph.D. Student, Rutgers University-Camden During the 2020 general election, New Jersey voters approved a ballot question to amend the state constitution to allow residents [...]
New Jersey’s Changing Population and Childcare Needs
by Sarah F. Small and Debra Lancaster Like many parents in the United States, New Jersey parents have faced some formidable obstacles finding accessible quality childcare. This is particularly true given changes in the childcare [...]
Equal Access to STEM Pathways? A Closer Look at Science Course-taking Trends in New Jersey’s High Schools
by Vandeen Campbell Freshman Year Science Course-taking in NJ, 2016-2019 Note: The total number of schools and students represented in each chart panel varied slightly each year. In 2019-20, 58 high schools (total 9th grade [...]
New Jersey’s Childcare Landscape During COVID-19: A Slow and Uneven Recovery
by Sarah Small and Debra Lancaster Many New Jersey parents felt the sting of reduced childcare access during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, the childcare landscape has not made a recovery that meets [...]
State Equity Initiatives
by Marilyn Rubin Government actions have the potential to make a substantial and lasting impact on equity for all residents. One of government’s most powerful levers for advancing equity is its budget, “the medium through [...]
Pandemic’s Impact on Women in NJ: Domestic Violence, Access to Healthcare and Housing
By Sarah Small and Debra Lancaster With so much economic precarity brought on by the pandemic, many women in New Jersey have been confronted with issues of homelessness and inaccessible healthcare. According to the US [...]
How has COVID Affected Women and Work in New Jersey? Our New Report Investigates
Sarah Small and Debra Lancaster Women’s work lives have been disrupted in profound ways during COVID-19: in their roles as frontline workers confronting the virus, as caregivers taking on even more unpaid care work at [...]
COVID-19 and the Gender Wage Gap in New Jersey
With childcare disruptions, deep unemployment, and job changes, women in New Jersey have faced turbulent economic prospects worse than men’s along several dimensions throughout the pandemic. However, New Jersey women are no stranger to economic [...]
Release of “Evaluating Evaluations” Report
Tracy P. Glova The New Jersey State Policy Lab today issued a report on evidence-based policymaking and program evaluation in New Jersey. “Evaluating Evaluations: Analyzing Evidence‐Based Policymaking in New Jersey and Insights from other Leading [...]
Enhancing Child Tax Credits’ Support of New Jersey’s Neediest Families
Sarah Small and Debra Lancaster Many New Jersey parents breathed a sigh of relief upon receiving their Child Tax Credit Payments in late 2021. Our new report at the Rutgers Center for Women and Work, [...]
Report on Food Security and Organic Waste Reduction
Jeanne Herb The New Jersey State Policy Lab and the Organics Workgroup of the NJ Climate Change Alliance have partnered to inform the development of statewide public policy aimed at reducing food waste, contributing to [...]
The New Jersey Housing Crisis in a COVID Era
Katharine Nelson Affordable housing is increasingly scarce within the United States, and COVID-19 has dramatically exacerbated the simmering crisis in affordable housing. In New Jersey, the risk of eviction is greater than across the country, [...]
Cannabis Legalization: A Baseline Study
Today, we’re releasing our report, Cannabis Legalization: A Baseline Study, as part of a project led by Dean Charles Menifield, one of the Policy Lab’s Co-Principal Investigators. This report explores education, health, and law enforcement [...]
Our First Report: Encouraging Activation of Vacant Commercial Properties
The New Jersey State Policy Lab is publishing our first report, Vacant Commercial Property in New Jersey: Causes and Solutions, written by Michael Hayes and Pengju Zhang. The economic recession caused by the COVID-19 pandemic [...]