Fall 2007
Complete Issue

Contents (each article available in PDF)

• Helping Clients Build Credit
  by Vikki Frank, Credit Builders Alliance
  Until now people who repaid loans from community groups had not been on credit bureaus’ radar. Now Credit Builders Alliance is partnering with Experian to help clients of community lenders build strong credit histories.
• Do Temporary Jobs Help Low-Skilled Workers?
  by David Autor, University of Chicago, and Susan N. Houseman, W.E. Upjohn Institute
  Because Detroit randomly assigns its welfare-to-work clients to different contractors — some favoring temporary jobs, some not — the researchers were able to uncover surprising data on whether temping helps the disadvantaged build careers.
• Mapping New England: Largest Immigrant Groups
  by Julia Reade, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
  Among Southern New England immigrants, the largest populations are from Portugal and Canada (each with about 100,000), followed by the Dominican Republic and Italy, with about 70,000 and 60,000, respectively.
• New England Farmers Meet Immigrant Needs
  by Frank Mangan, Maria Moreira, and Raquel Uchôa de Mendonça, UMass Amherst
  A multi-institution agricultural collaborative is researching ways to help Massachusetts farmers grow and market local immigrants’ favorite home-country vegetables. In a related effort, immigrants are learning techniques for being successful farmers themselves.
• Young Entrepreneurs Are the Future
  First Person with Deborah Neuman, University of Maine Target Technology Incubator
  The Small Business Journalist of the Year for Maine and New England describes producing and hosting“Back to Business” on radio and directing the University of Maine’s Target Technology Incubator.
• The New England Health-Care Experiment
  by Brian P. Rosman, Health Care For All
  Several ambitious health-care policies are being tested in New England. The most far-reaching, in Massachusetts, is premised on shared responsibility. Government, employers, insurers, providers, and patients all have obligations and benefits.
• Changes in Income Distribution in New England
  by Ross Gittell and Jason Rudokas, University of New Hampshire
  Although by some measures New Englanders are doing well economically, the region has experienced the largest jump in household income inequality of all nine census divisions. The authors parse the data.
• Understanding Concentrated Poverty
  by DeAnna Green, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
  The Federal Reserve and the Brookings Institution have been collaborating on national concentrated poverty research. The author studied three Springfield, Massachusetts, neighborhoods with a combined poverty rate of 43 percent.
• An Overview of New England’s Economic Performance in 2006
  by Tom DeCoff, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
  The region’s 2006 economic performance was mixed. Although much of New England’s growth was slower than the nation’s, all six states added jobs, and the unemployment rate remained steady.
• Uniting the For-Profit and Nonprofit Worlds
  by Peter Drasher, AltruShare Securities LLC
  A new kind of partnership is benefiting both nonprofits and for-profits by tapping the scale of investment and depth of data available in the for-profit world and applying 50 percent of returns to underserved communities.
• Letters to the Editor

Articles may be reprinted if Communities & Banking and the author are credited and the following disclaimer is used: "The views expressed are not necessarily those of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston or the Federal Reserve System. Information about organizations and upcoming events is strictly informational and not an endorsement."

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