CommonWealth Beacon staff
Posted inThe Codcast

Raj Chetty’s prescription for reviving the American dream

by CommonWealth Beacon staff

For generations, it was virtually guaranteed that American children would out-earn their parents. But as Raj Chetty explains in this special live episode of The Codcast, recorded at the recent WBUR Festival, that dream is fading. What factors are contributing to economic stagnation? How can we increase upward mobility? How do these trends vary across neighborhoods, race, gender, and immigration status?

Posted inThe Codcast

Lessons from Boston on Mass. school segregation lawsuit

by CommonWealth Beacon staff

Massachusetts has been busing students between neighborhoods and school districts for 60 years, but segregation within the school system persists – and in some places it’s actually gotten worse over recent decades. This week on The Codcast, CommonWealth Beacon reporter Jennifer Smith talks with Dan O’Brien, professor of public policy and urban affairs and director of the Boston Area Research Initiative at Northeastern University, about a new lawsuit brought against the state. Students and civil rights organizations want the state to step in to address segregation across school districts, and Boston’s long and fraught history of attempted desegregation may offer some lessons.

Posted inThe Codcast

Health care coverage for immigrants remains in limbo

by CommonWealth Beacon staff

On the monthly Health or Consequences episode of The Codcast, John McDonough of the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health and Paul Hattis of the Lown Institute talk with Vicki Pulos, a senior health law attorney at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute. They discuss the massive 2025 federal tax-and-spend law and its consequences for MassHealth and the Connector, what the state can do to limit coverage losses, and immigrant insurance eligibility cuts.

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