"The Hidden Lives of America’s Poor and Middle Class”

Jonathan Morduch, Professor of Public Policy and Economics at NYU Wagner, has co-written an article in the Stanford Social Innovation Review, describing the U.S. Financial Diaries project he leads. The ongoing project deeply explores the financial lives of individual American families of lower and middle income levels. It illuminates, in part, the phenomenon of unsteady household income and expenses, and how this volatility can hamper the ability of working families to gain economic stability and upward mobility. At the same time, the project shows that financial products, programs and policies created to help working households are sometimes ill-suited to the day-to-day challenges these households actually face – whether they are living below or well above the poverty line.

Professor Morduch is Executive Director the Financial Access Initiative, a consortium of researchers focused on the most pressing issues of financial inclusion in the U.S. and in developing countries. He created the U.S. Financial Diaries project with colleagues Rachel Schneider – with whom he co-authored the article – and NYU Wagner graduate Daryl Collins (PhD, 2010).