Research associates play a critical role in helping LEO fulfill its mission by overseeing project management, collaborating with our partner service providers, and conducting statistical analysis.
When I joined LEO as a research associate myself, there was so much I didn’t know. Poverty is a complex issue and the disparity in size between the sheer collective effort needed to eliminate it and the cumulative contributions a single individual can make is vast. It made me wonder about my fellow RAs—all of various tenures at LEO and backgrounds. What is it that gets them out of bed in the morning and what reflections might they have to say about their work? It’s sometimes a trope that twenty-somethings might not have a lot of wisdom to share. But this twenty-something was curious—a quality us researchers share—and decided to do some “research.” Here’s what three of my fellow RAs had to say:
Q: What motivates you to pursue poverty research at LEO?
Maura: What led me to apply as an intern is the same thing that perpetuates my interest in economics. Economics as an academic discipline has some of the most rigorous analytical and evaluation techniques. We do a lot of RCTs and that is one of the best ways to do causal analysis. That can very easily remain isolated to [large institutions] like corporations and higher education where they are either trying to maximize profit or publications. I think that social issues and particularly the larger systemic issues deserve that rigor; [they] shouldn’t stay in that ivory tower of education.
And it flips that power narrative [where] that knowledge and research is available at all levels of our economy…I would also say that I look at research through a human rights perspective. I think it aligns with a lot of the Catholic Social tradition and yes, that is why I continue to pursue poverty research because I see a lot of the issues not just relating to things [like] if we have the funding we can provide to people but more of things that fulfill rights that people have…[I]f we can figure out how to allocate those resources using economics to ensure that everyone’s rights are fulfilled, I feel like that ties more into being a vocation.
Rebecca: My family experienced severe financial struggles due to illness. I transitioned into research after several years working in the private sector while caring for a family member. Their end-of-life care played a pivotal role in my decision to transition into a career in research as it revealed the shortcomings at various levels of the US healthcare system and the social safety net, from hospitals and skilled nursing facilities to the high costs of medical care and limited access to essential care like physical therapy, I felt as though we met systemic barriers to quality of life at each institutional level. The disappointment from this experience fueled my initial determination to switch careers and make an impact on public policy. Driven by a dedication to research that seeks to make a positive impact in the lives of others, I felt a responsibility to seek the highest quality of training possible. I was familiar with LEO’s work through papers written by Jim and Bill [James Sullivan and William Evans, LEO co-founders] that were taught in my master’s program, and I was confident that I wanted to conduct similar studies while collaborating with talented faculty and a supportive infrastructure for high-quality research.
Q: What are some results you’re looking forward to in a project you’re currently working on, and why?
Maura: Catholic Charities West Virginia, the hospital transition program. The program’s aim is to address the social determinants of health. For the population of West Virginia, those are things like food insecurity [and] transportation issues. So if you have a follow-up appointment, how are you going to get there? How are you going to get to the pharmacy to get your prescription picked up….Is your home accessible if you’re coming home in a wheelchair or with crutches? Is there anything we can do to change that? So those are the questions about social determinants of health: that when a concern arises the case managers from Catholic Charities West Virginia are able to address those whether it’s a gift card for gas or maybe it’s replacing a handrail at your house so you can more easily use your stairs.
[I]f we can prove that that decreases readmission to hospitals after you’ve been discharged then we can show it saves this much money and hopefully it can be picked up by [hospital] systems. Perhaps it could be reimbursed by Medicaid or Medicare. It’s a unique study because it’s hard to look at social determinants of health as [they are] not as easily quantifiable as something like a diagnosis code in your [medical] history…marrying that with economic evaluations and what we can learn [in terms of] cost savings [can lead to] human rights fulfillment…so I’m just excited for those results since it would make a big difference for people in poverty.
Max: I’d be happy to talk about the Rochester Guaranteed Basic Income (GBI) project. It’s a GBI program; basically people are getting unconditional cash transfers of $500 a month for a whole year, so $6,000 total over the [whole] course…It’s restricted to low-income residents based on the federal poverty level. So, really, the project is about financial empowerment…[enabling] people to be financially self-sustainable, and that’s something we’ll be able to measure by looking at employment outcomes, credit records, and a follow-up survey that we’re working on right now.
That’s a really important type of program…something that affirms the dignity of study subjects with the lack of conditions on the use of the benefit. This program is trusting people to make the most of the benefit for themselves. Showing that a program like this would be really great because relative to more intensive programs, it’s easy to implement, replicate, and scale.
Q: What unique role do you think nonprofits have in poverty research?
Max: Service providers are the people who are actually face-to-face, serving the people in need. It follows from that that they’re the experts on how to [solve] that….To be honest, if you think about our job [as researchers] versus our partners’ jobs in these studies, our job is way easier, right? Anyone can run a regression with some data, but it’s a lot harder to run an effective nonprofit or administer an effective anti-poverty program. They’re already doing really, really good work, and it makes sense for us to rely on them for answers and solutions [to poverty].
Rebecca: People living in poverty are often more profoundly affected by the efforts of nonprofit organizations compared to other community or government initiatives. Nonprofits are particularly adept at delivering immediate relief, addressing fundamental needs like housing and income support. This relationship between nonprofits and the communities they serve offers researchers a valuable opportunity. They can study well-executed, smaller-scale programs, facilitated by nonprofits, and leverage connections that would otherwise be inaccessible without nonprofit involvement.
Q: What achievement have you been most proud of during your time at LEO?
Rebecca: I take great pride in my involvement with the Transformative In-Prison Workgroup, a series of projects aimed at affecting positive change within correctional facilities. This organization successfully cultivated partnerships with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) and various community-based organizations. What makes our work unique is our ability to conduct studies within an incarcerated setting, a rare and privileged endeavor due to the complexities of the incarceral system and the protected status of individuals who are incarcerated.
Research conducted within prisons poses significant challenges, making such studies scarce. However, those impacted by the criminal justice system are among the most vulnerable in the United States. Implementing rehabilitation programs holds immense potential to enhance their lives and the communities they return to. After undergoing a rigorous review process, our projects have recently received approval from the CDCR. I have been involved in these projects since their initial design phase, and I am overjoyed to see them progress to the next phase of the project lifecycle.
Looking back on the reflections of my colleagues—Maura, Rebecca, and Max—I come away with our shared commitment to applying analytical rigor to complex social issues, inspired by personal experiences and the transformative potential of our work. To me, these insights show our work at LEO is more than a job. It’s a vocation driven by a shared vision of a world where every individual has the opportunity to thrive.
Maura Hogaboom calls Arlington Heights, Chicago home, graduated with a B.A. in Honors Economics from the University of Notre Dame, and first started at LEO as an intern during the summer of 2022 to then join LEO full-time as an RA in July 2023.
Maxwell Olander hails from Florence, Massachusetts, holds a B.A. in Mathematics from Northwestern University, and had his one-year anniversary at LEO back in November 2023.
Rebecca Margolit is from Glendale, California and earned a B.S. in Economics from the University of California, Davis as well as a M.A. in Economics from San Diego State University. She is closely approaching her two-year anniversary working at LEO in June 2023.
Nicholas Nguyen comes from Orlando, Florida, received a B.A. in Economics and Mathematics from Pomona College, and joined the LEO research team in November 2023.
Read the rest of this edition of Illuminate below!