UC Davis undergraduate students have been contributing to economics research on whether the Women, Infants and Children, or WIC, program, a U.S. safety net program, improves children’s test scores.

The U.S. poverty rate puts a number on the share of households who struggle to make ends meet. The way we measure poverty dates back to the 1960s and provides a starting point for building an effective safety net that lifts people out of poverty.

Marianne Page, a professor of economics, co-founded the UC Davis Center for Poverty and Inequality Research in 2010. Today, the center creates a wealth of research and outreach opportunities for its network of faculty affiliates and graduate students across the social sciences at UC Davis and beyond.