Buffalo Commons

Library

View

The True Cost of Child Care: Erie County NY (Final Report)

Lou Jean Fleron, Russell Weaver, Catherine Creighton — Oct 26, 2022

Funded by Erie County and supplemented with New York state funds allocated to the Cornell ILR Buffalo Co-Lab, the study builds on the Phase One report issued earlier this year and analyzes data on the child care industry and workforce for both Erie County and the state.

View Resource

Economic Inequality in Buffalo: Session 1

Sam Magavern — Jan 5, 2021

Sam Magavern, Partnership for the Public Good's Senior Policy Fellow and Cornell ILR's Visiting Activist Scholar, delivered three successive presentations in July 2020 illuminating data on disparities in Buffalo, explaining how those disparities are arising, and showcasing the innovative ways local nonprofits are working to solve them in tandem with community.

View Resource

Economic Inequality in Buffalo: Session 2

Sam Magavern — Jan 5, 2021

Sam Magavern, Partnership for the Public Good's Senior Policy Fellow and Cornell ILR's Visiting Activist Scholar, delivered three successive presentations in July 2020 illuminating data on disparities in Buffalo, explaining how those disparities are arising, and showcasing the innovative ways local nonprofits are working to solve them in tandem with community. Session 2 focuses on issues of housing. 

View Resource

Workers on the Brink: Low-Wage Employment in Buffalo and Erie County

Nicole Hallett Apr 12, 2018

In 2017, Professor Hallett, winner of a public research fellowship from Open Buffalo and PPG, conducted a survey of 213 workers in Buffalo to learn more about the challenges they are facing. 

View Resource

Inclusionary Zoning: Creating Equity and Lasting Affordability in the City of Buffalo, New York

Buffalo Inclusionary Housing Coalition, Skye Hart, Victoria Neenan — Oct 12, 2016

The City of Buffalo is experiencing fast-rising rents and housing prices in the midst of severe and growing poverty.  New housing is being built, with generous subsidies from the taxpayers, but most of it is luxury or market-rate apartments and condominiums.   Far from aiding the affordability crisis, this new development is worsening it, particularly in neighborhood such as downtown, the West Side and Fruit Belt, where gentrification is underway and displacement of lower income …

View .PDF

Economic Inequality in New York State

Amy Kaslovsky — Nov 19, 2008

New York State was the state with the greatest income disparity between the rich and poor in the mid-2000s.  At that time incomes in the bottom fifth of the population were 8.7 times lower than those in the top fifth.  In New York City this gap was even wider.  In the mid-2000s the City’s top income quintile had an average income 9.5 times higher than the average income of the bottom quintile.  Overall income in New York State grew between the 1980s and the mid-2000s …

View .PDF

Poverty: A State of Extremes

The League of Women Voters of Buffalo/Niagara Oct 1, 2006

New York was the only state where both poverty and income exceeded national levels in 2005, with 13.8% of residents living in poverty and a median household income of $49,480.  This high poverty/high income paradox underscores a widening ‘wealth gap’ observed in New York and nationwide.  Buffalo Niagara differed from the state in 2005, with a poverty rate (12.7%) close to the U.S. average and a median household income that was $4,000 below the U.S. median.  Within the …

View .PDF