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From cutting-edge policy research to illuminating analysis, we bring a racial equity lens to the most pressing issues facing our country. For our latest blog posts and media updates, visit our Media page.

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The Human Cost of Houseplants cover image

The Human Cost of Houseplants: Labor Conditions of Florida’s Plant Nursery Workers

This report exposes the hidden labor crisis behind America's booming houseplant industry and makes the case for a worker-driven accountability model that has already delivered real improvements for workers in other industries.

Research
Demos
WeCount!
Partners for Dignity and Rights
Woman voting at voting booth

The Costs of Implementing Documentary Proof of Citizenship Bills

As states across the country consider Documentary Proof of Citizenship (DPOC) requirements in the wake of the federal SAVE Act’s reintroduction, one fundamental issue has gone largely overlooked: What do these laws actually cost states?

Research
Lata Nott
Victoria Hammitt
Neda Khoshkhoo
Nick Harper
Joshua Harmon
Lucas Della Ventura
Demos
The Campaign Legal Center
State Voices
Woman voting

Language Access & State Voting Rights Acts

Effective language access is essential for ensuring that every voter can fully participate in our democracy. Our new case study examines how the Connecticut Voting Rights Act (CTVRA) has become a model for expanding language access beyond what federal law requires.

Research
Angelo Ancheta

Retail Politics

How America’s Big-Box Retailers Turn Their Economic Power into Political Influence

Research
Catherine Ruetschlin
Sean McElwee

The Dominance of Big Money in the 2014 Congressional Elections

Democracy has at its heart a basic promise: citizens have an equal voice in deciding who represents them.

Research
Adam Lioz

The Problem of African American Underrepresentation in City Councils

More than 1.2 million African Americans in 175 communities across the country have councils that do not descriptively represent them

Research
Karen Shanton

Credit Card Debt in the Latino Community

In the aftermath of the Great Recession, Americans battered by job loss, foreclosure, and plummeting home values tightened their belts and paid down debt. The Latino community, hit particularly hard by the housing crash, was no exception. Yet new research from Demos’ National Survey on Credit Card
Research
Amy Traub
NCLR

Why the Voting Gap Matters

If we do not close voter turnout gaps, our democracy is destined to become less and less representative in the coming decades.

Research
Sean McElwee

Connecticut’s Great Cost Shift

Connecticut’s investment in higher education has decreased considerably over the past two decades, and its financial aid programs, though still some of the country’s most expansive, fail to reach many students with financial need.

Research
Mark Huelsman
Robert Hiltonsmith

Morality and the Market: Values, Ethics and the Need for a New Social Contract

Americans are famously concerned about values and personal morality. The United States ranks among the most religious of all the advanced industrialized democracies, and it has frequently experienced eras of intense moral introspection. The past several decades have been such a period, with heated
Research

Inequality's Impact on the Economy

A breakdown of the public policies needed to ensure that all Americans have a chance to move into the middle class and stay there.

Testimony and Public Comment
Heather C. McGhee

Memorandum on New York City Employment Credit Checks

From: Demos To: Mayor Bill de Blasio; City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito; and interested parties Regarding: Unjustified exemptions that weaken and Aundermine legislation on employment credit checks 
Testimony and Public Comment

The Affordable College Compact

A Federal-State Partnership to Increase State Investment and Return to Debt-Free Public Higher Education

Policy Briefs
Mark Huelsman