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About Stephen Pimpare

Stephen Pimpare is director of the Public Service & Nonprofit Leadership program and Faculty Fellow at the Carsey School of Public Policy at the University of New Hampshire. He is the author of The New Victorians (New Press, 2004), A People's History of Poverty (New Press, 2008), Ghettos, Tramps & Welfare Queens (Oxford, 2017), and Politics for Social Workers (Columbia, 2021).

Stephen Pimpare is director of the Public Service & Nonprofit Leadership program and Faculty Fellow at the Carsey School of Public Policy at the University of New Hampshire.

Stephen's website

NBN Episodes hosted by Stephen:

Public Policy May 17, 2022

Wicked Problems

The Ethics of Action for Peace, Rights, and Justice

Austin Choi-Fitzpatrick, Douglas Irvin-Erickson, and Ernesto Verdeja

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
The ethics of changemaking and peacebuilding may appear straightforward: advance dignity, promote well-being, minimize suffering. Sounds simple, right? Actually acting ethically when it really matters is rarely straightforward. If someone …
Public Policy April 22, 2022

The Fundamental Institution

Poverty, Social Welfare, and Agriculture in American Poor Farms

Megan Birk

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
By the early 1900s, the poor farm had become a ubiquitous part of America's social welfare system. Megan Birk's history of this foundational but forgotten institution focuses on the connection …
Public Policy April 8, 2022

Fixing Social Security

The Politics of Reform in a Polarized Age

R. Douglas Arnold

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Since its establishment, Social Security has become the financial linchpin of American retirement. Yet demographic trends—longer lifespans and declining birthrates—mean that this popular program now pays more in benefits than …
Public Policy March 22, 2022

American Exceptionalism

A New History of an Old Idea

Ian Tyrrell

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Today I talked to Ian Tyrell about his book American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea (U Chicago Press, 2021).The idea that the United States is unlike every other …
Public Policy February 9, 2022

Reexamining the Federal Role in Higher Education

Politics and Policymaking in the Postsecondary Sector

Rebecca S. Natow

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Rebecca S. Natow's book Reexamining the Federal Role in Higher Education: Politics and Policymaking in the Postsecondary Sector (Teachers College Press, 2022) provides a comprehensive description of the federal government's relationship …
Public Policy February 7, 2022

Homelessness is a Housing Problem

How Structural Factors Explain U.S. Patterns

Gregg Colburn and Clayton Page Aldern

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
In Homelessness is a Housing Problem: How Structural Factors Explain U.S. Patterns (U California Press, 2022), Gregg Colburn and Clayton Page Aldern seek to explain the substantial regional variation in …
Public Policy January 12, 2022

Disorder

A History of Reform, Reaction, and Money in American Medicine

Peter A. Swenson

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Tracing the dramatic conflicts both inside organized medicine and between the medical profession and the larger society over quality, equality, and economy in health care, Peter A. Swenson illuminates the …
Public Policy December 10, 2021

How the Other Half Eats

The Untold Story of Food and Inequality in America

Priya Fielding-Singh

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Inequality in America manifests in many ways, but perhaps nowhere more than in how we eat. From her years of field research, sociologist and ethnographer Priya Fielding-Singh brings us into …
Public Policy December 8, 2021

Choose Your Medicine

Freedom of Therapeutic Choice in America

Lewis A. Grossman

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Throughout American history, lawmakers have limited the range of treatments available to patients, often with the backing of the medical establishment. The country's history is also, however, brimming with social …
Public Policy December 6, 2021

The Privatization of Everything

How the Plunder of Public Goods Transformed America and How We Can Fight Back

Donald Cohen and Allen Mikaelian

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
As people reach for social justice and better lives, they create public goods--free education, public health, open parks, clean water, and many others--that must be kept out of the market …
Public Policy October 21, 2021

The Labor Guide to Retirement Plans

For Union Organizers and Employees

James W. Russell

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
James Russell’s The Labor Guide to Retirement Plans: For Union Organizers and Employees (Monthly Review Press, 2021) is a helpful how-to for workers navigating their retirement and pension options, from …
Public Policy September 14, 2021

Free to Discriminate

How Realtors Conspired to Segregate Housing and Divide America

Gene Slater

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Gene Slater's book Free to Discriminate: How Realtors Conspired to Segregate Housing and Divide America (Heyday Books, 2021) uncovers realtors' definitive role in segregating America and shaping modern conservative thought. Gene Slater follows …
Public Policy September 3, 2021

Can Fixing Dinner Fix the Planet?

Jessica Fanzo

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
How can consumers, nations, and international organizations work together to improve food systems before our planet loses its ability to sustain itself and its people? Do we have the right …
Public Policy August 30, 2021

Skid Road

On the Frontier of Health and Homelessness in an American City

Josephine Ensign

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Home to over 730,000 people, with close to four million people living in the metropolitan area, Seattle has the third-highest homeless population in the United States. In 2018, an estimated …
Public Policy August 30, 2021

Crossing the American Health Care Chasm

Finding the Path to Bipartisan Collaboration in National Health Care Policy

Donald A. Barr

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Why is there such a deep partisan division within the United States regarding how health care should be organized and financed and how can we encourage politicians to band together …
Public Policy August 24, 2021

Misunderstanding Health

Making Sense of America's Broken Health Care System

Rohit Khanna

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
With technological advances and information sharing so prevalent, health care should be more transparent and easier to access than ever before. So why does it seem like everything about it―from …
Public Policy May 28, 2021

The Path to Free College

In Pursuit of Access, Equity, and Prosperity

Michelle Miller-Adams

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
In The Path to Free College: In Pursuit of Access, Equity, and Prosperity (Harvard Education Press, 2021), Michelle Miller-Adams argues that tuition-free college, if pursued strategically and in alignment with …
Public Policy May 27, 2021

A War on Global Poverty

The Lost Promise of Redistribution and the Rise of Microcredit

Joanne Meyerowitz

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
A War on Global Poverty: The Lost Promise of Redistribution and the Rise of Microcredit (Princeton UP, 2021) provides a fresh account of US involvement in campaigns to end global …
Public Policy May 24, 2021

Dividing Paradise

Rural Inequality and the Diminishing American Dream

Jennifer Sherman

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
How rural areas have become uneven proving grounds for the American Dream. Small-town economies that have traditionally been based on logging, mining, farming, and ranching now increasingly rely on tourism …
Public Policy May 14, 2021

What We Mean by the American Dream

Stories We Tell about Meritocracy

Doron Taussig

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Doron Taussig invites us to question the American Dream. Did you earn what you have? Did everyone else? The American Dream is built on the idea that Americans end up …
Public Policy May 11, 2021

How Ten Global Cities Take on Homelessness

Innovations That Work

Linda Gibbs, Jay Bainbridge, Muzzy Rosenblatt, and Tamiru Mammo

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
How Ten Global Cities Take on Homelessness: Innovations That Work (U California Press, 2021) provides a first-hand account of the challenges of homelessness and how cities have used innovation and …
Public Policy May 4, 2021

The Other Side of the Coin

Public Opinion toward Social Tax Expenditures

Christopher G. Faricy and Christopher Ellis

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
In The Other Side of the Coin: Public Opinion toward Social Tax Expenditures (Russell Sage Foundation, 2021), political scientists Christopher Ellis and Christopher Faricy examine public opinion towards social tax …
Public Policy April 15, 2021

Ungoverned and Out of Sight

Public Health and the Political Crisis of Homelessness in the United States

Charley E. Willison

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
If health policy truly seeks to improve population health and reduce health disparities, addressing homelessness must be a priority. Homelessness is a public health problem. Nearly a decade after the …
Public Policy April 13, 2021

Engine of Inequality

The Fed and the Future of Wealth in America

Karen Petrou

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare
Following the 2008 financial crisis, the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy placed much greater focus on stabilizing the market than on helping struggling Americans. As a result, the richest Americans got …