The Federal Budget and Social Policy: Challenges, Goals, and Proposals

Federal deficits and debt have heightened the risk of significant economic disruption in the United States. Amid broad consensus that the current path is unsustainable, how can the nation address fiscal issues while forging a new social contract that attends to social and economic development priorities?

April 23, 2025
8:00 AM-12:00 PM (central time)

Clark-Fox Forum
Brown School
Hillman Hall
Washington University
Hybrid Event

Kathryn Anne Edwards

Jason J. Fichtner

Eugene Steuerle

Dorian Traube

Michael Sherraden

Kathryn Anne Edwards is a PhD economist and independent economic policy consultant. Her research focuses on the intersection of labor markets and public policy, including unemployment and unemployment insurance (UI); recessions and recoveries; women’s labor supply; poverty alleviation; retirement security; and Social Security. She has testified three times in front of Congress about economic policy and writes a weekly column on the economy for Bloomberg.

Jason J. Fichtner is Senior Policy Fellow at the Center for Social Development and Executive Director of the Retirement Income Institute, Alliance for Lifetime Income. He is also a Senior Fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center and on the Board of Directors for the FINRA Investor Education Foundation and the National Academy of Social Insurance (NASI). Fichtner is a Member of the Puerto Rico Pension Reserve Trust, where he serves on both the Pension Benefits Council and the Pension Reserve Board.

Fichtner is also affiliated with Stanford University as a Policy Fellow with the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy (SIEPR) and a Research Fellow at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Financial Security (CFS).  

Fichtner also served as a senior economist with the Joint Economic Committee of the US Congress, and has work has been featured in the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Investor’s Business Daily, the Los Angeles Times, the Atlantic, and USA Today, as well as on broadcasts by C-SPAN, PBS, NBC, NPR, and SiriusXM.

Fichtner is the author of “The Hidden Cost of Federal Tax Policy” and the editor of “The Economics of Medicaid.”

Eugene Steuerle is an Institute fellow and the Richard B. Fisher chair at the Urban Institute. Among past positions, he was Deputy Assistant Secretary of the US Department of the Treasury for Tax Analysis (1987–89), President of the National Tax Association (2001–02), Codirector of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, Chair of the 1999 technical panel advising Social Security on its methods and assumptions, and Chair of the 2015–16 National Academy of Sciences Committee on Advancing the Power of Economic Evidence to Inform Investments in Children, Youth, and Families. Between 1984 and 1986, he was the economic coordinator and original organizer of the Treasury’s tax reform effort. Steuerle is the author, coauthor, or coeditor of 18 books, including “Dead Men Ruling,” “Nonprofits and Government” (3rd edition), “Contemporary US Tax Policy” (2nd edition), and “Advancing the Power of Economic Evidence to Inform Investments in Children, Youth, and Families.”

Dorian Traube is the Neidorff Family and Centene Corporation Dean and professor at the of the Brown School at Washington University. Previously, Traube was a professor in the Suzanne Dworak Peck School of Social Work at the University of Southern California. Her research focuses on early child development, home visitation and telehealth solutions for families with young children.

Traube developed Parents as Teachers@USC Telehealth, the first partnership of its kind between a national home visitation model and a university-based telehealth clinic. In doing so, she also established the first virtual home visitation program, offering a reliable home visitation model via video conferencing technology. Traube earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and her master’s and doctoral degrees in social work from Columbia University. She is a licensed clinical social worker in California and New York.

Michael Sherraden, PhD, is the George Warren Brown Distinguished University Professor at Washington University in St. Louis, founding director of Washington University’s Center for Social Development, and founding director of Next Age Institute, a collaboration between Washington University and National University of Singapore, where he was the inaugural S.R. Nathan Professor of Social Work. In creating and testing innovations to improve well-being, Sherraden has defined and informed a growing body of applied research and policy to promote inclusion in asset building. This work has influenced numerous asset-based policies and programs in the U.S. and other countries, including Child Development Account policies. Sherraden has received the Distinguished Career Achievement Award from the Society for Social Work and Research, the Career Achievement Award from the Association for Community Organization and Social Administration, and numerous other honors. TIME magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world.