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Our Mission

Multidisciplinary Community

Bringing together world-leading researchers to shape public policy through innovation, collaboration, and debate.

The Policy Lab is a multidisciplinary community within The Center for Applied Research on Work (CAROW) and the ILR School that connects research on work with the practice of putting it to use. As a home for the robust policy work taking place across Cornell, the CAROW Policy Lab is uniquely positioned to facilitate collaboration between colleagues working on state and national-level policy analysis, recommendations, and tools. Through this collaboration, we ultimately aim to provide the public with the tools to understand and resolve the challenges of our contemporary labor market and its many intersections.

Objectives:

  1. To foster collaboration and innovation among faculty and students across ILR in the topic areas where ILR’s existing policy efforts overlap or intersect, and to dedicate resources to explore areas where they potentially could
  2. To raise the profile of the applied policy work taking place across the ILR School and serve as a hub to host data and content and as a “one-stop-shop” for external policy audiences to easily access and interact with ILR’s work
  3. To convene policymakers, community partners, and other stakeholders with researchers from across the ILR School, in an effort to nimbly address the most relevant policy issues of the day related to labor and work

Policy Lab Explainers

Research and Insights

Read more explainers from the CAROW Policy Lab

What the Proposed Rule to End Subminimum Wage Means for Workers with Disabilities

On December 3rd, 2024, the United States Department of Labor proposed a new rule to end the 14c waiver program for people with disabilities. The Yang-Tan Institute's Ellice Switzer responds to a Q&A on the new proposed rule.
Photo of a hand selecting one person figure out of a line of figures, with a dollar sign over its head.
What the Proposed Rule to End Subminimum Wage Means for Workers with Disabilities

Domestic Workers Rising

Domestic workers perform the critical labor of caring for children and cleaning homes but face many forms of exploitation. Zoë West, Ketchel Carey, and Anne Marie Brady of ILR’s Worker Institute break down how an innovative peer training model is empowering domestic workers to demand more on the job.
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Domestic Workers Rising

You Got a Social Security Overpayment Notice. Now What?

Social Security overpayments are often very costly, and they can be complex to address. Experts at the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability have prepared this fact sheet on how to navigate the issue if it happens to you.
Outstretched hand reaches out from a pile of papers to another hand
You Got a Social Security Overpayment Notice. Now What?

To send in submissions or propose a topic/idea for the Policy Lab, email: carow@cornell.edu.

Policy Lab Members

Our members span ILR's many disciplines, initiatives and research groups. We are made up of researchers and educators, policy specialists, communicators and advocates.

Policy Lab Staff

Zach Beauvais

  • Marketing Director

Anne Marie Brady

  • Director of Research for Worker Rights and Equity, ILR Worker Institute

Anne DeCecco

  • Senior Research and Policy Development Associate

Rusty Weaver

  • Director of Research, ILR Buffalo Co-Lab

Policy Lab Affiliates

Jodi Anderson Jr.

  • Director of Technological Innovation, Criminal Justice and Employment Initiative

Ariel Avgar. Ph.D.

  • David M. Cohen ’73 Professor of Labor Relations, ILR School
  • Senior Associate Dean for Outreach and Sponsored Research
  • Director, Center for Applied Research on Work (CAROW)

Esta Bigler

  • Director of Cornell University ILR’s Labor and Employment Law Program

Kate Bronfenbrenner

  • Director of Labor Education Research

Nellie Brown

  • Director of Workplace Health & Safety Programs Lead Programs Manager/people/nellie-brown

Susanne Bruyere

  • Academic Director, Yang-Tan Institute

M. Diane Burton

  • Joseph R. Rich ’80 Professor, Human Resource Studies
  • Academic Director, Institute for Compensation Studies

Patricia Campos-Medina

  • Executive Director, The Worker Institute

Michelle Chen

  • Postdoctoral Fellow

Reyna Cohen

  • Research & Policy Development Associate, Climate Jobs Institute

Cathy Creighton

  • Director of Cornell University ILR Buffalo Co-Lab

Ian Greer

  • Research Professor
  • Director, ILR Ithaca Co-Lab

Kaitlyn Jackson

  • Policy Associate for the Yang Tan Institute on Employment and Disability

Jason Judd

  • Executive Director of the Global Labor Institute

Timothy McNutt

  • Director, Criminal Justice and Employment Initiative

Kimberly J. Osmani

  • Training and Content Development Associate with the Yang-Tan Institute

Iris Packman

  • Senior Research & Policy Development Associate, Climate Jobs Institute

Gali Racabi

  • Assistant Professor of Labor & Employment Law

Matthew Saleh

  • Director of Research, Criminal Justice and Employment Initiative

Arianna Schindle

  • Director of Training and Curriculum Design, Worker Rights and Equity, ILR Worker Institute

Lara Skinner

  • Executive Director, Climate Jobs Institute

Avalon Hoek Spaans

  • Assistant Director of Research, Climate Jobs Institute

Ellice Switzer

  • Extension Associate with the Yang-Tan Institute

Megan Thorsfeldt

  • Associate Director, Center for Applied Research on Work

KC Wagner

  • Director of Workplace Issues at Cornell University's ILR Metro District Office in New York City.

Zoë West

  • Senior Researcher, Worker Rights and Equity, ILR Worker Institute

Contact Us

Reach out to the Policy Lab

CAROW Policy Lab
Cornell University, ILR School
Ithaca, NY 14853

Phone: (607) 255-4380

carow@cornell.edu

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