This grant funds a project by Till von Wachter, professor of economics at UCLA and faculty director of the California Policy Lab at UCLA, to examine how retraining programs affect employment outcomes among older workers. Four research questions are at the core of von Wachter’s work: How has the incidence of employment instability and unemployment evolved for older workers? How well has the workforce system, particularly its job training opportunities, served older unemployed workers? What are the outcomes of job training and other services for older workers, in terms of employment and earnings? Has the ability of the system to improve older workers’ outcomes increased after recent legislative reforms? To shed light on these questions, Von Wachter has gained unprecedented access to a comprehensive linked dataset covering California’s workforce at the individual level. These data include quarterly earnings records for individual workers for each employment relationship, including identifiers for the employing establishment; quarterly employment, wage bill, and detailed industry affiliation for establishments; individual Unemployment Insurance (UI) claims, with detailed information on duration of claim, benefits received, worker demographics, occupation, and education; and detailed information on type of workforce service received, including type of training and job search assistance, the dates of service, as well as information from intake and exit interviews with caseworkers. Von Wachter’s work has the potential to advance understanding of how to use training to increase labor force participation of older workers and could inform local and national policymakers interested in improving the workforce system.

This grant provides partial funding for a project led by Martin Baily of the Brookings Institution to develop a new paradigm for work and retirement that incorporates working longer as an essential tool for increasing retirement security. Baily aims to develop the case for specific, actionable policy reforms that will encourage increased saving and enable longer working lives, as well as identifying policy reforms to enable consumers to have greater access to and understanding of retirement products in the private market. First, Baily will commission a series of detailed policy proposals that will be then presented in public forums—three public forums with three papers presented at each—directed at educating federal and (where appropriate) state policymakers. Each of the nine papers commissioned for the policy series will offer practical recommendations grounded in research that can be adopted by policymakers and private-sector actors. Suggested topics include how to make jobs more flexible, training for older workers, reducing the tax penalty for working longer, age discrimination, annuities, reverse mortgages, and long-term care insurance. After the briefings, Baily (with co-principal investigator Benjamin Harris) will then author a report that will lay out a comprehensive new vision for retirement. This will include three complementary components: reform of labor market policies to accommodate longer lives; creation of more robust private insurance markets and better products; and changes to the saving landscape, particularly for the growing population without access to traditional retirement accounts (for instance, freelance workers).

This grant funds a research network of economic scholars studying issues at the intersection of aging and work. Led by Kevin Milligan of the University of British Columbia, the network includes David Cutler of Harvard, Ellen Meara of Dartmouth, John Shoven of Stanford, Nicole Maestas of Harvard, Arie Kapetyn of University of Southern California, and Sita Slavov of George Mason, among others. Grant funds will support an annual workshop for network members and various other convenings allowing them to set a common research agenda, share ideas, and discuss and inform each other’s research. Over the next two years, network members will address various aspects of three topics: How public policy incentives affect work at older ages; what aspects of the workplace and employer practices can sustain work at older ages; and how older workers fit into the overall labor market. Overall, grant funding will support the production of at least eight academic papers on these topics.

This grant provides three years of continued support to the American Film Institute’s (AFI) efforts to encourage young screenwriters and filmmakers to write and produce compelling, engaging narrative films that explore scientific themes or have scientists, engineers, or mathematicians as major characters. AFI’s program includes three annual award programs: a $25,000 award given to the best student film project that brings science and technology to life; a $20,000 annual screenwriting award given to the best science-themed script; and a yearly tuition scholarship worth $45,000 given to an incoming graduate student with a background in the hard sciences who wishes to become a filmmaker and to incorporate scientific themes in his or her filmmaking. In addition, AFI holds a seminar series where established actors, writers, directors, and producers talk to students about science and Hollywood, and provides access to working scientists to serve as mentors on student scripts.

This grant, to the University of Southern California’s (USC’s) School of Cinematic Arts, provides three years of renewed support for a series of activities aiming to support student engagement with science as a subject matter in their work and to spur the development and production of science and technology film, television, and new media projects by USC film students. Supported activities include a $25,000 production award, given annually to the best student film project that features science and technology as a theme; two $17,500 screenwriting awards, given annually to the best student film or television scripts featuring science and technology as a theme; a $17,500 animation award, given annually to the best student animation project featuring science and technology as a theme; an annual $12,500 grant given to the most innovative student interactive game design project featuring science or technology as a theme; and a yearly seminar that brings USC film students together with leading scientists to discuss the power and potential of science as a vehicle in narrative filmmaking. In addition, grant funds will support a host of related support activities, including faculty mentoring, industry events, and dedicated science advisors to ensure accuracy of scientific content in student projects.

This grant provides three years of renewed support to the University of California Los Angeles, for a series of activities, programs, and initiatives designed to encourage UCLA film students to engage with scientific themes in their filmmaking and to produce science-themed films and screenplays. Funded activities include an annual colloquium that brings film students together with leading researchers to discuss the newest developments in science and technology; one annual, $30,000 production grant awarded to the best film project that incorporates scientific or technical themes; two annual $15,000 screenwriting awards given to the best student scripts incorporating scientific themes or featuring a scientist, engineer, or mathematician as a major character; one annual, $15,000 filmmaking grant for the best episodic television project that explores scientific or technical themes; and the development of a screenwriting course open exclusively to students who are working on a science-themed project. The course will help students explore both the challenges and opportunities of incorporating scientific themes into narrative film and television. In addition, this grant provides funds for dedicated scientific advisors to help students with their projects, independent judges to evaluate student submission, and faculty support and other operational costs associated with administration of program.  

This grant provides funds to the Science Festival Alliance (SFA)—a network and incubator of science festivals across the country—to promote the development and expansion of 12 science festivals across the United States in communities with small resource bases and with a focus on promoting diversity. SFA will select and recruit four leading festivals; they will spend the first year experimenting with different approaches to improving diversity. Each lead festival would create a customized plan for engaging diverse audiences with measurable indicators for progress that would be evaluated after 12 months. This new knowledge would then be applied in selecting the 12 new partners—each lead festival is responsible for recruiting and mentoring three new festival partners in communities with small resource bases. The 12 selected festivals would be given modest $2,000 professional development grants and then be eligible for $10,000 challenge grants as they develop their own plans. Grant funds support these activities and associated administrative and operational costs.

This grant supports the WNYC Health Unit’s ongoing coverage of health care policy, health economics, and the complexities and contradictions of the U.S. health care system. Over the three-year grant period, Sloan funds will help WNYC produce 45 to 50 broadcast segments each year on a range of health topics including the Affordable Care Act under the Trump administration, the opioid and obesity epidemics, and the gap in hospital billing between what hospitals charge and the real costs of care. Segments will be aired on several of NPR’s most popular radio programs, including Morning Edition, All Things Considered, The Takeaway, and the Brian Lehrer Show. In addition to these weekly segments, WNYC will produce two to three episodes of its Only Human podcast each year. The long-form serial podcast allows WYNC to take a deeper dive into complex health care issues, with a focus on extensive research, immersive storytelling, and rich characters. WNYC will also convene annual workshops, bringing together leading health care practitioners, economists, and policy experts to discuss the health care system and potential reforms. Last, grant funds will support a new radio drama, produced in collaboration with Radiolab, on the life and work of John Bonica, an anesthesiologist and a world champion wrestler also known as the “father of pain management.”

This grant to the Catticus Corporation provides support for the production and broadcast of a one-hour documentary special on driverless cars, “Look Who’s Driving,” that will explore both the promise and pitfalls as we move toward adoption of autonomous vehicles (AVs). In addition to explaining the major technological advances that have enabled progress in AVs—mapping, sensing, and artificial intelligence—the series will explore the engineering, legal, regulatory, security, privacy, and ethical challenges behind this much-ballyhooed potential revolution in transportation. The documentary will include interviews and commentary from leading technologists and engineers working on AVs, as well as scholars, historians, research scientists, and ordinary citizens. The show is slated to be broadcast on the PBS series, NOVA.

Funds from this grant support efforts by Consumer Reports (CR) to provide consumers with the knowledge and tools they need to make more informed choices about their digital privacy. Supported activities include refining the Digital Standard, an evaluative framework used to objectively rank consumer products based on how well they perform on security architecture, data collection, and user control over his or her own data. CR will bring together academics, thought leaders, technical experts, and industry players to review and suggest improvements to the platform. It will draw on its Consumer Insights Panel, a web-based tool that interacts with 4,500 consumers to inform more effective messaging and education strategies. CR will then use the revised Digital Framework to evaluate major technology platforms such as Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Wikipedia. Finally, CR will publish its findings in a report to help inform future consumer choices and industry product development. The overall effort is designed to establish privacy as a core consumer value and to drive competition regarding who can do the best job protecting consumer privacy and individual ownership of data.