On the last Friday of each month, the New Hampshire Fiscal Policy Institute’s research team shares a curated list of books, research papers, podcasts, and more that are helping to shape our understanding of the economic wellbeing of the Granite State and beyond.
Here are our picks for March 2025:
📄 What is the Financial Risk of Nonprofits Losing Government Grants? – Urban Institute
“In New Hampshire, nonprofits received a total of $1.1 [billion] in government grants. Nonprofits in Hillsborough, Grafton, and Merrimack counties received the most government funding. Nonprofits in Coos, Merrimack, and Hillsborough counties would have the biggest gap to fill if they lost their government grants. Nonprofits in Cheshire, Merrimack, and Coos counties have the highest share of nonprofits at risk of not covering their expenses if they lost their government grants.”
📄 Remote and Hybrid Work in New Hampshire – New Hampshire Employment Security
“Commuting pattern data shows longer mean commuting times for workers living in Rockingham and Hillsborough counties – and a high level of commuter interchange between the border counties of New Hampshire and Massachusetts….For workers commuting from southern New Hampshire to Massachusetts border counties, hybrid work policies are more prevalent than in other regions of the state. In 2024, there were 684,354 unique job postings for full-time, permanent positions in the Manchester-Nashua MSA [metropolitan statistical area] and the Boston-Cambridge-Newton MSA (which includes Rockingham and Strafford counties). Of those postings, 64,303 or about 9.4 percent were advertised as remote or hybrid.”
📄 Imposing Medicaid Work Requirements Could Cause Many Adults With Substance Use Disorders To Lose Access to Treatment – Health Affairs
“[Losing health insurance] could have serious impacts, including for those already in treatment who drop out because they lose Medicaid. Recent studies have found that treatment dropout is associated with increased risk of drug overdose and increased use of inpatient and emergency departments. In addition, whether or not someone with SUD is currently in treatment, loss of access to treatment would make it harder for them to find and retain work in the future, undercutting the stated policy aim of getting this population into the workforce.”
📄 Covering the Care: Pregnancy Tops the List of Highest Out of Pocket Costs for NH’s Commercially Insured – UNH Institute of Health Policy and Practice
“Out-of-pocket (OOP) costs are highest for pregnancy with delivery, averaging $1,772 per person in 2022. All other conditions in the top ten had average OOP costs between $750 to almost $1,000 per person. Between 2016 and 2022, OOP costs for all ten identified conditions increased, with an average rise of $289 per person, and most conditions experiencing increases of more than $200. The OOP costs for pregnancy with delivery saw the largest dollar increase over the time period, rising by more than $500.”
📄 Outcome Summary of ARPA-D Contracted Initiatives: Strengthening New Hampshire’s Child Care System – Pear Associates
“NH Businesses are interested in ongoing work that fully engages them as partners, not solely investors, in systems change to leverage their skills and expertise. Work Well Business Roundtables provide a platform for business engagement that includes the ability for business partners to allocate in-kind expertise and resources to address family child care needs, resulting in more creative problem solving and strengthened business-community relationship building. Similar to the Recovery Friendly Workplace Initiative, ongoing technical support for businesses is needed to drive family-friendly and business-friendly policy development for child care system improvements (e.g., federal tax-credit opportunities, child care scholarships for their workforce, workplace policy assessments).”
💡 Have you read something that should be on our radar? Share it with us at info@nhfpi.org—we’d love to hear from you!