Emily Campbell M.A. – Associate Director, Center for Community Solutions

Dear Colleagues:

“While the rat race ends with retirement,” the Washington Post reported back in October, “one of its principal features extends well past a person’s last day of work.” That feature is the stark inequality in the United States. A new report from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) had found that “inequality has been growing from one generation to the next,” which is “particularly alarming… as old age inequality among current retirees is already higher than in all other OECD countries, except Chile and Mexico.”

Although Medicare means that inequalities in access to health care are not as great for the elderly as for other Americans, Social Security’s redistributive benefit formula still leaves the substantial inequality that OECD found. Emily Campbell sees the local consequences in her work for the Center for Community Solutions. And they reflect how the international economy is shaping the lives of seniors in all advanced industrial democracies, as well as the peculiarities of American political, social and economic institutions: topics Professor Hokenstad has studied for decades. Join us as two experts join forces to explain a phenomenon that quietly surrounds us.

All best regards,
Joe White
Luxenberg Family Professor of Public Policy and Director, Center for Policy Studies

About Our Guests

M.C. “Terry” Hokenstad is a Distinguished University Professor Emeritus at Case Western Reserve University. He is the Ralph S. and Dorothy P. Schmitt Professor Emeritus at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences, and also serves as Professor of Global Health in the School of Medicine. In a career spanning more than four decades, Hokenstad is recognized as a worldwide leader in social work education and research. He is a past president of the North American and Caribbean Region of the International Association of Schools of Social Work, and has served as president of the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) and chair of the International Committee for the National Association of Social Workers (NASW). He has been a trustee of the National Council on Aging and the National Conference on Social Welfare. He is a member of the United Nations’ Non-Governmental Organization Committee on Aging, and served on the U.N. Technical Committee responsible for drafting the International Plan of Action on Aging. In 2002, he was named to the United States delegation to the U.N.s World Assembly on Aging.A prolific scholar, Hokenstad has authored nine books and numerous articles, chapters, and monographs, in the fields of comparative social welfare, care of older people, and social work practice and education. In addition, he has served as editor-in-chief of The International Social Work Journal and co-editor of special issues of publications such as Ageing International, Social Policy & Administration, the Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare, and the Journal of Applied Social Sciences. He serves on the editorial board of several other scholarly journals.

Emily Campbell serves as Associate Director, Senior Fellow and holds the Williamson Family Fellow for Applied Research. As the Williamson Family Fellow, she guides staff members examining a variety of health, social and economic conditions. Her research includes work on poverty, public and private funding of health and social services. Campbell previously worked for a U.S. Congressman, and she has consulted with numerous nonprofits, foundations and government agencies to provide data and public policy decision support. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of The Literacy Cooperative. Campbell holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and a Master of Arts in Political Science from Case Western Reserve University.

Where We Meet

The Friday Public Affairs Lunch convenes each Friday when classes are in session, from 12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. Our programs are open to all and no registration is required. We usually meet in the Dampeer Room of Kelvin Smith Library.

* Kelvin Smith Library requires all entrants to show identification when entering the building, unless they have a university i.d. that they can magnetically scan. We are sorry if that seems like a hassle, but it has been Library policy for a while in response to security concerns. Please do not complain to the library staff at the entrance, who are just doing their jobs.

The Dampeer Room is on the second floor of the library. If you get off the elevators, turn right, pass the first bank of tables, and turn right again. Occasionally we need to use a different room; that will always be announced in the weekly e-mails.

Parking Possibilities

The most convenient parking is the lot underneath Severance Hall. We regret that it is not free. From that lot there is an elevator up to street level (labeled as for the Thwing Center); it is less than 50 yards from that exit to the library entrance. You can get from the Severance garage to the library without going outside. Near the entry gates – just to the right if you were driving out – there is a door into a corridor. Walk down the corridor and there will be another door. Beyond that door you’ll find the entrance to an elevator which goes up to an entrance right inside the doors to Kelvin Smith Library.

Schedule of Friday Lunch Upcoming Topics and Speakers:

April 13: The Eurozone Crisis is Over: Now What? With Nicolas Véron, Senior Fellow at the Bruegel think tank in Brussels and the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, D.C. ***Alternate Location: Peter B. Lewis Building, Room 202, 11119 Bellflower Rd, Cleveland, OH 44106***

April 20: People and Property. With Peter Gerhart J.D., Professor and Dean Emeritus, School of Law. ***Alternate Room: Room LL06 (lower level, opposite elevators), Kelvin Smith Library***

April 27: Two Sides of Brexit. With Elliot Posner Ph.D., Associate Professor of Political Science, and Luke Reader Ph.D., SAGES Lecturer. ***Alternate Room: Room LL06 (lower level, opposite elevators), Kelvin Smith Library***