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In the News: Jennifer Karas Montez

Montez Featured in American Prospect Article on State Policies and Differences in Health Outcomes

“You have two states that [we]re the same, were pretty middle-of-the-road in terms of life expectancy, but they take opposite trajectories,” says University Professor Jennifer Karas Montez. Some states, she says, took action to “invest in [the state] population’s overall economic well-being and health. And you had other states that took a...very different approach.”

October 22, 2024

Centennial Celebration Honors Alumni, Students, Staff and Faculty for a ‘Century of Service’

The Maxwell School’s 100th anniversary celebration will be held on Oct. 18 in Goldstein Auditorium.

October 1, 2024

Stability and Volatility in the Contextual Predictors of Working-Age Mortality in the United States

Jennifer Karas Montez, Shannon M. Monnat, Emily E. Wiemers, Douglas A. Wolf, Xue Zhang

“Stability and Volatility in the Contextual Predictors of Working-Age Mortality in the United States,” co-authored by Maxwell faculty members Jennifer Karas Montez, Shannon Monnat, Emily Wiemers and Douglas Wolf, was published in the Journal of Health and Social Behavior.

September 17, 2024

NIA Awards $3.8 Million for Maxwell Sociologists’ Health and Longevity Research Networks

Research networks led by Jennifer Karas Montez and Shannon Monnat will use two five-year grant renewals to study adult health and aging trends in the United States.

September 11, 2024

Research Insights on Population Health Inspire Policy Change

Maxwell's Policy, Place, and Population Health (P3H) Lab investigates the connection between state policies, local conditions, and health and mortality in the United States.

August 29, 2024

Widening Educational Disparities in Health and Longevity

Jennifer Karas Montez and Erin M. Bisesti

“Widening Educational Disparities in Health and Longevity,” co-authored by University Professor Jennifer Karas Montez and sociology Ph.D. student Erin Bisesti, was published in the Annual Review of Sociology.

August 27, 2024

State COVID-19 Policies and Drug Overdose Mortality Among Working-Age Adults in the US, 2020

Douglas A. Wolf, Shannon M. Monnat, Emily E. Wiemers, Yue Sun, Xue Zhang, Elyse R. Grossman, Jennifer Karas Montez

“State COVID-19 Policies and Drug Overdose Mortality Among Working-Age Adults in the United States, 2020,” co-authored by Maxwell faculty members Douglas Wolf, Shannon Monnat, Emily Weimers and Jennifer Karas Montez, was published in the American Journal of Public Health.

May 20, 2024

States’ COVID-19 Restrictions were Associated with Increases in Drug Overdose Deaths in 2020

Douglas A. Wolf, Shannon M. Monnat, Jennifer Karas Montez, Emily Wiemers, and Elyse Grossman
This brief summarizes the findings of a paper that used national data to identify how states’ COVID-19 policies affected drug overdose rates among U.S. adults ages 25-64 during the first year of the pandemic.
May 15, 2024

States’ COVID-19 Restrictions were Associated with Increases in Drug Overdose Deaths in 2020

Douglas A. Wolf, Shannon M. Monnat, Jennifer Karas Montez, Emily Wiemers, and Elyse Grossman
This brief summarizes the findings of a paper that used national data to identify how states’ COVID-19 policies affected drug overdose rates among U.S. adults ages 25-64 during the first year of the pandemic.
May 2, 2024

10 Ways to Better Understand How Shifting State Policy Contexts Affect Americans’ Health

Jennifer Karas Montez

“10 Ways to Better Understand How Shifting State Policy Contexts Affect Americans’ Health,” authored by University Professor Jennifer Karas Montez, was published in the Milbank Quarterly.

April 24, 2024

Montez Cited in Washington Post Article on the Impact of States’ Policies on Life Expectancy

The differences in state policies directly correlate to those years lost, said Jennifer Karas Montez, director of the Center for Aging and Policy Studies and author of several papers that describe the connection between politics and life expectancy.

October 17, 2023

Maxwell Sociologists Honored and Elected to Leadership Positions at ASA Annual Meeting

Prema Kurien and Janet M. Wilmoth received awards, and several faculty colleagues were elected to roles in the American Sociological Association. 

October 4, 2023

Maxwell Sociologists Receive $1.8 Million From the NIA to Study Midlife Health and Mortality

The research team led by Jennifer Karas Montez and Shannon Monnat hopes to better understand how state policies and local economic conditions impact health and mortality rates.

September 21, 2023

ACA Medicaid Expansions Did Not Significantly Improve Maternal Morbidity

Pinka Chatterji, Hanna Glenn, Sara Markowitz, and Jennifer Karas Montez
This data slice summarizes findings from a study that tested whether ACA Medicaid expansions helped reduce severe maternal morbidity.
August 30, 2023

Electoral Democracy and Working-Age Mortality

Jennifer Karas Montez, Kent Jason Cheng, Jacob M. Grumbach

"Electoral Democracy and Working-Age Mortality," co-authored by University Professor Jennifer Karas Montez and social science Ph.D. student Kent Cheng, was published in The Milbank Quarterly.

July 10, 2023

Democratic Erosion Predicts Rising Deaths from Drug Poisoning and Infectious Disease

Jennifer Karas Montez, Kent Jason G. Cheng, and Jacob M. Grumbach
This brief summarizes a study examining how changes in electoral democracy in the 50 states predicted changes in the risk of death among adults ages 25-64 during 2000-2019.
June 22, 2023

Montez Quoted in Boston Globe Article on Life Expectancy and Where People Live

In one study, University Professor Jennifer Karas Montez and other researchers found that, if every state simply implemented the same policy environment as Connecticut, “The U.S. would increase its life expectancy by roughly two years,” she says. “That is a massive increase.”

April 24, 2023

Montez Quoted in Washington Post Article on Politics, Policy and Increasing Mortality Rates

University Professor Jennifer Karas Montez says “state policy knobs are a lever that we could use to really turn this country around and stop this alarming—just horrible when you think about it—increase in the risk of dying before age 65.”

December 28, 2022

Monnat and Montez Talk to US News About Their Research on Link Between Policy and Mortality Rates

“State policies, which have been relatively ignored in research on explanations for U.S. mortality trends, turn out to be really important for understanding geographic disparities in mortality,” Shannon Monnat, professor of sociology, tells U.S. News & World Report.

November 2, 2022

Montez Discusses New Research on Link Between Policy and Mortality Rates With NBC News, USA Today

If states had adopted liberal policies across the board, University Professor Jennifer Karas Montez and her co-authors calculated that 171,030 lives would have been saved in 2019 alone; on the flip side, conservative policies in all states would have led to an additional 217,635 working-age deaths.

October 28, 2022
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