1 The Panel Study of Income Dynamics:

The Panel Study of Income Dynamics was born as a result of the desire to assess the success of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty on the economic well-being of U.S. families. In 1966 and 1967, the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) directed the U.S. Bureau of the Census to conduct a national assessment of the success of the War on Poverty by conducting a study called the Survey of Economic Opportunity (SEO), which completed interviews with about 30,000 households. Interest in continuing this national study led OEO to approach the Survey Research Center (SRC) at the University of Michigan about interviewing a sub-sample of approximately 2,000 low-income SEO households. Professor James N. Morgan, who became the new study’s director at SRC, argued successfully for adding a fresh cross-section of households from the SRC national sampling frame so that the new study would be representative of the entire population of the United States, including non-poor as well as poor households. In addition, it was fortuitously decided to follow members of the families who moved away from their original households, such as children who came of age during the study. In this way, the sample could remain representative of the nation’s families and individuals over time. This study became what is no