Media clips

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• What your DoorDash driver really thinks about you will surprise you

  Paywall. 

  Fast Company November 3, 2023
• Why it’s so expensive to be single in the U.S.

  In some cases, married couples have advantages that simply don’t exist for single individuals, such as with income taxes.

  “It used to be that the tax brackets were structured in such a way that if two people were earning money and then they combine their incomes, they would pay more taxes after they were married,” Monique Morrissey, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, tells CNBC.

  She’s alluding to what’s known commonly as the marriage tax penalty or bonus.

  CNBC November 3, 2023
• For House Speaker Mike Johnson, a pressing task: Keep the government open

  “I don’t think anybody can be taken really seriously if they say that they want to extend those tax cuts, add more on top of them, and also somehow say that they care about the deficit,” said Samantha Sanders, director of government affairs and advocacy at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.

  The Washington Post November 3, 2023
• Giving Workers Power to Thrive in the Face of New Technology

  That history demonstrates that today’s advances in automation and AI will not inevitably lead to mass unemployment, as some predict. But some industries, and some people, are always affected more than others. One thing that remains constant is the power dynamics involved in these transitions: Who is driving them? Who benefits? Who loses?

  Stanford Social Innovation Review November 3, 2023
• November 3, 2023
  November 3, 2023
• Reports Cast Shadows on the Economic Picture for Black Californians

  According to the Economic Policy Institute, the unemployment rate for Black Californians stands at 7.4%, which is higher than the 4.5% unemployment rate for all racial groups in the state for Q2 2023. This is also higher than the national rate of 5.8%.

  Sacramento Observer November 2, 2023
• The Importance Of The United Auto Workers’ Victory

  Since the 1970s, the nation’s wealth and income gap has widened dramatically. Between 1978 and 2019, the richest 0.1 percent of Americans increased their earnings by 341 percent in inflation-adjusted dollars, while the earnings of the typical worker grew only 18 percent, according to the Economic Policy Institute.

  Talking Points Memo November 2, 2023
• Charlie Munger Says It’s Harder for Gen Z and Millennials To Get Rich Nowadays — Is He Right?

  According to Pew Research and the Economic Policy Institute, wages have grown so slowly since Ramsey first entered the labor market that the average worker’s purchasing power hasn’t measurably budged in the ensuing four decades.

  GO Banking Rates November 2, 2023
• Labor Shock and Pay Raises Fuel a Dining Transformation

  The takeoff in earnings at both full-service and limited-service restaurants beginning in 2014 seems to have had an obvious cause — minimum wage increases in 30 states since then, according to the Economic Policy Institute, plus 48 localities adopting minimum wages higher than their state’s. Restaurants are more likely than employers in other industries to pay minimum wages, so such legislation affects them disproportionately.

  Bloomberg November 2, 2023
• Florida teachers pick up extra jobs to make ends meet

  Research by the Economic Policy Institute found on average – teachers made 26.4% less than other similarly educated professionals last year. 

  FOX 35 Orlando November 2, 2023
• Eating healthy as inflation rises and wages stagnate

  As a way of looking at how wage stagnation is impacting consumers, KHON2.com took a look at the Economic Policy Institute‘s data on wages since 1948.

  According to the EPI, workers’ wages between 1948 and 1973 rose 91.3% as worker productivity increased by 96.7% through those years. However, since 1974, workers’ wages only increased 108.9% while worker productivity has increased by 243.1%.

  KHON2 Hawaii November 2, 2023
• Can Des Moines workers expect raises in 2024? Here’s what an annual salary guide says

  A study released the last week of October by the Economic Policy Institute noted that while the Midwest enjoys the lowest unemployment rate in the country, its wages have lagged behind those in other regions of the country.

  The EPI study found the Midwest’s real median wage growth rising only 0.4% from 2019 to 2022, far below the 3.1% national average during the same period. Wage growth over that period was 5.7% in the Northeast and 4.7% in the West, with the South coming in at 0.9%.

  Des Moines Register November 2, 2023
• Is a ‘Mayday!’ Now Looming for Our Billionaire Class?

  Workers in major American industries haven’t seen gains that stunning since the middle of the 20th century, a time when the chief execs of America’s largest corporations averaged only just over 20 times the compensation of their workers. That gap today, the Economic Policy Institute calculates, is now running nearly 350 times.

  Inequality.org November 2, 2023
• Proposed rollback of child labor law in FL gets pushback; critics say kids would be exploited

  In fact, Florida is the 13th state this year to introduce legislation that would roll back labor laws intended to protect minors, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a nonprofit think tank in Washington, D.C.

  The organization says that the bill “proposes rolling back long-standing state standards adopted more than a century ago in response to widespread exploitation of children” and contends it will “harm Florida’s poorest youth and their families.”

  Florida Phoenix October 30, 2023
• Publix accused of employee wage theft in federal class-action lawsuit. What to know

  Every year, according to the Economic Policy Institute, American workers lose as much as $50 billion per year to wage theft. Our clients have experienced something many workers face as we all become reachable on our phones at any time of day or night — that companies expect employees to be in constant communication but fail to track this time worked. It’s unacceptable to force hourly workers to work outside of their shifts and to not pay workers for their time.

  Miami Herald October 30, 2023
• It looks like striking auto workers forced Ford’s bosses into a record 25% pay increase

  Paywall. 

  Business Insider October 30, 2023
• Morris Pearl Says Americans Shouldn’t Be Worried About the National Debt. Here’s Why.

  The lack of complaining from the GOP in 2017 when Trump passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) serves as a key example. This bill, according to the nonpartisan Economic Policy Institute, provided significant benefits to wealthy Americans and corporations. However, it did little to help working families.

  Business Insider October 30, 2023
• The Midwest is getting left behind as the rest of America sees big raises

  Compared to the rest of the US, the Midwest is lagging in terms of real median wage growth, rising just 0.4% — or eight cents — from 2019 to 2022, new research from the left-leaning think tank Economic Policy Institute shows. This is in contrast to the nation’s 3.1% median wage growth during the same period.

  Workers in the Northeast saw a median wage growth increase of 5.7% during the three-year period, while the West rose 4.7%. The South was a bit above the Midwest at 0.9%.

  …

  Though federal funding from the American Rescue Plan Act and the CARES Act helped many Midwesterners stay afloat, the Midwest “has endured years of slow wage growth, slow job growth, public-sector employment shortfalls, and declines in unionization,” the report notes.

  “That decline was ushered in by a period of austerity — disinvestment in the public sector, as well as in public-sector employment — trade policies that incentivized offshoring, and a host of anti-worker policies that have limited the collective bargaining power of workers and the ability of unions to secure higher wages for their members, and in turn, all workers in the region,” Nina Mast, one of the study’s coauthors, told Insider.

  Business Insider October 30, 2023
• Amid Discouraging New Inequality Stats, Some Encouraging Rays of Hope

  Back in 1965, the Economic Policy Institute detailed last month, chief execs at America’s major corporations took home 21 times as much as America’s most typical workers. CEOs last year averaged 344 times typical worker pay.

  Inequality.org October 20, 2023
• Michigan’s $15 minimum wage proposal will be on 2024 ballot: What to know

  According to the Economic Policy Institute, minimum wage is indexed in 18 states and in Washington, D.C., meaning it is “automatically adjusted each year for increases in prices.” Economic analyst David Cooper says that by indexing minimum wage, the hourly salary never loses its value — and it’s written into law that the wage will rise by a certain amount depending on a specific formula, so politicians are not arbitrarily deciding the number.

  Click on Detroit October 20, 2023
• U.S. Undoes Progress on Child Poverty as Spending Cuts Take Priority

  “It confirmed that a lot of this is really just a choice,” said Kyle Moore, an economist who studies inequality for the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C. “We had programs in place that demonstrably cut poverty, particularly child poverty. We allowed those programs to expire. And poverty went back up — a lot.”

  Capital and Main October 20, 2023
• Detroit Today: Why shareholder capitalism limits our economy

  CEO pay has skyrocketed 1,460% since 1978, with CEOs being paid 399 times more than a typical worker in 2021, the Economic Policy Institute reports. So what is behind the stagnation of worker pay in America and what part did our economic system play?

  Detroit Today October 20, 2023
• 7 Ideas to Reduce the Racial Retirement Gap

  “The simplest way to address unequal access to retirement benefits is to expand Social Security benefits, especially for lower-income workers,” says Valerie Wilson, director of the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity and the Economy.

  AARP October 20, 2023
• HH could prop up education funding

  In 2022, the state stood at 35th in per-student funding and last among all states in teacher pay when compared to similarly educated professionals, according to separate reports by the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., and the Denver-based Bell Policy Center. 

  Aspen Daily News October 20, 2023
• The Journey of Teachers Who Leave the Profession

  Fewer college graduates feel compelled to head into public education, a profession whose workers experience stress and burnout at twice the rate of the general workforce. “It is essentially like there is a potential pool of teachers that are not willing to accept jobs given the compensation and working conditions,” says Hilary Wething, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).

  Last year, an EPI report revealed the so-called “teacher pay penalty” is higher than at any time in the past quarter-century, when economists first began tracking this data. Today, for every dollar that someone in the private sector makes, “teachers are earning about 73.6 cents on that dollar,” Wething says. In the mid-1990s, it was about 94 cents.

  American Prospect October 20, 2023
• A teacher who spent over $4,000 of her own money to outfit her classroom explains why funding from schools for supplies just isn’t enough

  A report from Sylvia Allegretto, a senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research and a research associate at the Economic Policy Institute, found the pay penalty for teachers and comparable college graduates who are working was at a record large gap in 2022 — a pay penalty of 26.4%.

  Business Insider October 20, 2023
• U.S. households’ net worth surged during pandemic, Fed Reserve survey finds

  The Fed survey says wages increased the most for higher-paid workers, widening inequality. Last year, average earnings didn’t keep up with inflation. But wages have actually outpaced price increases over the past seven months, per Economic Policy Institute chief economist Josh Bivens.

  “I think we’re set for some pretty good years for income growth especially for sort of the bottom half,” he said.

  If wages can keep outpacing inflation, Bivens said there could be some incremental improvement in inequality.

  Marketplace October 20, 2023
• Minimum wage hike to $15 would close racial, gender pay gaps

  The report uses a model created by researchers at the pro-labor Economic Policy Institute to estimate how many workers would benefit from raising the minimum to either of the hypothetical new rates, $15 or $20. They counted both workers who currently make less than that rate, and workers who currently make just over that mark and who they anticipate would get raises “as pay scales adjust upward.”

  The Cap Times October 20, 2023
• AZ is 2nd worst in the nation for teacher pay gap

  The most recent teacher pay analysis from the Economic Policy Institute found that Arizona teachers earned 33.2% less last year than other workers with college degrees did, placing the state just behind Colorado’s 37.4% gap. That’s a jump from 2021, when Arizona ranked 4th worst and the cause, according to the report’s authors, has a lot to do with the economy. 

  AZ Mirror October 20, 2023
• Friday, October 13, 2023

  Features interview with Adewale on affirmative action. 

  Maryland Public Television October 20, 2023