EPI in the news

• CVS, Walmart, and 14 other ‘essential’ businesses that are desperate for workers right now

  The open positions also come as many workers find themselves suddenly without jobs, in some cases without pay and benefits, as a spate of stores close indefinitely. According to the Economic Policy Institute, an estimated three million jobs will be eliminated by this summer alone as a result of the economic impact of the coronavirus. Other figures from IHS Markit show that the US unemployment rate is on track to nearly double from 3.5% in February to 6% by mid-2021.

  Business Insider | April 3, 2020
• Workers in ‘contractor’ limbo at risk in Covid-19 jobless wave

  The Economic Policy Institute made a similar prediction of 3 million jobs lost by summer on March 17.

  Fierce Electronics | April 3, 2020
• “Trade agreements like NAFTA and permanent normal trade relations with China, which forced American workers to compete against people making pennies an hour, has resulted in the loss of 160,000 jobs here in Michigan.”

  The analysis Sanders relied on came from economist Robert Scott at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank.

   

  For NAFTA, Scott took the rising U.S.-Mexico trade deficit and teased out how that translated into job effects at the state level. Between 1993 and 2010, and accounting for the Great Recession, Scott found a loss of 43,600 jobs in Michigan.

   

  Our Sources

  Economic Policy Institute, Growing China trade deficit cost 3.7 million American jobs between 2001 and 2018, Jan. 30, 2020

  Economic Policy Institute, Heading South U.S.-Mexico trade and job displacement after NAFTA, May 3, 2011

  Politifact | April 1, 2020
• Trump’s Coronavirus payroll tax cut has ‘important drawbacks’ and is ‘really inferior’ to other ideas, economists say

  Josh Bivens, director of research at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) think tank, told Newsweek cutting payroll tax “is not the worst opening offer one could imagine coming from the Trump White House, but it’s still really inferior to a lot of other ideas that should be in the top tier.”

  “Even a large payroll tax cut would have trouble offsetting the corona shock to the economy—it would be disbursed too gradually and too much of the benefit would go to pretty high-income households who won’t spend enough of it,” Bivens said

  Newsweek | April 1, 2020
• Obama economist: Maine overtime guarantee the least that should be done for middle class

  Shierholz, who is now the director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank, said overtime reform is one of the most direct ways Maine lawmakers can help middle-class workers.

  “Minimum wage laws only hit, by definition, workers at the very low end of the wage distribution,” she explained. “I think there’s enough evidence to say the economy is rigged against working people. That’s not just happening at the bottom. That’s also happening at the middle of the wage distribution. But there is no minimum wage for the middle class. So, overtime protections are one way to help workers in the middle.”

  Maine Beacon | April 1, 2020
• Fact check: Were 401(k)s really an ‘accident of history’?

  “401(k)s are an accident of history”: That’s the title of a 2017 article at the Economic Policy Institute, which goes on to say that “401(k)s were never intended to replace pensions.”

  Forbes | April 1, 2020
• Workers in US gig economy most vulnerable to virus outbreak

  Unlike in Europe, paid sick leave is a luxury in the United States, where 55 percent of workers in the hotel and restaurant trade do not have access to it, according to the Economic Policy Institute.

  International Business Times | April 1, 2020

More EPI in the news