🔭 A view from the left:
Affordability also reflects decades of wage stagnation.
Heidi Shierholz of the Economic Policy Institute argues that federal policies — from a frozen minimum wage to weakened unions and consolidation — have held down pay. EPI estimates typical workers would earn about 40 percent more today had wages kept pace with productivity.
The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) analysis shows that if the Trump administration achieves its stated goal of deporting one million people per year over the next four years, “the direct care industry would lose close to 400,000 jobs—affecting 274,000 immigrant and 120,000 US-born workers.”
Josh Bivens, chief economist at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., says the welcome reduction in inflation since the pandemic has finally flatlined, but it may yet show some uptick next year. Wage growth from 2019 to 2024, particularly for lower-wage workers, “stopped pretty dead in 2025 and seems unlikely to reverse in 2026.”
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A slowdown in wage growth will create silent pain in 2026. “Consumers might chalk up their struggles to high prices or cost-of-living because they often don’t even think they – or policymakers – have any real control over their wage growth, but wages are the blade of the scissors that does most of the cutting in terms of determining affordability,” he adds.
The school bus driver shortage is just a fact of life, Richardson said; it’s been a consistent problem for most of her career. Data from the Economic Policy Institute show that school bus driver employment has decreased over the past 15 years, prompted by federal budget cuts in the early 2010s that forced schools to cut bus services or privatize its school buses.
MIT’s Living Wage Calculator and the Economic Policy Institute both show that a genuinely comfortable lifestyle for a family of four can easily top $100,000 in many states. And a recent Harris Poll found that 64% of Americans earning six figures say their income merely keeps them afloat. The virality of Green’s post itself suggests that traditional economic indicators don’t fully reflect how financially strained many American families feel.
The cost of necessities is calculated using data from the Economic Policy Institute’s family budget calculator, with inflation adjusted to 2025 dollars in the study. The figures show the income a family needs for a modest yet adequate standard of living, breaking out costs for housing, food, health care, taxes and more.
“Many families don’t have the discretionary spending. They want to save for college for their kids and just simply don’t have anything extra,” said Elise Gould, a senior economist from the Economic Policy Institute, pointing out that the budget rule is now unrealistic for many families. “They can have trouble making ends meet, let alone being able to invest in the future.”
“It really boils down to sort of a perfect storm of factors,” says Valerie Wilson, the director of the program on race, ethnicity, and the economy at the Economic Policy Institute. “We have the federal layoffs and job losses. We have the retraction of DEI policies . . . and organizations, including the federal government, that have essentially eliminated DEI departments or roles that were likely held by a large number of Black women.” Wilson also notes that job losses across industries have disproportionately impacted women—from manufacturing to professional and business services.
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“The reason why we have a more diverse federal workforce is because at one point, the federal government was actually willing to sort of be a leader in establishing more equitable employment practices that were ultimately adopted in states and cities and, to some extent, the private sector,” Wilson says.
A nationwide mandate could generate an estimated $7 trillion in additional retirement savings and create 62 million new savers over a decade, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Think tanks like Brookings (widely viewed as centrist to liberal) and the Economic Policy Institute (widely viewed as liberal) argue that without coordinated action, the middle class will continue to erode—making affordability less about choices and more about structural barriers. Still, how to pay for those investments fuels sharp political debates.
According to the Economic Policy Institute, 67 localities across the U.S. have adopted minimum wages higher than their state minimum wage.
- Americans were more likely to support unions than big companies by the widest margin in 60 years, according to Economic Policy Institute data.
“Downward revisions for August and September plus large losses in October — due to an enormous drop in federal workers at the end of September — has meant a significant slowing in the pace of job growth,” said Elise Gould, a senior economist with the Economic Policy Institute. “The three-month moving average of job growth fell from 232,000 in January to 62,000 in November.”
And on Tuesday, new government data pointed to large federal job losses in recent months, some 162,000 jobs in October and a further 6,000 last month.
“Federal government employment is down by 271,000 since reaching a peak in January,” the Bureau of Labor Statistics said.
“The cost of these losses are only beginning to be felt,” Elise Gould, an economist with the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, said Tuesday.
At least 40 localities — including states, counties, and cities — have established reparations initiatives as of December 2024, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a nonprofit economic policy think tank.
Wage theft is the second-most common workplace violation and costs workers $4 billion a year, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
On any given day, educators are planners, safety monitors, counselors, mentors, and liaisons with families. Yet teachers earn 26% less than other professionals with similar education (Economic Policy Institute, 2022).
Nationally, since February, nearly 600,000 Black women have forcibly exited the labor force and a report released this year from the Economic Policy Institute found that unemployment rates among Black women in South Carolina this year increased to 7.5%—the highest unemployment rate since 2021.
If the Trump administration hits its stated target of deporting 4 million people over four years, the direct care workforce could shrink by roughly 394,000 jobs — 274,000 positions held by immigrants and 120,000 held by United States-born workers — according to an analysis by the Economic Policy Institute.
That kind of contraction would tighten the supply of frontline in-home care workers who help older adults and people with disabilities stay safe at home, the institute said in a blog post. This could potentially force more families to scramble for unpaid caregiving arrangements at the same time demand for home- and community-based support continues to rise.
The big picture: More than 8.3 million workers will see their pay go up on Jan. 1. That includes both those getting a direct increase and others indirectly affected when companies adjust wage ladders, according to an estimate from the progressive Economic Policy Institute.
Stunning stat: For the first time, there will be more workers in states with a minimum wage of $15 an hour or higher than those with the federal minimum of $7.25.
Source: The National Employment Law Project, Economic Policy Institute, U.S. Department of Labor
In that regard, the Charleston region may prove critical. The area is home to roughly 11,000 federal employees, the largest concentration of federal workers in South Carolina, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Minnesota stands out for its strong safety net, low unemployment, and consistent investment in education. Research from the Economic Policy Institute shows the state ranks high in worker protections and union density. These factors contribute to more evenly distributed prosperity across communities.
The big picture: For the first time, more workers in 2026 will live in states with a minimum wage of $15 an hour or higher than those still tied to the federal $7.25 floor, according to the progressive Economic Policy Institute.
Over 8.3 million workers will see a raise in their minimum wages, as more states will employ a $15 or greater minimum wage than states that invoke the federal minimum wage of $7.25, according to Economic Policy Institute.
Additionally, 47 cities and counties will be raising their minimum wages, increasing the number of workers likely to receive larger paychecks, says Economic Policy Institute.
Driving the news More than 8.3 million workers in 19 states will see their pay go up on Jan. 1, Axios’ Emily Peck reports.
- That includes both those getting direct increases and others indirectly affected when companies adjust wage ladders, according to an estimate from the progressive Economic Policy Institute.
Josh Bivens, chief economist at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., says the welcome reduction in inflation since the pandemic has finally flatlined, but it may yet show some uptick next year. Wage growth from 2019 to 2024, particularly for lower-wage workers, “stopped pretty dead in 2025 and seems unlikely to reverse in 2026.”
Here’s everything we talked about today:
- “What Role Do Immigrants Play in The Direct Long-Term Care Workforce?” from KFF
- “Trump’s deportation plans threaten 400,000 direct care jobs: Older adults and people with disabilities could lose vital in-home support” from Economic Policy Institute
The average adult in Northwest Arkansas spends $340 a month on groceries, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Eliminating the state grocery tax will save them 42 cents a month.
According to the Economic Policy Institute, a family of four needs almost $93,000 a year in Shelby County to afford bills, housing, food, childcare, transportation and healthcare.
The big picture: More than 8.3 million workers across the country will see their pay go up on Jan. 1. That includes both those getting a direct increase and others indirectly affected when companies adjust wage ladders, according to an estimate from the progressive Economic Policy Institute.
Sources:
- Economic Policy Institute. “Family Budget Calculator.”
He then repeated racist statements, accusing undocumented immigrants of “invading” and “stealing” American jobs and housing. (Both claims are untrue, according to the Economic Policy Institute and PolitiFact).
According to data provided by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), collating Department of Labor submissions from individual states, unemployment insurance claims are significantly up in Washington, D.C., as well as in other states singled out by the Moody’s report.
When deportations increase, the child-care workforce tends to decrease—which puts pressure on working families. Cites EPI research on deportations/child care workforce (paywall).
Research shows farmworkers are paid much less, roughly 40%, than comparable workers outside of agriculture. And roughly one-fifth of farmworkers earn incomes below the poverty level, according to federal data.