Low pay and poor working conditions are the norm for workers in long-term care, according to a report published Wednesday by the think tank Economic Policy Institute.
Researchers gathered data on employment levels, demographics, compensation, poverty rates and unionization of workers. The field is dominated by women, especially Black and immigrant women, the authors said.
McKnight’s Senior Living
August 4, 2022
The Economic Policy Institute, an independent nonprofit think tank that studies economic trends, looked at the pay of CEOs at the 350 largest companies in the U.S. each year by revenue. One finding: Compensation was $1.7 million in 1978 and rose 1,322% to $24.2 million by 2020.
CEO pay grew 60% faster than the overall stock market during that time. Typical worker income in the industries those 350 CEOs represented grew 18%, indicative of growing income inequality.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
August 4, 2022
But the reduction in supply was met with increased demand as Americans started purchasing durable goods to replace the services they used prior to the pandemic, said Josh Bivens, director of research at the Economic Policy Institute. “The pandemic put distortions on both the demand and supply side of the US economy,” Bivens said.
CNET
August 4, 2022
Daniel Costa, director of immigration law and policy research at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., said that the U.S. government is failing to meet basic labor standards and provide basic rights to workers in the growing H-2A and H-2B visa programs. The H-2A visa program—the main focus of the hearing—is for seasonal jobs in agriculture, while the H-2B program is for seasonal jobs outside of agriculture.
“Although migrants coming to the United States through temporary work visa programs are legally authorized to work, they are among the most exploited laborers in the U.S. workforce because employer control of their visa status leaves many powerless to defend and uphold their rights,” Costa said. The flaws in the H-2 visa programs are systemic and structural, he said, listing abuses like charging workers exorbitant recruitment fees, keeping them in debt bondage, underpaying workers and allowing abuses to occur, as seen in the Operation Blooming Onion case.
SHRM
August 4, 2022
As Josh Bivens of the Economic Policy Institute has pointed out, corporations are not just passing on cost increases to customers; they’re padding their profits as well. Profits account for over half of the recent increase in prices, well above the historical average of 11 percent.
Dissent Magazine
August 4, 2022
And because that number has stayed stuck while prices keep rising, the Economic Policy Institute warned that the federal minimum wage now has less actual spending power than at any point in the last 66 years.
Business Insider
August 4, 2022
The federal minimum wage has not changed since 2009, and the Economic Policy Institute reported that the value of the minimum wage is worth 27 percent less than it was worth 13 years ago.
“A national $15 minimum wage would raise the incomes of tens of millions of workers, including servers in restaurants, grocery store employees and essential health care workers—as many as 2 million direct care workers who provide long-term services and supports would benefit from a $15 minimum wage in 2025,” a piece published by the Economic Policy Institute stated.
Newsweek
August 4, 2022
The median wage for child-care workers in 2021 was $13.22 an hour, or about $27,500 a year. Almost all are hourly workers, and the benefits are limited—according to an analysis by researchers at the the Economic Policy Institute, only one in five has access to employer-sponsored health insurance, and only one in 10 has a retirement plan. With high turnover and lean staff, administrators have been forced to ask educators to work extra hours.
The Atlantic
August 4, 2022
Most large corporations want access to politicians, so they spread their contributions across political parties and people with “very different” ideological approaches, according to John Schmitt, a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute.
“They’re not using their time sitting with legislators to change their minds about abortion,” Schmitt told me. “They’re using the time to change the regulatory structure that affects their industries or to influence where federal, state [or] local funds go.”
Los Angeles Times
August 4, 2022
“The brief love affair with essential employees saw its greatest flourishing in April and May of 2020,” said Dave Kamper, senior state policy coordinator for the Economic Policy Institute. “Unemployment numbers had hit a staggering high, and the whole country was on the same page about the risks of Covid and the importance of compensating workers who had no choice but face exposure.”
Bloomberg Law
August 4, 2022