David Cooper, senior economic analyst at the Economic Policy Institute, told The American Independent Foundation that with the economy still 8.2 million jobs behind pre-pandemic levels, it was not the time to be cutting back unemployment benefits.
“There are far more people looking for work and unable to find it than there are employers unable to fill vacancies, and pulling back on [unemployment insurance] will only slow down the recovery,” he said. “To the extent that employers in some industries — like restaurants and leisure and hospitality — are having trouble finding staff, they need to take a hard look at the wages and quality of those jobs. Those industries are notoriously some of the lowest paying industries in the economy.”
He added, “I don’t think anyone should be surprised that some people might not be eager to take difficult jobs that are even harder now — and that might put their health at risk — if employers aren’t offering better pay and benefits than they were offering prior to the pandemic.”
The American Independent
May 14, 2021
American-made steel has been essential to our national security and our economy for decades. Now, with our economy beginning to recover from the COVID-19 crisis, it’s essential that the Biden administration continue supporting the U.S. steel industry by keeping Section 232 steel measures in place.
Morning Consult
May 14, 2021
Wages overall have not shot up significantly, which would be expected if employers needed to lure workers away from the higher unemployment benefits, said Valerie Wilson, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank. And the leisure and hospitality industry, a low-wage sector that would be most affected by a disincentive, had the nation’s strongest growth last month, adding 331,000 jobs.
“If it was true people were staying out because of the money, they certainly wouldn’t be coming back to the lowest-paying jobs,” she said.
Boston Globe
May 14, 2021
“It’s just breathtakingly terrible economics,” Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute and former chief economist at the Department of Labor from 2014 to 2017, said in a tweet.
“It will cause enormous suffering of those whose benefits are cut off, and damage state economies by turning away federal money that is providing fiscal support,” she added.
CNBC
May 14, 2021
“In this era, there’s been more uncertainty than ever before, so I wouldn’t hang my hat on any number,” former Department of Labor chief economist Heidi Shierholz tells Axios.
Axios
May 14, 2021
Another sign of two Americas: Black unemployment rate rose slightly to 9.7% vs. 5.3% for whites, “making Black workers the only racial and ethnic group (as a whole) to experience worsening metrics,” according to Elise Gould, senior economist with the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank. “Clearly, these two groups are experiencing a very different labor market.”
MarketWatch
May 14, 2021
Other economists, including Heidi Shierholz, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, say unemployment benefits’ disincentive effect is overstated. She said if there was a significant shortage of labor, employers wouldn’t be able to hire more than 900,000 workers in a month, as they did in March, and wages would be escalating at a much more rapid rate.
Dr. Shierholz, who worked in the Obama administration, said the pandemic caused a huge disruption in the labor market and it will take time for the dust to settle.
“And if the extended benefits mean some workers can take the time to find a job that’s a better match for their skills, and pays them a better wage, that’s a good thing, not a bad thing,” she said.
The Wall Street Journal
May 14, 2021
Currently, in 33 states and Washington, D.C., infant care is more expensive than college, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
CNBC
May 14, 2021
Vermont has plenty of company in facing calls for unemployment insurance reform. Nationally, experts say the crisis has exposed deep problems in states’ unemployment systems.
The problem was especially pronounced last spring. For every 10 people across the country who succeeded in lining up unemployment benefits in the first month of the pandemic, five to six more either tried and were unable to file a claim, or did not try to apply because it seemed too difficult, according to a study by the Washington, D.C-based Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank.
…
“This is another part of the infrastructure in our country that needs to be updated, and we need to put resources into our systems so this doesn’t happen again,” said Elise Gould, an expert on wages and poverty at the Economic Policy Institute. “This is the kind of trouble that many people were facing in the past. But it happened so quickly when millions were claiming that it became clear to more people how broken the system was.”
VT Digger
May 14, 2021
“Employers simply don’t want to raise wages high enough to attract workers,” observes Heidi Shierholz, a former chief economist for the Department of Labor who is now policy director at the labor-affiliated Economic Policy Institute. “I often suggest that whenever anyone says, ‘I can’t find the workers I need,’ she should really add, ‘at the wages I want to pay.’”
LA Times
May 14, 2021