Media clips

---

• 11 Charts on Taxing the Wealthy and Corporations

  As corporate tax obligations have declined, CEO pay has skyrocketed. According to Office of Management and Budget data and Economic Policy Institute research, when corporate tax receipts made up 21.8 percent of all federal revenue in 1965, the average CEO-to-median worker pay ratio was 21 to 1. After the 2017 Republican tax cuts, corporations plowed significant windfalls into stock buybacks and executive bonuses. By 2019, corporate tax receipts had fallen to just 6.6 percent of federal revenue and the average pay ratio had risen to 320 to 1.

  Inequality.org July 9, 2021
• ‘Trying to strangle local governments’: What happens when states and their cities become adversaries?

  The fault lines of inequality exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic have also thrown the pre-emption issue into starker relief. A 2020 report from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute notes that legislative moves are “disproportionately harming the same communities that have been pre-empted from taking local action, limiting their ability to effectively combat the public health crisis.”

  The report, which focuses on the South, characterizes pre-emption as “embedded in a racist history.” Pre-emptive laws “are passed by majority-white legislatures and tend to create barriers to economic security in cities whose residents are majority people of color.”

  MarketWatch July 9, 2021
• Biden’s latest executive order empowers workers in 3 key ways

  Noncompete agreements prevent workers from going to a competitor or starting a competing business within a certain period after leaving their previous job. Between 36 million and 60 million private-sector workers were subject to noncompete agreements in 2019, according to estimates by the Economic Policy Institute.

  “The only economic leverage that non-unionized workers have is the implicit threat that they could quit and go somewhere else,” Heidi Shierholz, senior economist and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, told Yahoo Money. “Noncompete agreements reduce wages. Your employer doesn’t have to pay you bigger wages if they know that you don’t have outside options.”

  Limiting noncompete agreements or making them unenforceable — as Biden’s order sets out to do — may not be enough, according to Shierholz. Banning them instead would give workers more leverage, she said.

  Yahoo Finance July 9, 2021
• Number of workers unemployed for more than a year jumps by 248,000

  “There are many people who lost their jobs early on in the recession who’ve been unemployed ever since,” according to Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute and former chief economist at the Department of Labor during the Obama administration.

  The increase in yearlong unemployment comes as the U.S. added 850,000 jobs in June, the most since August 2020.

  But the jump makes sense given the contours of the Covid labor market, Shierholz said.

  Layoffs, which began en masse in March and April 2020, were still about 20% higher than pre-pandemic levels over the following two months, she said.

  (Layoffs are a different metric than net jobs gained or lost, and are reported separately from the monthly jobs figures.)

  A jump in 52-week unemployment therefore reflects the elevated layoffs a year ago. The numbers will likely soon decline, since layoffs had normalized by July, she said.

  “As the overall unemployment rate comes down, I expect the long-term unemployment rate will come down,” according to Shierholz.

  Those out of work for an extended duration are likely among the hardest-hit industries, like leisure and hospitality, Shierholz said.

  CNBC July 9, 2021
• Statistics tell split stories about recovery

  Economist Elise Gould, who works with the non-partisan Economic Policy Institute, noted that the leisure and hospitality workforce is still below the pre-COVID-19 numbers. There are also big needs in government and education employment.

  …

  Gould’s fellow economist at EPI, Heidi Shierholz noted in a series of tweets that wage increases accompany hospitality growth.

  “One exception is in leisure and hospitality, where wages of nonsupervisory workers have risen sharply enough to suggest an actual (if sector-specific) shortage,” Shierholz tweeted. “But when you look further, you find little to be concerned about.”

  Herald Banner July 9, 2021
• Exclusive: Union flexes muscle for internet funding

  CWA does not represent tower climbers, Shelton said, and an Economic Policy Institute report from October found that the share of telecom workers represented by a union has fallen from 60% in the 1970s to about 16%.

  Axios July 9, 2021
• U.S. job openings high for second consecutive month

  But that number, combined with 5.9 million hirings, is still encouraging, according to Elise Gould with the Economic Policy Institute. “So you are seeing both job openings and hiring eating away at the big hole that we have that was left in the labor market when the pandemic hit,” Gould said.

  Marketplace July 9, 2021
• Biden seeks to strengthen options for workers with new order

  A 2019 analysis by the liberal Economic Policy Institute estimated that 36 million to 60 million workers could be subject to noncompete agreements.

  The Associated Press July 9, 2021
• Nikole Hannah-Jones refused to be blinded by white prestige

  Hannah-Jones’ experience reaffirms an insidious truth: Black greatness is seen only as equal to white mediocrity. In 2015, the Economic Policy Institute reported the unemployment rate for college-educated Black people was the same as for white people who had not finished college. And this issue has plagued UNC for years.

  Mic July 9, 2021
• Not a ‘smoking gun’: No proof expanded unemployment benefits are killing the economic recovery

  “It seems like something that was completely misguided and not supported by the facts or the evidence at all,” said Valerie Wilson of the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank. “There were a lot of inaccurate comparisons and conclusions drawn.”

  “I think the idea of wanting to cut benefits early is more a political point than one that is justified by the economic data,” Wilson added. “With the latest report, we’re on track for the recovery to remain strong and vibrant, and I just don’t think it’s a very wise decision to do anything to hinder that at this point. Those benefits are important for families and contributing to the demand that is needed for job growth to continue. By cutting those prematurely, you risk cutting the recovery short or at least hindering it.”

  Yahoo News July 9, 2021