Cites EPI’s minimum wage tracker.
Pew Charitable Trust
March 15, 2021
On March 9, the Democratic House passed the first significant legislation in support of labor since the 1930s. The PRO (Protecting the Right to Organize) Act removes obstacles to organizing and joining a union, ensures good-faith bargaining, and punishes employers for violations of the law. A Gallup Poll show public approval of unions at 68 percent—including 45 percent of Republicans. But even so, passing the PRO Act in the Senate will be hard.
Dissent Magazine
March 15, 2021
A report by the Economic Policy Institute on the effects of toxic stress on children found that “children exposed to more frightening and threatening events are more likely to suffer from academic problems, behavioral problems, and health problems.” It also said “low income children are more likely to be exposed” to this stress.
Boston Globe
March 15, 2021
A $15/hour minimum wage is a basic, decent wage that will help full-time workers achieve a modestly adequate standard of living (source: Economic Policy Institute).
The Salt Lake Tribune
March 15, 2021
Last year, the Economic Policy Institute reported that for male workers, the decline in union membership accounted for more than one-third of income inequality, and the lost wages from labor’s decline are about $200 billion a year, “with that money being redistributed upward, to the rich.”
Philadelphia Inquirer
March 15, 2021
The Economic Policy Institute notes that 30.8% of Black children live in poverty compared with 10.8% of white children.
Valley News
March 15, 2021
JESSICA SMITH: But the president and progressives did not get everything they wanted. The Senate stripped the minimum wage hike from the package, tightened the eligibility for stimulus checks, and reduced the weekly boost to unemployment benefits.
HEIDI SHIERHOLZ: It’s not perfect. There’s still work to be done, but it will make a huge difference. It’s one of the reasons I’m quite optimistic about the chances for a relatively quick bounce back.
Yahoo Finance
March 15, 2021
HCA CEO Sam Hazen was paid $27 million in 2019, making him the highest paid CEO in the hospital sector for that year (2020 figures will be released in mid-March). Hazen’s 2019 compensation was higher than the CEO of Humana, $16.7 million. His pay is 478 times the median HCA employee, up from 383 times in 2018. His pay is over 1,038 times the lowest paid worker at HCA, which is $12.50 at its El Paso facility. Hazen is paid roughly $13,000 an hour. According to the Economic Policy Institute, the average ratio of U.S. CEO pay to median worker was 320 to 1 in 2019.
Truthout
March 15, 2021
Features interview with Valerie Wilson.
CNBC
March 15, 2021
“There are a million ways it feels like a game-changer,” said Heidi Shierholz, a senior economist and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank. “It is such a departure in how we deal with relief. We have not done things this way before, and we have suffered because of it.”
According to Shierholz, whereas the relief bills that addressed the Great Recession more than a decade ago included cost-cutting and austerity, with some of the budget cuts falling on states and local governments, the new relief bill avoids some of those mistakes.
“So then state and local governments became these little anti-stimulus machines because they are making cuts all over the place, and those cuts in the aftermath of the Great Recession delayed the recovery by four years,” she said. “We are going to get relief now while the labor market is still weak, and we are setting the economy up for as fast as a bounce-back as possible when the virus is under control.”
Washington Post
March 15, 2021