Media clips

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• Almost 3 million people fell off the unemployment benefits cliff

  “It’s a totally egregious way to govern, that we let these programs lapse and then people just fall through the cracks,” said Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, and a former chief economist at the Labor Department. “People are living week to week.”

  CNBC January 22, 2021
• Biden fires Trump-appointed labor board general counsel and deputy who refused to resign

  Seen by labor advocates as someone who was focused on hampering the enforcement of rules he was sworn to uphold, Robb had brought a staunchly employer-friendly approach to the board. He sought to curtail union use of “Scabby the rat” (the inflatable used by some unions during strikes), urged the board to limit employees’ protected union activity, and sought to restrict employees’ use of company email to discuss workplace issues, according to a report from the Economic Policy Institute.

  Washington Post January 22, 2021
• Big jump in unemployment benefit claims from gig workers

  And Heidi Shierholz, a labor economist at the Economic Policy Institute, said that was problematic before, but with the pandemic, “it’s really shown us that there are gaps in our regular unemployment system that you can drive a truck through. We do have the ability to close them, like the existence of this program shows us that we can do it.”

  Marketplace January 22, 2021
• Sharon Block, Union Ally, Named to White House Regulatory Post

  “Sharon brings tremendous expertise, knowledge, and integrity to this important work,” said Thea Lee, president of the left-leaning think tank Economic Policy Institute. “OIRA has the potential to be a roadblock or an essential partner in ensuring that appropriate regulatory policy fairly balances diverse viewpoints and interests. Sharon is the right candidate for this critical position at this moment in history.”

  Bloomberg January 22, 2021
• The Beginning of the End of Meaningless Work

  The Covid-19 pandemic has only accelerated this questioning—a return to an understanding of work as a site of struggle, not liberation. It has also introduced a new kind of laborer: the “essential worker,” tying together workers who typically are not seen as having a shared fate, from grocery store cashiers to nurses, food app delivery drivers to teachers. Workers in meatpacking plants, in Amazon warehouses, in critical infrastructure have been recognized as fundamental in maintaining society as we know it, even as their labor is demeaned and their lives endangered. The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) estimates that there are more than 55 million workers across 12 industries who now share this label: 70 percent didn’t have a college degree; one in eight were covered by a collective bargaining agreement. In frontline essential work, the Center for Economic and Policy Research found, women and people of color are overrepresented (disaggregated data on women of color was not presented). They also found that one-third of essential workers live in low-income families.

  The New Republic January 22, 2021
• Unemployment Claims Rise Sharply, Showing New Economic Pain

  And the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning research group, says the number of workers displaced by the pandemic is far higher than the 10.7 million officially counted as unemployed in December. By the institute’s calculation, after adjusting for misclassification and undercounting and factoring in those considered to have quit the labor force, 26.8 million workers are jobless or have seen a drop in hours and pay because of the pandemic.

  New York Times January 22, 2021
• The Trump economy left Black Americans behind. Here’s how they want Biden to narrow the gaps.

  “The top 1 percent of households claimed about 83 percent of the benefits of that tax law. There are very few African Americans in the top 1 percent,” said Valerie Wilson, director of Economic Policy Institute’s program on race, ethnicity and the economy. “When we look at the economic well being of African Americans, we have to look not just at absolute progress, but at relative progress, and there has been absolutely no gains on that front.”

  Washington Post January 22, 2021
• What’s Next for Biden’s $1,400 Stimulus Checks? Hurdles, Holdups and Compromise

  Josh Bivens, director of research at the Economic Policy Institute, praised Biden’s plan shortly after it was unveiled last week.

  “Most importantly, this package is at the scale of the problems it is aiming to solve. To support the spending and investment needed to fully repair the labor market, we estimated in early December that roughly $3 trillion was needed. Less than one-third of this amount was included in the end-of-year recovery package, and the Biden administration’s proposal fills in the remaining amount,” Bivens said in a statement.

  Newsweek January 22, 2021
• Fact-check: Would a $15 minimum wage raise the price of a Taco Bell burrito to $38?

  Sources

  Economic Policy Institute, “Minimum Wage Tracker,” Jan. 7, 2021

  Politifact January 22, 2021
• Yellen says raising minimum wage to $15 would have ‘minimal’ impact on jobs, but nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office disagrees

  Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think-tank, argued that the CBO’s estimated job losses from enacting a $15 minimum wage are “overstated.”

  “The crucial fact is that an employment decline as a result of a minimum wage increase doesn’t necessarily mean any worker is actually worse off,” she wrote in a July 2019 report. “For a wide variety of reasons, a sizable share of low-wage workers routinely cycle in and out of employment; each quarter, more than 20% of the lowest-wage workers leave or start a job.”

  MarketWatch January 22, 2021