According to the data from the Economic Policy Institute, while 27 percent of the total US workforce would benefit from the raise:
- 39 percent of Black and Latina women would benefit (vs. 18 percent of white men);
- 38 percent of African American workers would benefit;
- 33 percent of Latino workers would benefit; and
- 32 percent of women workers would benefit (vs 22 percent of men).
Common Dreams
February 10, 2021
How did they do that? Dube notes that the latest report “UPweighted more negative studies,” despite, in at least one case, evidence having emerged since the negative study to call its results into question. Even a recent review of the available data by noted minimum wage increase opponents David Neumark and Peter Shirley “had a median estimate of -0.15 for directly affected workers, less than half the size of the CBO assumption,” the Economic Policy Institute’s Ben Zipperer pointed out.
Daily Kos
February 10, 2021
This week, the CBO sided firmly with the naysayers—which one could tell easily enough by how quickly left-leaning economists flamed its results. “We believe that the CBO’s assumptions on the scale of job loss are just wrong and inappropriately inflated relative to what cutting-edge economics literature would indicate,” Heidi Shierholz of the labor-aligned Economic Policy Institute wrote in a Monday blog post that was typical of the blowback. Critics accused the CBO of, among other analytical sins, putting far too much weight on a 2018 paper that showed Seattle’s push for a $15 minimum wage had eliminated a significant number of jobs, even though a followup study by the same team later suggested the impact of the hike was fairly small.
Slate
February 10, 2021
“The damage that he was doing to workers’ rights under labor law is like nothing we’ve seen before,” said Lynn Rhinehart, a senior fellow at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.
The Hill
February 10, 2021
Economists questioned how accurate the CBO’s estimates were, with Heidi Shierholz, director of policy for the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, saying in a Twitter post that the CBO’s estimates were “really out there” and out of line with previous studies that showed job losses far lower than what the CBO predicted.
The Balance
February 10, 2021
Still, a study by the Economic Policy Institute said raising the minimum wage would affect about 32 million workers — most of them essential workers. And about 60% of those affected by the higher wage would be women.
News Nation Now
February 10, 2021
Wondering what the livable wage is in your area? Use the Economic Policy Institute’s budget calculator here.
NBC 12 News
February 9, 2021
According to an analysis of the report by Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), the BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) for December provides a “clear sign that recovery is not charging ahead.”
…
The phrase “little changed” is mentioned 17 times throughout the survey, Gould noted in a tweet, illuminating the point that that job market has seen weak recovery for millions of unemployed Americans.
“Along most of the [BLS] measures, we are not seeing improvements,” Gould told Newsweek. “Hopes for recovering, that’s not what’s happening now.”
Newsweek
February 9, 2021
A Feb. 2 report on Biden’s proposal by think tank Economic Policy Institute said that raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour would raise Federal Insurance Contributions Act 
taxes each year by $7 billion to $13.9 billion. Employees pay half of those taxes and employers pay the other half.
Law360
February 9, 2021