Heidi Shierholz of the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute attributed the disparity in job loss to two factors: “One is that unionized workers have had a voice in how their employers have navigated the pandemic, and have used this voice for things like negotiating for terms of furloughs or work-share arrangements to save jobs. The other reason is a ‘pandemic composition effect.’ There has been (on average) more pandemic job losses in industries with lower unionization rates, like leisure and hospitality, and less job loss in sectors with higher unionization rates, like the public sector.”
Politico Morning Shift
January 25, 2021
Today, the Economic Policy Institute released data showing that despite overall union membership falling slightly in 2020 compared to 2019, the percentage of workers in unions had actually increased during the pandemic — because fewer unionized workers had lost their jobs.
Refinery29
January 25, 2021
Also impacting the statistics, however, is the fact that COVID-19 hit industries with smaller union presences, such as hospitality and leisure, especially hard. About half of the increase in the unionization rate in 2020 was the result of the pandemic’s concentrated impact on less-unionized job sectors, according to an analysis from the Economic Policy Institute. (The other half can be attributed to union workers faring better than nonunion workers in their same industries.)
Time Magazine
January 25, 2021
Ben Zipperer, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), told Insider that there’s a “theoretical horror story” of businesses hiring less — and thereby hurting the lowest-paid workers — when the minimum wage is increased. He said that those effects are smaller or even nonexistent in the real world.
“What happens is that yes, it is true that when you raise the minimum wage employers hire fewer low wage workers, that is correct,” Zipperer said. “On the other hand, the factor that’s really offsetting that is that, even though employers are hiring fewer workers, fewer workers are leaving their jobs.”
Business Insider
January 25, 2021
The Paris News
January 25, 2021
Overall, Biden faces a dilemma, said Robert E. Scott, a senior economist at the left-of-center Economic Policy Institute.
Scott described Biden’s agenda as “broadly progressive,” especially when paired with the $1.9 trillion coronavirus and economic relief proposal he has released. But its chances of enactment would fall if Biden is serious about securing bipartisan support, he said.
Politifact
January 22, 2021
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
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