Media clips

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• The pandemic is making a vicious cycle even worse for low-income students

  “The pandemic has exacerbated well-documented opportunity gaps that put low-income students at a disadvantage relative to their better-off peers,” Emma Garcia and Elaine Weiss from the Economic Policy Institute wrote in September. They defined opportunity gaps as limits in access to conditions and resources that enhance learning and development.

  Socio-economic factors are among the biggest drivers of educational success for kids, Garcia and Weiss found in a 2017 study. Children who fall behind in their early education rarely make up the lost ground, they said.

  That can do lifelong damage to people’s wealth: Higher educational attainment correlates with lower poverty rates, according to the Census Bureau. A 2018 paper from the Congressional Research Service showed 78.9% of working-age adults living in poverty in the United States had at most a high school diploma — a much higher percentage than in the general population, where only 56% of people had at most a high school diploma.

  The opportunity gap that Garcia and Weiss warned about always existed — but it got worse in the pandemic.

  “This is not new,” Garcia, who focuses on education policy in her work as an economist, told CNN Business. But the consequences from the pandemic will compound and last beyond just the short-term, she said.

  CNN Business July 12, 2021
• EPI panel, govt. official warn companies want a ‘piece work’ society

  Intentional employer “misclassification” of workers as “independent contractors,” stripping them of minimum wages, overtime pay, jobless aid, workers comp, and the right to unionize, is not just a “gig economy” problem, two advocates, and a top enforcement official warn.

  Instead, it’s an increasing tactic of bosses to degrade and exploit workers from coast to coast. One expert warns if companies succeed in their push to turn all “employees,” now covered by labor law, into not-covered “independent contractors,” the U.S. workforce could turn to a “piece work” society, reminiscent of the garment sweatshops of the 1890s.

  The panel, the first of two convened by the Economic Policy Institute, discussed both the report, Misclassification, The ABC Test, And ‘Employee’ Status and the expensive and successful campaign by two of the most-prominent “Gig” firms, the rideshare companies Uber and Lyft, to get California voters to permanently let them misclassify all their workers as “independent contractors.”

  But the problem goes far beyond Uber and Lyft and far beyond California, EPI reports.

  People's Weekly World July 12, 2021
• Many moms left the workforce during the pandemic. For some, going back isn’t so simple.

  It’s a Catch-22 familiar to many single mothers, says Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute. “Women are being presented with false choices,” Gould says. “You can’t leave your kid home alone and go to work if you don’t have affordable child care. That’s not a choice that you’re making.”

  The Washington Post July 12, 2021
• Blue Collars Have Outpaced White Collars in Pay—At First Glance

  “Low-wage, low-hours workers were hit hardest in the Covid-19 recession,” the Economic Policy Institute said in May, announcing its annual State of Working America report. OK, makes sense. But then how do you explain this chart?

  The chart shows that in the two years from May 2019 to May 2021, pay went up nearly twice as fast for lower-wage workers as for higher-wage workers. That seems to undercut the Economic Policy Institute argument that Covid hit low-wage workers hardest.

  “Too many white collars, not enough blue collars,” economist Edward Yardeni, founder of Yardeni Research Inc., wrote in a note to clients on June 27. “There’s no shortage of white-collar workers, including college-educated professionals, administrators, supervisors, and executives. There is a serious shortage of blue-collar workers,” he added.

  In reality, both the EPI and Yardeni are correct, although about different aspects of the labor market. The Economic Policy Institute points out that during the pandemic, average hourly earnings were artificially boosted by the disappearance of many jobs at the bottom of the income ladder. Taking those very low-wage jobs out of the calculation made the average of those remaining higher. Some of those jobs have since returned, but not all.

  Bloomberg July 12, 2021
• Activision shows the case for changing the CEO pay game

  He is not alone in having had a lucrative pandemic: six of the 10 largest executive packages on record were awarded last year, compensation group Equilar estimated. But the average US CEO pay ratio had already grown from 61:1 to 320:1 in the 30 years before Covid-19 struck, according to the Economic Policy Institute, and that gulf has started to trouble investors.

  Financial Times July 12, 2021
• For Farmworkers, the Fight for the 8-Hour Day Isn’t Over

  Nearly half of all U.S. farmworkers lack legal status, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Just more than a quarter of farmworkers are U.S.-born, according to the agency’s numbers. The Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning research think tank based in Washington, D.C., estimates about 10% are foreign workers in the United States on H‑2A temporary visas. The average farm wage was $13.99 an hour as of 2019, roughly 60% of the average non-farm wage.

  In These Times July 12, 2021
• Child Care Should Be Universal and Well-Paid — Not Just Affordable

  An analysis by the Economic Policy Institute found that raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour would boost take-home pay for as many as 560,000 child care workers, or more than 40 percent; the vast majority would be women, more than a third Black and Latinx. Improved wages could also help stabilize the workforce by curbing the currently high turnover rates, which would help daycare programs attract and retain qualified staff, and put early educators on a sustainable career path. Early education advocacy and professional organizations such as the NAEYC have been pushing for more resources and infrastructure for educators seeking professional development and training.

  Truthout July 12, 2021
• Half of the people who applied for unemployment didn’t get it, new report says

  “Unemployed workers really had totally different qualities of life, totally different standards of support based solely on where they live,” David Cooper, a senior economic analyst at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute (EPI), previously told Insider.

  Business Insider July 12, 2021
• Black Workers Stopped Making Progress on Pay. Is It Racism?

  Black workers also earn lower wages relative to their credentials. An analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank, found that whether they have a high school diploma or an advanced degree, Black workers make about 80 percent of the earnings of a white worker with similar education.

  The New York Times July 12, 2021
• Over 200,000 workers are seeing a pay bump today as 2 states and DC up their minimum wages

  Over 200,000 workers will see their paychecks grow, according to an estimate by Ben Zipperer of the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. Of the workers who will benefit, most are women, according to Zipperer; Black and Hispanic workers will see the largest hikes.

  Business Insider July 9, 2021
• Employers are turning to signing bonuses to try and lure in new workers

  While one-time bonuses might be one way to temporarily address the problem, Heidi Shierholz, the director of policy at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, previously told Insider there could be a more simple, compensation-based solution: Raising wages altogether.

  Business Insider July 9, 2021
• Hiring bonuses no substitute for higher wages

  Ben Zipperer: The Economic Policy Institute says hiring bonuses in no way substitute for higher wages.

  Scripps National News July 9, 2021
• Jobs Up, Pay Up: Breaking Down the June Jobs Report
  Cheddar July 9, 2021
• There’s a Way to Get More People Vaccinated—and It Doesn’t Involve the Lottery

  Terri Gerstein is the director of the State and Local Enforcement Project at the Harvard Labor and Worklife Program and a senior fellow at the Economic Policy Institute. Previously, she was the Labor Bureau chief in the New York State Attorney General’s Office and a deputy commissioner in the New York State Department of Labor.

  The Nation July 9, 2021
• Jobs report

  Payroll growth over the last three months in the US has been ‘huge’, says Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute (and former chief economist at the Department of Labor)

  The Guardian July 9, 2021
• Scott Walker’s Wisconsin Paved the Way for Donald Trump’s America

  While Joe Biden narrowly won back Wisconsin and Michigan last year, the states are increasingly polarized, a trend that has been exacerbated by labor’s demise. As the Economic Policy Institute has shown, the decline in union membership correlates with a rise in income inequality. It is also a central culprit in America’s political dysfunction and in the atomization of the electorate; studies have shown that union members are more active in civil society, more likely to vote and less prone to racial resentment.

  New York Times July 9, 2021
• The Supreme Court Just Dealt a Blow to Farmworkers — And All Other Workers, Too

  The rule that gives California unions access to private property was put in place for good reason. “It takes account of who farmworkers are, how they work, and the fact that they are really hard to reach,” says Daniel Costa, director of immigration law and policy research at the Economic Policy Institute.

  Costa says that many farmworkers live on the premises where they work, meaning that in order to speak to them at all, union organizers need to be able to access private agricultural property. In other cases, such as at Cedar Point, workers live in housing that is rented out and therefore effectively controlled by their employer.

  On top of being physically hard to reach, Costa says there are often language barriers, with many workers speaking a primary Indigenous language rather than Spanish or English. “They also sometimes work unusual hours because of the heat, and usually live and work in far-off rural places,” says Costa.

  Jacobin July 9, 2021
• Joe Biden Wants To Crack Down On Noncompete Clauses

  The crackdown on noncompetes is meant to increase competition among employers and restore workers’ leverage in the job market. Labor economists say limiting or banning such clauses will give workers more mobility and ultimately greater earnings, by allowing them to take their work to the highest bidder.

  “If you’re a nonunionized worker … basically your only source of power with your employer is the implicit threat that you can quit and take a job somewhere else,” said Heidi Shierholz, senior economist at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.

  Huffpost July 9, 2021
• Biden aprobará una orden ejecutiva para ayudar a los trabajadores a mejorar su empleo

  Un análisis realizado en 2019 por el liberal Economic Policy Institute estimó que entre 36 y 60 millones de trabajadores podrían estar sujetos a acuerdos de no competencia.

  Telemundo July 9, 2021
• Activists want policymakers to reimagine unemployment program, which typically serves only a fraction of the jobless

  Mason’s experience is one of the reasons advocates are calling on policymakers to reimagine the unemployment system. In a new report, the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute (EPI) is calling for setting minimum federal standards to replace wildly divergent levels of benefits from state to state, tying the term of benefits programs to the economic conditions on the ground instead of relying on Congress and expanding eligibility in a system with a long list of reasons for rejecting people.

  EPI say state-level unemployment programs are obsolete and riddled with exclusions. Absent federal intervention that temporarily expanded eligibility during the pandemic, less than one-third of jobless people in the U.S. received unemployment benefits in 2019.

  Nevada Independent July 9, 2021
• Labor shortage? Wage data sends mixed signals.

  But, “there really isn’t any evidence of widespread labor shortage,” said Valerie Wilson at the Economic Policy Institute.

  If there were, Wilson said, employers would be jacking up wages across the board to entice unemployed workers. Instead, there are some pockets of wage acceleration, “in leisure and hospitality. A big boost in those wages is the fact that they’re getting more tips now because more people are coming to those restaurants in person.”

  Marketplace July 9, 2021
• There’s no labor shortage — just not enough good jobs

  “Nothing about this is going to be permanent,” said Heidi Shierholz, a senior economist at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.

  LA Times July 9, 2021
• Biden Moves To Restrict Noncompete Agreements, Saying They’re Bad For Workers

  The White House estimates that noncompete agreements are used by roughly half of private-sector businesses for at least some of their employees, affecting anywhere between 36 million and 60 million workers. The numbers come from a 2019 report from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, which surveyed 634 employers.

  The report found that while businesses with well-paid, highly educated workers are more likely to use noncompetes, the agreements were not uncommon in sectors dominated by low-wage workers. Almost 30% of establishments offering an average hourly wage below $13 require noncompetes for all their workers, the survey found.

  Famously, the sandwich chain Jimmy John’s agreed to stop using noncompetes in 2016 after being sued in New York and Illinois. The chain had prohibited its sandwich-makers and drivers from working for another sandwich shop within a 3-mile radius of any Jimmy John’s in the country.

  Noncompetes are still fairly common in construction, manufacturing and retail, the EPI survey found. And workers bound by them often enter jobs unaware of the requirement. Almost a third of businesses surveyed said they ask new employees to sign the agreements after they’ve accepted the job, often on their first day of work.

  NPR July 9, 2021
• Schools Pay a High Price for Low Teacher Salaries

  In the meantime, teachers—who, according to recent data by the Economic Policy Institute, earn about 20 percent less than other professionals with similar experience—continue to face financial hardships.

  Education Week July 9, 2021
• Hiring crunch is boosting pay for restaurant workers

  So while restaurant workers have more options today, “that doesn’t mean there are a bunch of family-sustaining jobs,” said Heidi Shierholz, a labor economist with the Economic Policy Institute. “The weekly wages that are in that industry — they are extraordinarily low.”

  In June, average weekly earnings for all employees in the leisure and hospitality sector amounted to $483, or just over $23,000 per year, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

  “Wages have grown in leisure and hospitality this year for sure, but they plummeted in the earlier part of the recession. So it’s not like the wages are high by any stretch in this industry,” Shierholz said. “These workers definitely have more leverage than they did in December in the worst of this, but it is far from an industry where workers call all the shots. It’s still extremely low wages, unstable hours, weak benefits.

  Eventually, the industry is likely to arrive at a post-pandemic equilibrium, and workers will lose some of their newfound bargaining power.

  “I looked hard and I can’t see anything in this that I expect to be permanent,” Shierholz added. “We’re in a labor market that’s in very rapid flux, so there are some pockets like this where we’re seeing unusual dynamics. But I think this is a temporary shift in some of the bargaining power to workers.”

  CBS News July 9, 2021
• 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