Robert Reich, the U.S. Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton, tweeted Tuesday: “Capitalism is off the rails.” That was in reaction to a new report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), which found that the average CEO compensation in 2019 at one of America’s top 350 firms was $21.3 million, up by 14% from the year prior—and up 1,167% from 1978. A typical worker at one of these top companies now earns $67,000 per year.
Fast Company
August 20, 2020
Nebraska consistently tops the rankings in workforce participation, including ranking second in the percent of married couple families who both work. With parents at work, what are we supposed to do with all these kids? How are families going to pay for all this unexpected childcare? It is already cost burdensome; Nebraska is one of 33 states where childcare costs more than college, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Lincoln Journal Star
August 20, 2020
The Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, found that chief executives of the United States’ 350 largest companies earned an average of $21.3 million in realized compensation in 2019, setting the ratio of CEO-to-worker pay at 320 to 1, up from 293 to 1 in 2018 and more than five times as high as the 61-to-1 ratio in 1989.
The Washington Post
August 20, 2020
“We cannot ignore that many people just cannot quit their jobs,” said Heidi Shierholz, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute.
CNN
August 20, 2020
Other industrialized countries have also seen rising inequality, but the decline in worker power is particularly acute in the United States. From the 1980s to the late 2010s, the labor share of income in the United States—essentially, the percentage of overall income that ends up going to workers—fell by four percentage points, in effect a decline of hundreds of billions of dollars per year. Over the same period, U.S. workers lost key protections: collective-bargaining agreements cover less than 12 percent of workers (and only seven percent of private-sector workers) in the United States, compared with 98 percent in France, 80 percent in Italy, and 56 percent in Germany.
Foreign Affairs
August 20, 2020
CEOs made 320 times more than what their typical worker earned last year, according to a new report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), part of a decades-long trend of rapidly growing compensation for corporate America’s top execs.
Yahoo Finance
August 20, 2020
While these graphs may imply that those in the top quintiles disproportionately benefit from the new Department of Labor Guidance on 401(k) PE access, it’s important to remember that many in the top quintile already have access to private equity since they qualify as “accredited investors.” To be an accredited investor, one must either have net assets of at least $2.5 million, or a gross income for each of the last two financial years of at least $250,000. According to the Economic Policy Institute using data from the Social Security Administration, the top 5 percent of earners make $309,348 annually as of 2018.
The National Review
August 20, 2020
In 2018, a median Hispanic household earned 73 cents for every dollar a median white household earned, according to the Economic Policy Institute. A median Black household earned just 59 cents for every dollar a median white household earned.
KSAT-San Antonio
August 20, 2020