“It is clear that the pain is nowhere near over for millions of workers and their families across the country,” Economic Policy Institute senior economist Elise Gould said in a statement on the report.
“This Labor Day, we will hear a lot of rhetoric from policymakers about helping workers, but it is important that they take real action that will help working people in this recovery.”
Newsweek
September 8, 2020
But if the goal is for the federal government to provide additional support to state and local governments, far better to do so directly, rather than by the roundabout route of offering a tax break to the rich. As Josh Bivens at the Economic Policy Institute writes:
“The SALT deduction is one tool for redistributing tax revenue, but most working people don’t have access to it, because they don’t itemize their tax deductions to be able to qualify for it. We should transfer federal aid directly to states to allow them to use the money on targeted healthcare, infrastructure, and education spending, which would more progressively distribute the money and allow states to be more responsive to recessions.”
Brookings Institution
September 8, 2020
The unemployment rate from August is the lowest since the pandemic shut down the economy in March. But Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, explained that the 8.4% figure doesn’t take into account all virus-related job losses.
“In August, there were 13.6 million workers who were officially unemployed. But there were an additional 1.1 million workers who were temporarily unemployed but who were being misclassified as ‘employed not [at] work.’ There were also 4.3 million workers who were out of work as a result of the virus but who were being counted as having dropped out of the labor force because they weren’t actively seeking work,” she wrote.
Courthouse News Service
September 8, 2020
The Economic Policy Institute issued a report in August showing that the highest rate of unemployment is among Latina workers. The pandemic has exposed the economic disparities among people of color that have long been known and women of color are feeling the brunt of impact.
CNN
September 8, 2020
The total number of workers who are permanently jobless is now 3.4 million, according to the bureau’s latest data. Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), wrote in a blog post Friday that contrary to the White House’s rosy spin, the new BLS report shows “the pain is nowhere near over for millions of workers and their families across the country.”
Common Dreams
September 8, 2020
White people are more likely to be able to work from home, according the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Also, essential workers are at high risk for contracting Covid-19, and while White people make up 60% of the population, they account for only 55% of essential workers, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
CNN
September 8, 2020
Nationally, analysis of federal data by the Economic Policy Institute shows that Black women saw a slightly smaller increase in unemployment in April compared with February, but the rate was higher — 16.9 percent compared with 15.8 percent — because it started out higher for Black women. Latinas saw a much higher jump in unemployment than white women, and have been slower to regain work.
The Middletown Press
September 8, 2020
The July trade deficit numbers come less than a month after a report by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) found that despite Trump’s repeated vows to “bring back” U.S. manufacturing jobs, the president’s first-term trade agenda and disastrous handling of the coronavirus pandemic have “wiped out much of the last decade’s job gains in U.S. manufacturing.”
“The Trump administration has taken credit for ‘reshoring’ manufacturing jobs, but the data show that isn’t true,” said Robert Scott, senior economist and director of trade and manufacturing research at EPI. “Nearly 1,800 factories have disappeared under Trump between 2016 and 2018.”
Common Dreams
September 8, 2020
Even conservatives such as Glenn Hubbard, who was chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President George W. Bush, have argued that state cash needs were becoming urgent. Arguments about “state profligacy,” Hubbard adds, are beside the point. At an Economic Policy Institute online seminar held last month, Hubbard observed that “if an overweight person comes to the ER with a heart attack, you treat the heart attack before you lecture him or her about weight.”
Nonprofit Quarterly
September 8, 2020
The unemployment rate for white Georgians grew 4% to 7.5% between the first and second quarters of 2020, according to data from the Economic Policy Institute. Unemployment for Black Georgians grew by 6.5% to 11.8% during the same time frame. Hispanic unemployment in Georgia shot up 9.1% to 12.4%.
Georgia Recorder
September 8, 2020