Elise Gould, senior economist at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, noted that public sector employment is still 1 million jobs below its February level after loads of layoffs during the beginning of the pandemic.
“We’ve seen large reductions in state and local public sector employment — a sector which disproportionately employs women and Black workers — over the last few months,” Gould wrote.
“I’d warn data watchers to consider those gains with a grain of salt, and to look at the overall changes from February (pre-COVID-19) to July.”
The Hill
August 10, 2020
The Bureau of Labor Statistics announced Friday that the U.S. added 1.8 million jobs in July, a significant drop compared to 4.8 million in June and 2.7 million in May. Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, noted in a blog post that the U.S. is “still 12.9 million jobs below where we were in February, before the pandemic spread.”
“Federal policymakers need to act now to reinstate the $600 unemployment insurance benefits to the 30+ million workers who are desperately trying to make ends meet,” Gould wrote. “And, those benefits are supporting a huge amount of spending, which means, without it, the loss of about five million jobs.”
“Federal policymakers also need to provide massive fiscal relief to state and local governments,” added Gould, “so they can continue to provide necessary services and prevent unnecessary cuts to their budgets as their revenue falls.”
Common Dreams
August 10, 2020
Today’s jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows three months in a row of payroll employment gains, an increase in jobs of 1.8 million in July on top of 4.8 million in June and 2.7 million in May. But, because so many jobs were lost in March and April, we are still 12.9 million jobs below where we were in February, before the pandemic spread. The slowdown in jobs gained is likely due to a resurgence of the coronavirus and re-shuttering in parts of the country.
The Progressive Pulse
August 10, 2020
“Because we did not put the public health measures in place necessary to successfully reopen, the coronavirus has spiked, and the jobs gains we saw in May and June have stalled, if not reversed. Now is not the time to cut benefits that are supporting jobs,” wrote Heidi Shierholz, senior economist and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, in a blog post.
CNN Business
August 10, 2020
“The slowdown in jobs gained is likely due to a resurgence of the coronavirus and re-shuttering in parts of the country,” said Elise Gould, senior economist at the nonprofit think tank Economic Policy Institute.
Most of the July employment gains were seen in the leisure and hospitality industry, which includes restaurants and bars. That sector added 592,000 positions, but it’s still down 2.6 million jobs since February. Retail trade added 258,000 jobs while professional and business services gained 170,000.
Gould noted the unemployment rate is still higher than the worst month of the Great Recession.
“Federal policymakers need to act now to reinstate the $600 unemployment insurance benefits to the 30+ million workers who are desperately trying to make ends meet,” she wrote. “And, those benefits are supporting a huge amount of spending, which means, with it, the loss of about 5 million jobs.”
Courthouse News
August 10, 2020
Few low-wage workers can do their jobs from home. Only 9.2% of the bottom fourth of workers can work from home compared with 61.5% of those in the top quarter, an Economic Policy Institute study found.
Raw Story
August 10, 2020
A separate study by the Economic Policy Institute found that expanding jobless aid boosted personal income by $842 billion in May; extending the heightened benefits through mid-2021, the nonprofit said, would provide an average quarterly boon to GDP of 3.7 percent.
Fox News
August 10, 2020
According to the Economic Policy Institute, the average cost of care for a four-year-old child in Georgia is more than $600 a month.
Atlanta Journal Constitution
August 10, 2020
Caroline Hyde & Taylor Riggs bring you the latest news and analysis after the closing bell on Wall Street. Today’s show tackles the jobs report and the latest on Trump’s China tech attack Guests Today: Elise Gould of the Economic Policy Institute, Graham Webster of the Stanford University Cyber Policy Center.
Bloomberg TV
August 10, 2020
Restoring those benefits at the $200 level could still damage the economy. One study from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute indicated that cutting back to $200 per week would shed 3.4 million jobs from the economy.
Business Insider
August 10, 2020