THE ECONOMIC POLICY INSTITUTE ESTIMATES THAT GOP’S PROPOSED CUTS TO UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS ALONE WOULD COST THE ECONOMY 3.4 MILLION JOBS
Sen. Jack Reed
July 30, 2020
He pointed to an analysis from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute that found cutting the boost to $200 a week would result in 3.4 million more layoffs.
Associated Press
July 30, 2020
The 70% replacement rate would result in an average benefit of about $310 nationwide, according to Heidi Shierholz, senior economist with the Economic Policy Institute, a think tank. But it would vary by individual and be capped at $500 per week.
San Francisco Chronicle
July 30, 2020
He pointed to an analysis from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute that found cutting the boost to $200 a week would result in 3.4 million more layoffs.
WKRN
July 30, 2020
Cutting unemployment insurance by $400 could cost 3.4 million US jobs over the next year, per data from Economic Policy Institute. The extra income helped low-income Americans rebound consumer spending and kept laid off workers afloat when only about half of American adults were employed as of June.
Business Insider
July 30, 2020
Unemployment payments aren’t simply replacing lost income. They also serve as economic stimulus. Heidi Shierholz, senior economist and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, points out that the $600 in additional unemployment benefits that workers have been getting actually supports millions of jobs. “Killing the $600 payment entirely would cost the U.S. 5.1 million jobs,” she says. People who are getting relief payments, Shierholz explains, spend it on basics like food and shelter. By contrast, people with higher incomes are now saving more.
Inc.
July 30, 2020
Through past recessions, UI benefits have been shown to be one of the most effective ways to stimulate the economy with approximately $2 injected into the economy per $1 received through these benefits.[3] Furthermore, the Economic Policy Institute projects “that extending the $600 UI benefits through the middle of 2021 would provide an average quarterly boost to gross domestic product (GDP) of 3.7% and employment of 5.1 million workers.”[4] We cannot risk losing this projected increase in GDP and related jobs this spending supports due partisan differences. With a drastic reduction in UI benefits, fiscally constrained families will be unable to purchase food and rent that will support our economy.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
July 30, 2020
“Ensuring that workers and consumers can hold companies accountable for their actions is critical to establishing a safe reopening of our economy,” Celine McNicholas and Margaret Poydock of the labor-associated Economic Policy Institute have observed.
Los Angeles Times
July 30, 2020
But fellow economist Ben Zipperer of the Economic Policy Institute disagrees with Bourne’s assessment.
“That kind of concern has always been raised when we’re talking about the minimum wage, and it doesn’t seem to actually play out in reality,” Zipperer said.
KXLH
July 30, 2020
“There’s a lot of people who just really, really, really struggled to even get through the system, get anyone to talk to them,” said Heidi Shierholz, a senior economist and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute. “When you have that experience over and over and over again, I actually can see why somebody would just say forget it, and give up.”
It is hard to know how many people who are eligible for unemployment have given up, or never tried to apply, but a survey EPI did in April found that for every 10 people who successfully filed for unemployment benefits, three or four were unable to get through, and two didn’t bother to try because it was too difficult. That was in the early days of the pandemic, when weekly unemployment claims first skyrocketed into the millions; state unemployment offices were unequipped to deal with the volume of calls and online applications.
Marketplace
July 30, 2020