HOUSE EDUCATION PANEL TO DISCUSS INEQUITIES, COVID-19 TODAY: The House Education and Labor Committee today will hold a hearing on “Inequities Exposed: How COVID-19 Widened Racial Inequities in Education, Health, and the Workforce.” It starts at noon and can be watched via Webex.
— Members will hear from: Camara P. Jones, adjunct professor at Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University; Valerie Rawlston Wilson, director of the Economic Policy Institute’s program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy; Avik Roy, president of the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity; and John B. King Jr., president of The Education Trust and former Education secretary under President Barack Obama.
Politico Morning Education
June 22, 2020
Heidi Shierholz, a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, suggested that the total number of workers currently receiving benefits or waiting for them is probably close to 34.5 million.
Politico Morning Shift
June 22, 2020
Lawmakers will hear from Camara P. Jones, adjunct professor at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University; Valerie Rawlston Wilson, director of the Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy at the Economic Policy Institute; Avik Roy, co-founder and president of the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity; and John B. King, Jr., president and CEO of The Education Trust.
PBS Newshour
June 22, 2020
Health care jobs can be dangerous in the midst of a pandemic, and some of those workers might have chosen to protect their safety by switching jobs or staying home, said Elise Gould, a senior economist at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute and coauthor of a study on black workers in the pandemic.
Stateline
June 22, 2020
Another idea: The Fed could “lower interest rates on loans offered to state and local governments, extend these loans’ maturities, and make them more broadly available to cities and counties,” Josh Bivens of the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank, wrote in a blog post earlier this month.
CNN Business
June 22, 2020
A recent report by the Economic Policy Institute stated that “African Americans have disproportionately high COVID-19 death rates and are more likely to live in areas experiencing outbreaks.” Deaths of blacks from COVID through May 13, 2020 represent 22.4% of all deaths while black Americans represent just 12.5% of the population.
The Press-Enterprise
June 22, 2020
The wealth gap has an obvious racial tilt, but there’s great economic disparity no matter how you look at it. “Upper income” families—which had a median net worth of $810,800, according to a 2017 Pew study—were the only tier able to build wealth from 2007 to 2016, adding 10% to their median net worth. Middle-income families—$110,100 in median net worth—lost 33% of their wealth. Access to retirement savings plays a role; high-income families are seven times more likely to have retirement account savings as low-income families, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Barron’s
June 22, 2020
There are an estimated 10.5 million members of the workforce over the age of 65, but many of them hold down jobs that can’t be performed remotely. In fact, almost 80% of workers 65 and over can’t telecommute, reports the Economic Policy Institute. By comparison, the same holds true for only 60% of those between the ages of 35 and 44.
The Motley Fool
June 22, 2020
Any recent manufacturing gains were abruptly wiped out by the COVID-19 lockdown — with a staggering 1.2 million manufacturing jobs lost this year. If Trump wants to take credit for an economic boom after a decade of recovery from the Great Recession, then he must also own this collapse, thanks to his administration’s mismanagement of the pandemic, including its refusal to organize an effective national response.
The Hill
June 22, 2020
Jhacova Williams (Race and Inequality) is an economist for the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy (PREE). In this capacity, she explores the role of structural racism in shaping racial economic disparities in labor markets, housing, criminal justice, higher education, and other areas that have a direct impact on economic outcomes. Williams’s research has focused on Southern culture and the extent to which historical events continue to impact the political behavior and economic outcomes of Southern Blacks.
Valerie Wilson (Labor Economics) is the director of the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy (PREE), a nationally recognized source for expert reports and policy analyses on the economic condition of America’s people of color. Prior to joining EPI, Wilson was an economist and vice president of research at the National Urban League Washington Bureau. She has written extensively on various issues impacting economic inequality in the United States—including employment and training, income and wealth disparities, access to higher education, and social insurance.
Fortune
June 22, 2020