“401(k)s are an accident of history”: That’s the title of a 2017 article at the Economic Policy Institute, which goes on to say that “401(k)s were never intended to replace pensions.”
Forbes
April 1, 2020
Unlike in Europe, paid sick leave is a luxury in the United States, where 55 percent of workers in the hotel and restaurant trade do not have access to it, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
International Business Times
April 1, 2020
Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a think tank, said even if fast food workers find a way to stay home when sick, directives to seek medical attention go unheeded for the uninsured.
“Seventy-three percent of workers have paid sick days, so about a quarter don’t. And these are often the low wage jobs, the service sector,” Gould said. “Hourly workers take care of children and the elderly. Those who work as home health aides — or in retirement homes or nursing homes. Children don’t seem to be at risk themselves, but they have the ability to spread the disease. And they have less respiratory etiquette.”
“Staying home or working from home can be easy for upper middle class people with good jobs,” she added. “The recommendations from the CDC — all the common sense things — could lead to economic catastrophe for the low-wage worker. This whole situation shows in painstaking detail how fragile our safety net is.”
WJNT
April 1, 2020
About 75% of private-sector workers in the United States had access to paid sick leave in 2019, according to Labor Department data. (For public-sector workers, it’s more than 90%.) Only 65% of private-sector employees in Ohio and other industrial Midwest states have access to paid sick time, according tan analysis of federal data by the liberal Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C. The Eastern Southern U.S., at 62%, is the only region with a lower percentage of workers without paid sick days.
Cleveland.com
April 1, 2020
The United States is unprepared for the COVID-19 pandemic given that many workers throughout the economy will have financial difficulty in following the CDC’s recommendations to stay home and seek medical care if they think they’ve become infected. Millions of U.S. workers and their families don’t have access to health insurance, and only 30% of the lowest paid workers have the ability to earn paid sick days — workers who typically have lots of contact with the public and aren’t able to work from home.
Talking Points Memo
April 1, 2020
The Economic Policy Institute released a white paper outlining the many benefits that Medicare for All would have for workers and the labor market: increased wages and salaries; job growth, even in the healthcare sector; elimination of “job lock” where people are held hostage at jobs just to keep their health benefits; and would particularly help female workers, who disproportionately work at jobs that don’t provide benefits.
Healthcare-Now
April 1, 2020
LINCOLN, Neb. — New research from the Economic Policy Institute shows that switching to a single-payer health system would boost the overall economy, make it easier for workers to switch jobs or start businesses and create a net surplus of new jobs.
Josh Bivens, research director at the institute, said wages would likely go up under a Medicare for all system because owners could elect to give some of the money that would have otherwise gone to insurance companies to workers instead.
“And so you’ve got about $700 billion today that is employee compensation that comes in the form of employers paying for health insurance premiums,” Bivens said. “You take that off their back, it’s the potential for employers to instead pay higher wages.”
Public News Service
April 1, 2020
DENVER — New research from the Economic Policy Institute shows that switching to a single-payer health system would boost the overall economy, make it easier for workers to switch jobs or start businesses, and create a net surplus of new jobs.
Josh Bivens, the institute’s research director, said wages likely would go up under Medicare for All because owners could elect to give some of the money that would have otherwise gone to insurance companies to workers instead.
“And so you’ve got about $700 billion today that is employee compensation that comes in the form of employers paying for health-insurance premiums,” he said. “You take that off their back, it’s the potential for employers to instead pay higher wages.”
Longmont Observer
April 1, 2020
Estimates for a system that ensures benefits on the scale Sanders is seeking is upwards of $30 trillion over 10 years. A recent study from the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning organization, suggested it could increase the wages of workers and boost the development of small businesses.
Markets Insider
April 1, 2020
With an uptick in demand for remote work, which heavily relies on IT infrastructure and expertise, IT experts could find themselves heavily burdened by work as more companies become remote, said Josh Bivens, research director at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank.
“As a general rule, yes, I think recessions economy-wide definitely cause a steep reduction in hiring, lots of layoffs [and] you see the rise in unemployment,” Bivens told CIO Dive. “There’s usually pretty broad-based pain,” but the epicenter of a potential coronavirus-induced recession would hit low-wage sectors and places where people gather, such as restaurants, tourism and entertainment.
CIO Dive
April 1, 2020