The huge number of claims has overwhelmed unemployment bureaucracies and technology, according to Heidi Shierholz, the senior economist and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute and the former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor.
NBC News
April 20, 2020
A new report from the Economic Policy Institute estimates that approximately “3.5 million workers likely lost their employer-provided health insurance in the past two weeks.” To compound this situation, the Trump administration announced that it will not reopen Obamacare markets for purchasing health insurance plans through the Affordable Care Act. This really puts the uninsured behind the eight ball.
The California Aggie
April 20, 2020
Preliminary state data on race and ethnicity show Latinos make up about 20% of the state’s population but 30% of the diagnosed COVID-19 cases. According to the Economic Policy Institute, less than one in five black workers and roughly one in six Hispanic workers nationally are able to work from home compared to roughly one and three white people.
Colorado Independent
April 20, 2020
According to Daniel Costa, director of immigration law at the Economic Policy Institute, the nationwide average pay rate for H-2A workers is $12.96 per hour—and the rate is even less in “some of the biggest H-2A states.” So while farm workers continue to risk their lives to keep the nation fed during a global pandemic and economic meltdown, Trump’s USDA is figuring out how to cut their wages, not compensate them with hazard pay.
Costa called on the labor department to put out an emergency regulation requiring additional spacing in employer-provided housing and on buses, because he says the terms of H-2A employment make the workers especially vulnerable to catching and spreading the coronavirus. “It’s shocking that a number of actions have now been taken to prioritize the ability of employers to get H-2A workers,” he says, “but there’s been zero effort to ensure that H-2A workers are able to stay safe and healthy during the pandemic.”
Mother Jones
April 20, 2020
According to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), a nonpartisan think tank, H-2A workers are already underpaid compared to other workers.
“In 2019, the average wage of all nonsupervisory farmworkers was $13.99 per hour, according to USDA, while the average wage for all workers in 2019 was $26.53 per hour, meaning the farmworker wage was just 53% of the average for all workers,” read an EPI post. “And the average wage for production and nonsupervisory nonfarm workers—the most logical cohort for workers outside of agriculture to compare with farmworkers—was $23.51.
Cal Matters
April 20, 2020
America is experiencing the largest increase in unemployment in history. But why are so many Americans paying the price for the COVID-19 pandemic?
AJ+
April 20, 2020
According to the Economic Policy Institute, only 16% of Latino workers reported being able to work remotely.
The Guardian
April 20, 2020
Travel restrictions and reduction in officials processing visas could reduce the number of farmworkers by as many as 60,000, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
WABE
April 20, 2020
The Economic Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank, estimates that 9.2 million U.S. residents were at high risk of having lost coverage during the past four weeks. The consulting firm Health Management Associates forecasts that perhaps 12 million to 35 million people will lose job-based insurance because of the pandemic, on top of the 27.5 million who were uninsured before the virus arrived.
The Washington Post
April 20, 2020
Ten years ago, Ron Hira in his Economic Policy Institute article, wrote that the H-1B visa and its L-1 cousin were “out of control.” Hira, a respected Howard University public policy professor, wrote that both of these visa programs need “immediate and substantial overhaul.” The original goals of the H-1B and L visa were to admit foreign nationals who complement the U.S. workforce. Instead, wrote Hira, “Loopholes in both programs have made it too easy to bring in cheaper foreign workers, with ordinary skills, who directly substitute for, rather than complement, workers already in the country. They are clearly displacing and denying opportunities to U.S. workers.”
Norfolk Daily News
April 20, 2020