Congress last passed a minimum-wage increase in 2007. The current federal minimum, $7.25 an hour, is about 29 percent below its 1968 peak when adjusted for inflation, according to the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. David Cooper, an economic analyst at the institute, said 29 states and the District of Columbia have higher minimums, and seven states plus the District of Columbia were phasing in the $15-an-hour threshold.
Progressives see the wage increase as a central weapon for fighting poverty and inequality, while conservatives often warn it will reduce jobs.
The report in essence said both sides were right. It found a $15 minimum wage would offer raises to 27 million people and lift 900,000 people above the poverty line, but it would also cost 1.4 million jobs.
Mr. Cooper disputed the jobs forecast, arguing that it was out of line with recent studies that showed increases in the minimum wage had produced little or no effect on employment. “C.B.O. seems to be going in the opposite direction,” he said.
The New York Times
February 9, 2021
But I can hear you supply-siders out there asking whether that gain is offset by lower tax revenues from the wealthy. The short answer is “not really.” The CBO believes that, ultimately, the bill for a minimum wage hike would be paid by higher-income people. According to a blog post by several economists at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, income losses would be concentrated, under the CBO’s analysis, on families whose average income is $232,800 (actually a little bit more, because that’s in 2018 dollars).
The New Republic
February 9, 2021
Another study from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute found the wage hike would reduce expenditures on public assistance programs by $13.4 billion to $31 billion and boost payroll tax revenue by $7 billion to $13.9 billion.
“The bottom line is that the CBO finds that the benefit to low-wage workers of raising the minimum wage far outweighs the cost,” said Heidi Shierholz, a senior economist and director of policy at EPI, on a Monday call with reporters.
CNBC
February 9, 2021
But proponents argue that better-quality studies tend to show that increases in the minimum wage do not hurt employment.
“We believe that the CBO’s assumptions on the scale of job loss are just wrong and inappropriately inflated relative to what cutting-edge economics literature would indicate,” said a team of experts from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.
The CBO did not properly weight the higher-quality studies in its analysis, said Heidi Shierholz, senior economist at the institute.
CNN
February 9, 2021
Heidi Shierholz, director of policy for the labor-backed Economic Policy Institute, said the CBO’s estimates of job losses “are highly questionable” and gave too much weight to inferior studies used in its analysis. Those exaggerated claims of job losses, she said, in turn results in higher projected costs for the government.
And even if those costs are accepted, she said, the benefits would be “enormous” in terms of reducing poverty and inequality.
Roll Call
February 9, 2021
Some progressive economists were quick to say the report’s estimates on job losses were too high. The left-leaning Economic Policy Institute released an analysis of the report saying those assumptions “are just wrong and inappropriately inflated relative to what cutting-edge economics literature would indicate.”
Huffpost
February 9, 2021
Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders, one of the main proponents of the $15 minimum wage, unsurprisingly attempted to do just that, instead citing the left-wing Economic Policy Institute’s estimates. More absurdly, Sanders tried to claim this was good news because it showed that the bill had an impact on the deficit and thus could be passed with a simple majority in the Senate through the parliamentary maneuver known as reconciliation.
Washington Examiner
February 9, 2021
The budget agency’s job-loss projection was viewed as extremely questionable by progressive economists and out of line with recent research on the effects of minimum wage increases. Josh Bivens, David Cooper, Heidi Shierholz, and Ben Zipperer of the Economic Policy Institute wrote Monday that “the CBO’s assumptions on the scale of job-loss are just wrong and inappropriately inflated relative to what cutting-edge economics literature would indicate.”
Common Dreams
February 9, 2021
The Economic Policy Institute reported that the minimum wage, if adjusted for inflation, should have exceeded $15 by 2020.
“Yet since the late 1960s, lawmakers have let the value of the minimum wage erode, allowing inflation to gradually reduce the buying power of a minimum wage income,” according to the group’s 2019 report.
The Independent
February 9, 2021
The report also found that the federal budget deficit would increase by $54 billion from 2021 to 2031 if the $15 minimum wage were enacted. That’s because the government would pay higher prices for goods and services that stem from the higher wages paid to workers, the CBO found.
“There is good reason not to accept CBO’s analysis” that a $15 minimum wage would increase the budget, said Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the liberal Economic Policy Institute.
“It’s really not a stretch to say that a new consensus has emerged amongst economists that minimum-wage increases have raised wages without substantial job loss,” she said on a call with reporters. (Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen shares in these views.)
The CBO’s 1.4-million job loss estimate is likely overstated, hence the federal government would not need to spend more money to fund social welfare programs such as unemployment insurance and medicare if fewer people were unemployed, Shierholz added.
MarketWatch
February 9, 2021
The left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, among other worker advocates, disputed some of the CBO’s findings, arguing there would be little to no effect on employment and the budget deficit would shrink rather than grow.
USA Today
February 9, 2021
“It’s bad for individuals, it’s bad for human suffering, harms the overall economy and drags this [downturn] out even more,” said Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, and former chief economist at the Labor Department.
CNBC
February 9, 2021
Last month, an independent analysis by the Economic Policy Institute found that the legislation would increase wages for almost 32 million Americans, over 20% of the nation’s workforce. This includes roughly a third of all Black workers and a quarter of all Latino workers. Nearly 60% of those who would benefit would be women.
“The Raise the Wage Act of 2021 is not just moral policy, it is also good economics,” Economic Policy Institute economist Ben Zipperer posted on Jan. 26. “This injection of wages will help stimulate the economy and spur greater business activity and job growth.”
Courthouse News Service
February 9, 2021
The minimum wage hike would double the current federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. It hasn’t risen in 12 years. The Economic Policy Institute calculates the increase would put $3,300 in the pockets of each of 32 million workers—22% of the U.S. workforce.
People's Weekly World
February 9, 2021
In a simple comparison of weekly wages (thus accounting for summers off), the Economic Policy Institute found that, between 2013 and 2017 in the U.S., a public school teacher with a bachelor’s degree earned a weekly average of $980, whereas a comparable non-teaching college graduate earned an average of $1,326 per week. There is clearly a disparity here, especially considering a teacher’s workday is often longer than the typical school day.
UConn Daily Campus
February 9, 2021
The CBO says Medicaid spending would increase, in part, because so many care workers would receive raises.
“We certainly hope they are right, and, since the costs are already accounted for in the cost estimate, we urge state policymakers to hold Medicaid services constant in the face of higher labor costs,” said the Economic Policy Institute in a statement. “The care workforce provides extraordinarily valuable services yet is among the most underpaid in the economy, due largely to historical legacies of racial and gender discrimination. The pay increase this workforce would get under a higher federal minimum wage would be among the most valuable outcomes of making this law.”
Yahoo Finance
February 9, 2021
The left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, among other worker advocates, disputed some of the CBO’s findings, arguing there would be little to no effect on employment and the budget deficit would shrink rather than grow.
USA Today
February 9, 2021
“It’s bad for individuals, it’s bad for human suffering, harms the overall economy and drags this [downturn] out even more,” said Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, and former chief economist at the Labor Department.
CNBC
February 9, 2021
Last month, an independent analysis by the Economic Policy Institute found that the legislation would increase wages for almost 32 million Americans, over 20% of the nation’s workforce. This includes roughly a third of all Black workers and a quarter of all Latino workers. Nearly 60% of those who would benefit would be women.
“The Raise the Wage Act of 2021 is not just moral policy, it is also good economics,” Economic Policy Institute economist Ben Zipperer posted on Jan. 26. “This injection of wages will help stimulate the economy and spur greater business activity and job growth.”
February 9, 2021
The minimum wage hike would double the current federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. It hasn’t risen in 12 years. The Economic Policy Institute calculates the increase would put $3,300 in the pockets of each of 32 million workers—22% of the U.S. workforce.
People's Weekly World
February 9, 2021
In a simple comparison of weekly wages (thus accounting for summers off), the Economic Policy Institute found that, between 2013 and 2017 in the U.S., a public school teacher with a bachelor’s degree earned a weekly average of $980, whereas a comparable non-teaching college graduate earned an average of $1,326 per week. There is clearly a disparity here, especially considering a teacher’s workday is often longer than the typical school day.
UConn Daily Campus
February 9, 2021
The CBO says Medicaid spending would increase, in part, because so many care workers would receive raises.
“We certainly hope they are right, and, since the costs are already accounted for in the cost estimate, we urge state policymakers to hold Medicaid services constant in the face of higher labor costs,” said the Economic Policy Institute in a statement. “The care workforce provides extraordinarily valuable services yet is among the most underpaid in the economy, due largely to historical legacies of racial and gender discrimination. The pay increase this workforce would get under a higher federal minimum wage would be among the most valuable outcomes of making this law.”
Yahoo Finance
February 9, 2021
That CBO report dropped yesterday, and there’s good news and bad news. The bad news is it’s just a terrible report. It assumes that, while 27 million people would get a raise, there would be 1.4 million jobs lost (over 10 years, so that sounds a lot bigger than it is). That plays havoc with all the budgetary implications. There are higher unemployment insurance costs, higher interest on the national debt, and higher prices for goods and services baked in. Basically CBO tried to model the entire economy and national expenditures based on this one change.
It also based that model on arbitrarily choosing seven research studies about minimum wage increases and then over-emphasizing the negative ones, as Arin Dube explains. If CBO used the methodology it used in 2019 to look at a previous minimum wage bill, it would have shown a 1.1 million job loss. Instead it showed 1.4 million, and that drift is completely at odds with the latest research. A fiery call from the Economic Policy Institute yesterday savaged the CBO score. “Normally we don’t like to yell at the referees,” said AFL-CIO economist Bill Spriggs. “But in this regard, the CBO has stepped outside its bounds and is not speaking truth to power, but is giving information that is misleading.”
The American Prospect
February 9, 2021
Las autoras del estudio son Emma García, economista del Economic Policy Institute y Teachers College, de la Universidad de Columbia, y Elaine Weiss, directora de políticas de la National Academy of Social Insurance e investigadora del Economic Policy Institute.
La Opinion
February 9, 2021
“La pandemia expuso las desigualdades que ya estaban presentes”, dijo a Univision Noticias Daniel Pérez, economista del Economic Policy Institute.
Salarios bajos, discriminación, poco acceso a beneficios como un seguro de salud o licencias en caso de emergencias familiares y menos posibilidades de trabajar desde casa y evitar así enfermarse con covid-19, les han hecho más difícil enfrentar la crisis.
…
Si bien en enero la economía de Estados Unidos creó 49,000 empleos, en el rubro del ocio y en el minorista, por ejemplo, hubo un declive en la cantidad de puestos trabajo: de 61,000 en el primer caso y 37,800 en el segundo.
“No veo que se dé una recuperación pronto. Creo que será una recuperación lenta y dolorosa para los latinos que trabajan en las industrias en la primera línea, salvo que haya una red de seguridad más robusta y se concreten las promesas hechas por la nueva administración a esos trabajadores”, explicó Pérez.
Univision
February 9, 2021
A May report by the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute and Howard University professor Ron Hira, who studies the H-1B, concluded that outsourcers comprise half of the top 30 H-1B employers and “make heavy use of the H-1B program.” Major Silicon Valley technology firms “take advantage of program rules in order to legally pay many of their H-1B workers below the local median wage for the jobs they fill,” the report said.
The Mercury News
February 9, 2021
In Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District — which includes all of Racine and Kenosha counties and parts of four other counties, and is represented by Janesville Republican Bryan Steil — an estimated 28% of workers (97,000 people in total) would be directly affected by the increase to a minimum wage of $15, according to a model from the Economic Policy Institute based on federal data.
The average wage increase for those workers would be 18%. Of those 97,000 workers: less than half of them (38,000) would be 16-24 years old. And 44,000 of them would be 25-54 years old.
The Journal Times
February 9, 2021
I would go further than that. State legislative attempts to override the authority of local governments strip communities of their right to self-governance. Particularly in a state like Texas, where rural and suburban communities exert outsized influence in shaping policy at the state level, state-set limits to local governmental control deny urban Texans their voice and representation on the local issues that often have the greatest impact on their lives and communities. It shouldn’t be a surprise that, too frequently, these are issues that disproportionately affect people of color. “You have these predominantly white state legislators making decisions and setting ceilings that keep communities of color from putting into place policies,” says Julia Wolfe, an analyst with the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank, who spoke to Governing.
D Magazine
February 9, 2021
Nearly half of a congressional district would get a raise with a $15 minimum wage
- U.S. Representative Terri Sewell (D-Birmingham) has previously supported regional increases in minimum wage based on the cost of living. Now, the debate over raising the minimum wage to $15 is back. In Sewell’s district, 43% of workers would receive a pay raise if the minimum wage increased to $15, according to the Economic Policy Institute. This would average out to a 22% increase for those workers, or $4,700 per year.
Yellowhammer News
February 9, 2021
Proponents focused on the positives in the analysis. “CBO finds that for a very small relative cost to the government, the benefits of the Raise the Wage Act are enormous,” Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the pro-labor Economic Policy Institute, said during a conference call scheduled Monday by her organization.
“It will increase the average incomes of low- and lower-middle-income families, it will reduce poverty, it will shift money from corporate profits toward wages of low-income workers, it will reduce inequality,” Shierholz said.
LA Times
February 9, 2021