The Economic Policy Institute analyzes key data from monthly Employment Situation reports generated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Among its recent findings is that the average number of jobs created each month throughout 2019 was slightly lower when compared to 2018. Likewise, some of the gains involving wage growth in 2018 were erased in 2019.
“Last year was a little softer than 2018,” says Elise Gould, senior economist at EPI. She explains that an average of 176,000 jobs was created each month in 2019, compared to 223,000 jobs in 2018. “But that still far exceeds how many jobs you need to create just to keep up with population growth.”
Human Resource Executive
January 23, 2020
The Economic Policy Institute believes another factor behind the jump in African American employment is a growing number of them who graduated from college.
The BL
January 23, 2020
Advanced manufacturing and especially aerospace remain a pillar of Connecticut economic development. By one measure from the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank and advocacy group in Washington, D.C., precision manufacturing jobs create 7.4 positions in a regional economy for every new job.
Middletown Press
January 23, 2020
That’s at least part of the picture painted by a 2018 report by the Economic Policy Institute recently dusted off by the Glenwood Springs Post Independent. Titled “The new gilded age: Income inequality in the U.S. by state, metropolitan area, and county” (epi.org/files/pdf/147963.pdf), it tracks trends that coauthor Mark Price doubts have changed in the interim.
The Sopris Sun
January 23, 2020
Employment doesn’t necessarily mean stability anymore, though. A 2018 Pew Research Center report found that despite low unemployment and a well-performing stock market, the actual buying power of most Americans hasn’t improved since the 1960s. A study from the Economic Policy Institute the same year found that in many states and cities, the levels of inequality are even greater than they were during the Gilded Age. Wage growth hasn’t kept up with either inflation or productivity, meaning that people are working more and producing more wealth, but the benefits are going mostly to the already rich. Now, even the prospect of being better off financially than one’s parents, an expectation that was for decades taken for granted in the U.S., is out of reach for many Americans.
GQ
January 23, 2020
AFT’s smaller grants went to a variety of groups, both related and unrelated to education and labor issues, from $300,000 to the Economic Policy Institute to $25,000 to the Yemeni American Merchants Association.
NEA gave its money in bigger chunks to fewer organizations. It distributed $30.2 million to 119 advocacy groups. Some of these overlapped with AFT donations, with NEA also contributing to the Economic Policy Institute ($200,000) and Priorities USA ($500,000).
The 74 Million
January 23, 2020
“The share of workers covered by a union contract is well less than half of what it was 40 years ago — caused in large part by fierce corporate opposition spending millions of dollars on anti-union campaigns and lobbying the government to weaken labor laws,” Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the labor-backed Economic Policy Institute, said in a statement.
Employers spend about $340 million a year on consultants that help keep workers from unionizing, according to a recent study from EPI that also charged management with breaking the law in 41% of union elections.
CBS News
January 23, 2020
A recent report from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute noted that U.S. employers spend more than $300 million on “union avoidance” consultants who specialize in undermining union campaigns. The same report found that 4 in 10 union elections include charges that the employer broke the law, often by threatening or firing pro-union workers.
The Huffington Post
January 23, 2020
“I believe that the switch JHU announced is definitely necessary, and in the right direction,” said Emma García, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute. “However, it’s likely not sufficient.” Inequality of access is just one of the barriers faced by black, other minority, and relatively disadvantaged students hoping to attain a degree at a high-profile university. In many cases, there are other obstacles that intervene long before students have an opportunity to apply for a prestigious college.
Quartz
January 23, 2020
HARRISBURG PA – Investing in what is described as a “values-based” early child education system would serve 500,000 Pennsylvania children and employ 200,000 teachers, according to a new report from the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington DC-based non-profit think tank.
The institute’s new research says efforts to expand access to early education have focused on affordability for families, and have been substantially funded by keeping teacher pay and support low. Its claims are supported by Diana Polson, a Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center policy analyst in Harrisburg, who says early child education teachers with a bachelor’s degree are paid 22 percent less than colleagues in kindergarten through eighth grade.
The Sanatoga Post
January 23, 2020