The Economic Policy Institute maintains a database of each state’s minimum wage and recent changes. According to that report, 21 states increased their minimum wages as of December 31 or January 1.
Markets Insider
January 10, 2020
Maryland is one of six states that passed laws to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour over time: California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York are the others, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Patch
January 10, 2020
The Raise the Wage Act (H.R. 582/S. 150) was introduced in January 2019 by Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.) and White House hopeful Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). An analysis from the Economic Policy Institute found that the legislation, which would raise the federal minimum wage over five years, could increase the incomes and improve the lives of an estimated 40 million Americans.
Common Dreams
January 10, 2020
Desde el primero día del 2020, veintiún Estados de la Unión y veintiséis ciudades y condados en todo el país incrementaron el salario mínimo en sus jurisdicciones, según el National Employment Law Project (NELP). Este aumento beneficiará a cerca de 6.8 millones de empleados de compañías privadas, según el Economic Policy Institute.
El Mundo
January 10, 2020
“Year-over-year nominal wage growth was 2.9%—the lowest it’s been in 18 months,” according to Elise Gould, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., in a statement. Historically, a low unemployment rate can spur higher wage growth. In that scenario, some employers hike starting pay to attract new employees. This has not been the case recently, though.
Thanks to legislation at the state level, nearly 7 million American workers will receive minimum wage pay hikes in 2020, according to David Cooper, an EPI economist. After the U.S. House of Representatives passed the “Raise the Wage Act of 2019” in July to increase the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour to $15 by 2025, the U.S. Senate has not moved to debate the bill. “Since the federal minimum wage was last raised in July, 2009, the minimum wage’s buying power has declined by 17 percent.” Cooper said.
MultiBriefs: Exclusive
January 10, 2020
“It’s been slowing over the last several months,” Elise Gould, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal research organization in Washington, said of wage growth.
“We haven’t really seen any changes in the labor market that would explain that,” she said. “Lots of businesses are showing profits, but we’re not seeing the kind of capital investments that we’d thought we’d see.”
The New York Times
January 10, 2020
As one of the seven authors of the letter to Congress, Shoag was joined by Heidi Shierholz, former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, as well as Stan Veuger, resident scholar of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, who has co-authored research on the topic with Shoag.
Case Western Reserve University
January 10, 2020
Elise Gould, senior economist at the nonprofit think tank Economic Policy Institute, said in a phone interview that while new jobs in December dropped off from the month before, the numbers are still solid.
“We’ve seen the unemployment rate come down, and for the right reasons,” she said. “People are coming back to the labor force, they are getting jobs as opposed to leaving because they despair. 145,000 is still more than enough to keep up with population growth and pull in those workers from the sidelines.”
Courthouse News Service
January 10, 2020
In December 2019, there was reason for hope: Nancy Pelosi and the U.S. House impeached the president. The Democratic debates, although they grew whiter, still included two women. And the first ever female president of the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), Thea Lee, appeared on Samantha Bee’s Full Frontal—proving economists can be fully human and funny, and encouraging a whole flank of female economists, notably rare in this still whitest, mostly male and unfunniest realm.
Ms.
January 10, 2020
And it’s likely going to get harder to attract new teachers. A study by The Economic Policy Institute predicts a growing teacher shortage in the years ahead, because people are turned off by the low pay and working conditions.
WYPR
January 9, 2020