The Economic Policy Institute estimated that 107,100 people, around 4 percent of the total workforce in Missouri, receive minimum wage at their jobs in the state. On average, the minimum wage increase would lead to an average of $620 extra in their pockets for the year.
KSHB (Kansas City)
December 27, 2018
“It may not have motivated every lawmaker to agree that we should go to $15,” David Cooper, a senior economic analyst at the Economic Policy Institute, told the Associated Press. “But it’s motivated many of them to accept that we need higher minimum wages than we currently have in much of the country.”
Bustle
December 27, 2018
As employers review these changes, they may need to check for local minimum wage law changes, too. There are 24 cities and counties with higher local minimum wages that took effect Jan. 1, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
HR Dive
December 27, 2018
Thea Lee, president of the Economic Policy Institute, has been appointed to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. The commission, which was chartered by Congress in 2000 to provide guidance on the national security implications of U.S.-China trade and economic relations, submits reports to Capitol Hill each November , as well as intermittent analyses in throughout the year. (Paywall)
Inside Trade
December 27, 2018
Some 5.3 million workers will be receiving higher pay starting Jan. 1 as minimum wage increases kick in for the New Year, according to an analysis released this month by the left-leaning think tank Economic Policy Institute. The EPI analyzed data from the Current Population Survey, conducted on a monthly basis by the U.S. Census Bureau.
MarketWatch
December 26, 2018
“I think they will look back on this as a mistake,” Josh Bivens, the director of research at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, said of the rate increase. “This threatens to snuff out the very beginning of wage gains that we’ve started to see recently in the data. The Fed should allow the expansion’s gains to reach more broadly into the work force and get off the steady escalator of ever-higher interest rates.”
The New York Times
December 20, 2018
“[T]here have been real signals flashing in the data that these past rate hikes are starting to slow the economy,” said Josh Bivens, director of research at the Economic Policy Institute. “By 2019, this drag from higher interest rates will no longer be counterbalanced by greater fiscal stimulus, and the pace of economic growth could slow markedly.”
CBS News
December 20, 2018
The left-leaning Economic Policy Institute isn’t happy with today’s Federal Reserve rate rise and warns acting now will hurt everyday people. “While rate hikes over the past couple of years have been premature in the face of tame inflation, coming into this month’s FOMC meeting there have been real signals flashing in the data that these past rate hikes are starting to slow the economy,” the group said. The rate hike “threatens to snuff out the very beginning of wage gains that we’ve started to see recently in the data.” The group would have liked to see the Fed hold steady on rates and allow wage gains to heat up, in large part because there’s no real inflation pressure threatening the economy.
Wall Street Journal
December 20, 2018
RISING RATES, LESS RAISES: The Federal Reserve raised its main borrowing rate on Wednesday for the fourth time this year, brushing aside calls from President Donald Trump to hold off on further interest rate hikes, POLITICO’s Victoria Guida reports. Though the move comes as the central bank underscores the growing number of jobs amid a low unemployment rate, Josh Bivens, an economist at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, told Morning Shift the hikes have begun to slow the economy and “give workers less leverage.”
“As unemployment has gotten low, we have finally started to see a small uptick in wage growth,” Bivens said. “I think that’s going to be short lived if they keep on the path of interest rate hikes.” The Fed indicated Wednesday that fewer rate hikes might be on the way next year based on expectations for slower economic growth, according to Guida. More from POLITICO here.
Politico Pro
December 20, 2018
In recent months, both wages and domestic capital investment have inched up, but at nowhere near the level of the increase in the return to shareholders. As the terrific new study by Josh Bivens and Heidi Shierholz of the Economic Policy Institute makes clear, the single most important factor in the past-four-decades’ diversion of business income from workers to shareholders and executives is the success of business’s assault on worker power, and the concomitant success of business’s insistence that government favor the rich over everyone else.
The American Prospect
December 20, 2018