Amid growing conversation about millennial workers and their relationships to unions, the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) recently released a report highlighting the impact that collective bargaining can have. Here are three interesting takeaways.
The decline in union membership over the last 20 years may contribute to the lasting impression of these groups as predominantly white, predominantly male, and primarily based in the manufacturing sector. However, per EPI’s report, about 10.6 million of the 16.3 million workers covered by a union contract in the United States in 2016 were women and/or people of color. (whole story)
Refinery29
September 1, 2017
Earlier this year, the Economic Policy Institute released a report that found that Asian women get paid 88 cents and white non-Hispanic women earn 81 cents for every dollar that non-Hispanic white men get paid. Meanwhile, black women get paid 65 cents and Hispanic women get paid 59 cents for every dollar earned by a white man. The report was released in time for this year’s International Women’s Day when women across the U.S. gathered to call for equal pay.
Marketplace
September 1, 2017
“I think it’s disappointing, but not unexpected,” Celine McNicholas, a labor lawyer for the Economic Policy Institute, told Bloomberg BNA. McNicholas was a National Labor Relations Board official in the Obama administration. McNicholas said the ruling was based on “flawed logic.”
Bloomberg BNA
September 1, 2017
Liberal groups said the change was needed. “For years, as the salary threshold was eroded by inflation and congressional inaction, businesses have used the imprecision of the duties test to avoid paying overtime to low-level employees who they wrongly classify as managers or executives,” said Celine McNicholas, labor counsel for the Economic Policy Institute.
The Washington Examiner
September 1, 2017
“It’s a bit misleading because our corporate tax code is riddled with loopholes and what corporations pay is far, far lower — somewhere between 13 and 21 percent,” Hunter Blair, a tax and budget analyst at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, told me. “When you get down to specific companies, sometimes they pay 3, 4, 5 percent,” he added
VOX
August 31, 2017
IPS’ findings are consistent with academic research on corporate taxes and jobs. The Federal Reserve Board of Governors saw “little evidence that corporate tax cuts boost economic activity, unless implemented during recessions.” The Economic Policy Institute could summon no data showing corporate tax cuts moving the needle; instead, they said, it would “primarily benefit a small number of high-income capital owners.”
The Nation
August 31, 2017
Some consumer advocates estimate the wait could result in tangible losses for investors. The Economic Policy Institute said that an additional 18-month delay could cost retirement savers an additional $10.9 billion dollars over the next 30 years because of the longer timeframe in which they’d potentially be getting conflicted advice.
Money
August 31, 2017
A study by the Economic Policy Institute estimates that Arizona retirement savers would lose out on $235 million of returns over the next 30 years as the result of bad advice given during the 18-month delay on the fiduciary rule. The Trump administration has said the rule places an unnecessary burden on financial advisers and makes them less willing to take on small-dollar investors. Meanwhile, Trump on Tuesday moved against an Obama-era equal-pay measure that was supposed to go into effect on Friday. The Office of Management and Budget announced it will not require companies to report data on how much various classes of workers are compensated. Heidi Shierholz, senior economist and director of economic policy at the Economic Policy Institute, said this shows that the president is not concerned with the persistent wage gap for women and minorities. “One of the key things that has contributed to unequal pay is just a lack of transparency – people not actually knowing what people in their group are paid relative to other groups,” Shierholz said.
Public News Service
August 31, 2017
But David Cooper, senior analyst at the Economic Policy Institute, says there are several ways for businesses to off-set the cost of a wage increase. Cooper says that, when wages are higher, employee turnover rates go down. This saves money on recruitment and training costs. Higher wages often result in a boost in productivity, he says. And these same workers are the most likely consumers to go out and spend, driving more business activity. And if that’s not enough? “Because labor, especially low-wage labor, is just a portion of businesses’ overall operating costs, most businesses are able to absorb those additional labor costs with very modest price increases,” Cooper said. Cooper says some studies have found a minimum wage increase of 10 per cent would require a 0.6 per cent increase in menu prices at fast food restaurants.
Northern Public Radio
August 31, 2017
“The H-1B by definition is supposed to be for a specialty occupation,” said Ron Hira, a researcher at the Economic Policy Institute, a nonprofit think tank in Washington. “But over the years, that got watered down.” In fiscal year 2015, 41 percent of all approved H-1B applications were at a Level 1 wage, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
San Francisco Chronicle
August 31, 2017