Rising incomes for lower- and middle-earners may help reduce inequality, especially if wage growth for higher-earners remains subdued. A recent analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think-tank, found that real wages for the top 1% of earners fell by 3.1% in 2016, and were lower that year than they were in 2007. As workers’ wages grow, firms’ profit margins may also come under pressure, reducing, somewhat, the capital income of the rich. Texas Roadhouse, a chain of steak restaurants, recently warned investors that it expects its wage bill to grow by 7-8% in 2017.
The Economist
November 15, 2017
The Washington Post
November 15, 2017
That point is broadly true. Wage growth has been relatively flat for decades, but after the recession hovered around 2 percent, as data from the Economic Policy Institute shows. Had wages grown at 3.5 percent after the recession — the pace wage growth saw before the recession — hourly earnings would be about 12 percent higher. (chart included)
The Washington Post
November 13, 2017
“Boosting productivity growth…will not lead to broad-based wage gains unless we pursue policies that reconnect productivity growth and the pay of the vast majority,” Larry Mishel and Josh Bivens of the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute wrote in 2015. Mr. Mishel is co-creator of a chart illustrating the post-1973 divergence between productivity and pay that has achieved iconic status on the left. (Larry quoted throughout)
The Wall Street Journal
November 13, 2017
The dark side of public–private partnerships entails bailouts and bad deals. Infrastructure is in part defined by natural monopolistic tendencies, and without an effective public regulatory monitoring mechanism, private actors who take on public services might raise prices to an inefficient level or degrade service quality to an inefficient degree, says Hunter Blair, budget analyst for the Economic Policy Institute. Governments run the risk of mistaking the financing that public–private partnerships can leverage for the funding of projects themselves—of missing the forest for the trees. “A lot of people in the government, when they talk about [public–private partnerships], they see it as this free lunch,” Blair says. “We’re going to bring in private money, so that means, somehow, it’s going to cost us less to pay for the infrastructure. Funding at the end of the day still has to come from taxes or user fees. There is no free lunch here.”
CityLab
November 13, 2017
In fact, most corporations have access to pretty much all the money they need right now, says Josh Bivens, director of research at the liberal-leaning Economic Policy Institute. But they’re not investing all that much or increasing wages. “So we have exactly what the corporate tax cut is trying to engineer—really high post-tax profit rates. And yet it has not resulted in more investment. So the idea that we just want to do more of the same thing that has not spurred investment strikes me as not correct,” Bivens says.
Marketplace
November 13, 2017
According to the Economic Policy Institute, one in five veterans — or 1.8 million veterans — are currently paid less than $15 an hour. Who are these low-paid veterans? Two-thirds (66 percent) are 40 years old or older, 61 percent have college experience and 69 percent work full time.
Marketplace
November 13, 2017
October brought more improvement, with 369,000 more Americans exiting unwanted part-time status, shrinking the percentage of involuntary part-timers to 3.4 percent. Still, the country has not returned to pre-crisis levels on this measure, which worries some economists. “We are continuing to see this steady improvement, but there is still this slack in the labor market,” said Heidi Shierholz, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank.
The Washington Post
November 8, 2017
Nearly 2 million US veterans would benefit from raising the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour. Approximately 1.8 million of the 9 million veterans in payroll jobs across the US would get a raise if Congress raised the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour by 2024, the liberal-leaning Economic Policy Institute determined in an analysis on the Raise the Wage Act of 2017 in honor of Veterans Day. Nearly two-thirds of the veterans who would get the raise are age 40 or older, over 60% have some college experience, and nearly 70% work full time, the EPI found. (whole story)
Business Insider
November 8, 2017
In a statement, Celine McNicholas, labor counsel for the Economic Policy Institute, claimed it “robs workers of their rights, making it impossible for them to effectively collectively bargain or litigate workplace disputes.” She also said it “leaves small businesses holding the bag when the large corporations that control their business practices and set their employees’ schedules violate labor law and refuse to come to the bargaining table.”
The Hill
November 8, 2017