Larry Mishel of the center-left Economic Policy Institute said Trump didn’t offer anything new in his speech, especially when it comes to issues like trade. “Donald Trump on trade treaties claims that he can renegotiate them and get different outcomes, but he has never said exactly what he is going to try to do,” said Mishel.
NPR Marketplace
August 9, 2016
The average annual cost of day care now surpasses the price of in-state college tuition in 31 states. It eats up at least 30 percent of a minimum-wage worker’s income in every state, according to a report last year from the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank.
Washington Post
August 9, 2016
In May, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton introduced a proposal to limit child-care costs to 10% of a family’s income. In 41 states, the cost of sending a 4-year-old to full-time preschool exceeds 10% of a median family income, according to the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. She also proposed universal preschool for 4-year-olds. The candidate hasn’t provided specifics on how to pay for those plans… For many families, child-care costs well exceed $6,000 a year. The cost to send a 4-year-old to a full-time preschool program exceeds the cost of in-state college tuition in 23 states. The cost is above $7,000 a year in most states, according to EPI.
The Wall Street Journal
August 9, 2016
“Because it’s a deduction, it’s going to miss the 44 percent of workers that don’t pay federal income tax,” said Hunter Blair, a tax and budget analyst at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), a liberal-leaning think tank. “And, with tax deductions, the benefits rise with income, so it’s a regressive plan.”… The EPI’s Blair called Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s plan to cap child care costs at 10 percent of a family’s income through federal subsidies and tax breaks “a vastly better policy than the tax deduction that Trump is proposing.”
CBS News
August 9, 2016
But adding a tax deduction for child care will have a cost. Child care is one of the largest expenses a family can incur – a study from the liberal Economic Policy Institute this year found day care costs more than college in 23 of 50 states.
The Associated Press
August 9, 2016
By contrast, some studies have shown that the vast majority of working Americans don’t get any paid family leave, while those who do are more likely to be high-wage workers. According to the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, 23 percent of workers at the top of the income ladder have access to paid family leave, while only 4 percent of workers at the bottom get that benefit.
CBS News Moneywatch
August 9, 2016
However, there’s an enormous range of average costs, depending on where a family lives. According to the Economic Policy Institute, the monthly expense of child care for one child of preschool age can range from $344 in rural South Carolina to $1,472 a month—that’s more than $17,000 a year—in Washington, DC.
Slate
August 9, 2016
According to a new study, minimum wage workers should be making nearly $19 an hour. The report from the Economic Policy Institute found that tying the minimum wage to productivity would raise pay to $18.67 per hour. That’s an increase of over $11 an hour from Utah’s current hourly rate of $7.25. Until the 1960’s, the minimum wage generally rose with the levels of worker productivity. David Cooper, the author of the report, said that gradual increases in the minimum wage have almost no effect on employment.
Utah Public Radio
August 9, 2016
Slow productivity growth feeds directly into voter discontent by limiting wage increases. But as slow as productivity growth has been, wages have risen even less. In fact, real inflation-adjusted median wages have risen more slowly than productivity for most of the past 40 years. There are several reasons for this: Corporate profits have increased their share of the total pie at the expense of a lower share for employee compensation; the rising cost of medical care means that health insurance coverage is taking a bigger bite out of paychecks; and most important, rising inequality has siphoned off much of the extra income produced by productivity gains into the pockets of the top 1 percent.
The New York Times
August 8, 2016
While Clinton tries to sell the notion that the Obama recovery was robust, she does concede that wages haven’t risen nearly enough. The liberal Economic Policy Institute estimates that the median hourly wage has increased only 5.7% since 1973. Whether Clinton realizes it or not, the stagnation she deplores is another indictment of Obama’s growth policies: Wages tend to increase faster when the economy grows more vigorously.
Los Angeles Times
August 8, 2016