The creation of more than 292,000 jobs in December was “an indication of a relatively strong labor market in 2015, especially compared with the Great Recession and the beginning of the recovery”, said Elise Gould, senior economist at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. She added that the US economy still had a “way to go before we reach full employment”.
The Guardian
January 11, 2016
“While the Fed has already nudged up short term interest rates, these weak wage data are an indication that they should hold off on further hikes. We need to see strong and sustained wage growth, above 3.5 percent, before it’s safe to say we are at full employment and the Fed could act to slow the economy.” –Elise Gould, Economic Policy Institute
Wall Street Journal
January 11, 2016
I spoke to economist Valerie Wilson, director of the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy, about the decline in black unemployment. She cautioned that it’s hard to tell how much is real or sustainable employment growth in one month. As we always say here, never put too much stock into one month’s numbers. But, Wilson noted that we’ve seen bigger decreases in black unemployment in recent years thanks to “the economy getting better as a whole.” When the unemployment rate decreases 1 percentage point nationally, it usually translates to about a 2 percentage point drop in black unemployment, she explained. “You get bigger changes in African American unemployment rate when the labor market gets tighter, because they are the ones left who are still looking for work.” Yet, the disparity between unemployment rates remain: The black unemployment rate is still almost double the white unemployment rate of 4.5 percent.
PBS News Hour
January 11, 2016
Despite the progress, there was a lot of room for improvement. Blacks still have higher unemployment than every other demographic. White unemployment is 4.5%, Hispanic unemployment is 6.3% and Asian unemployment is 4%. While it’s “an important improvement,” the black unemployment rate “would be unacceptable if that were the national rate,” says Valerie Wilson, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a think tank.
CNN Money
January 11, 2016
Now, the bad news is how far below fully maxing out the economy’s employment capacity we still are, and how long it may still take to get there. Back at the start of 2015, the Economic Policy Institute estimated we’d need to average 246,000 jobs a month in order to return to the balance of forces we enjoyed at the peak just before the 2008 crash. And even then we wouldn’t get there until the summer of 2017.
The Week
January 11, 2016
More than 25 European industry associations, including a group representing steel producers, have banded together to argue in favor of the status quo. The alliance hailed a study released last September by the U.S.-based Economic Policy Institute alleging that unilateral recognition of China as a market economy by the EU would put as many as 3.5 million jobs in Europe at risk.
Bloomberg
January 11, 2016
According to a report published by the Economic Policy Institute that examined income inequality between the top 1% and everyone else between 1917 and 2012, the share of all income held by the top 1% has grown from 9% between 1973 and 1978 to 22% as of 2012. This marks the highest share of income heading into the hands of the richest Americans since 1928, when 24% of all income was being funneled into the hands of the richest rich.
Fox Business
January 11, 2016
The fear that U.S.-based companies, such as Disney, abuse the H-1B program to replace American workers with cheaper, foreign labor is also at a high. (A 2013 report published by the Brookings Institution found that H-1B visa holders tend to earn more than their U.S native-born counterparts, but Ron Hira at the pro-labor think tank Economic Policy Institute disagrees.)
National Journal
January 8, 2016
Through most of the economic recovery, wage-growth has hovered around 2 percent annually. The Federal Reserve’s target for nominal wage growth (not adjusted for inflation) is 3.5-4.0 percent. According to analysis from the Economic Policy Institute, if the economy had achieved the Fed’s target for wage growth, the average American worker would earn $2.61/hour more than they do today.
Marketplace
January 8, 2016
Wealth inequality is spreading through the economy, and the gap in retirement assets may be even wider. Enrollment in 401(k) plans and other retirement accounts rises sharply with income, as Natalie Sabadish and Monique Morrissey of the pro-labor Economic Policy Institute have shown. Of households in the top fifth of the income ladder, they found, 88% had assets in retirement accounts such as IRAs and 401(k) plans in 2010. Of those in the bottom fifth, only 11% had retirement accounts. Retirement savings of the top 20% averaged about 134% of annual income; for those in the bottom fifth it was 58%.
Los Angeles Times
January 8, 2016