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The US economy is rebounding for the nation’s top income earners, but not for everyone else, according to a new study from the Economic Policy Institute. The study, published Sunday, finds that chief executives at the country’s 350 biggest firms earned an average of $16.3 million in 2014, marking a 54.3 percent increase since 2009. Meanwhile, compensation for typical workers in the same industries as those CEOs fell 1.7 percent over the same time period. “Those at the top of the income distribution, including many CEOs, are seeing a strong recovery, while the typical worker is still experiencing the detrimental effects of a stagnant labor market,” the study authors, Lawrence Mishel and Alyssa Davis, found.
Mother Jones June 22, 2015 -
The current answer appears to be a ratio of more than 300-to-1, according to a new study from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. The meteoric rise of CEO pay is nothing short of breathtaking, outpacing not only the wages of ordinary workers, but also gains in the stock market and the not-too-shabby rise of income among America’s 0.1 percent of top earners. Surging CEO pay has potentially negative implications for other employees, leaving less on the table for wages, benefits and other compensation. Top execs at large public companies are keeping about 10 percent of their companies’ net profits, about double the rate in the early 1990s, according to the AFL-CIO.
While some would argue that CEOs are earning more because they provide extraordinary benefits to their companies, EPI president Lawrence Mishel says the evidence doesn’t support that. “CEO compensation has done so much better than corporate profits or the stock market,” Mishel said. “I don’t think it’s because they are very highly skilled, although they are skilled. The other high-wage earners are very highly skilled as well. I think CEOs are paid more because they can get paid more.”
CBS Moneywatch June 22, 2015 -
CEO pay at the nation’s largest companies is 303 times that of the average pay of their employees, according to a new analysis from the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank. The average total compensation of CEOs at the 350 largest firms, including stock options and other bonuses, came to $16.3 million in 2014, according to EPI. That compares to just over $50,000 in pay for their workers.
CNN Money June 22, 2015 -
While the Great Recession officially ended six years ago, the labor market has not yet fully recovered, and that’s left many college graduates struggling to find jobs that match their skills and education level. “The depth of the recession and the slow pace of recovery since it ended means that seven classes of students have now graduated into a weak labor market and have had to compete with more experienced workers for a limited and slowly growing pool of job opportunities,” wrote researchers at the Economic Policy Institute in a recent paper.
CNBC June 22, 2015 -
In its new report, Inequalities at the Starting Gate, the Washington-based Economic Policy Institute found that race-based gaps in skills such as reading, math, eagerness to learn, persistence, and focus shrink significantly when socioeconomic status is taken into account. About 46 percent of black children live in poverty, the study noted. Sixty-three percent of Hispanic ELLs live in poverty. Emma García, an economist at EPI and the author of the report, said that there is an economic imperative to addressing these academic and non-cognitive skills gaps. “Not doing anything is going to be more costly than doing something,” she said. “We are compromising so much human capital by not making sure children are ready to learn and can develop fully when they go to school.” The report’s title is a deliberate allusion to a 2002 report, also published by the Economic Policy Institute, called Inequality at the Starting Gate. That study drew on the experiences of children who started school in 1998.
Education Week June 19, 2015 -
One report from the Economic Policy Institute shows that the companies are abusing the H1-B visa program to help U.S. companies cut labor costs. Brookings, however, found that H1-B workers make more than their American counterparts.
The Atlantic June 19, 2015 -
Average CEO pay at the 350 largest U.S. companies by revenue surged 937 percent from 1978 to 2013, while the compensation of non-supervisory employees rose 10.2 percent, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a research group that advocates for workers. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index has returned more than 5,000 percent over the same time period, with dividends reinvested.
Bloomberg June 19, 2015 -
Despite numerous glowing depictions of the American Dream in movies and books, upward mobility is much more uncommon in the United States than you might think. In fact, there’s considerably more mobility in almost all other developed economies, according to a recent study by the Economic Policy Institute.
Orange County Register June 19, 2015 -
A number of progressives dispute the assertion that automation is the prime culprit. In a 2013 report, the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning nonprofit organization in Washington, contends that between 2001 and 2011, 2.1 million U.S. manufacturing jobs disappeared because of the ballooning trade deficit with China.
Columbus Dispatch June 19, 2015 -
From my brief observation, these are really sweet kids. But many face special burdens: fractured families; parents who don’t speak English and are sometime illiterate in Spanish; parents with crazy work schedules. There’s a larger issue, as a recent report from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute warned: “Lower-social-class parents engage in fewer educationally supportive activities with young children, such as reading aloud or playing cognitively stimulating games.”
The Washington Post June 18, 2015