Media clips
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In Wisconsin, union membership in the public sector fell from 53.4 percent in 2011 to just 37.6 percent in 2013.
“This suggests that the erosion of public sector union coverage reflects the new anti-collective bargaining policies implemented in several states,” said Lawrence Mishel, president of the liberal-leaning Economic Policy Institute.
The overall rate of union membership has been steadily declining for decades. The share of workers belonging to unions peaked in the 1950s at about 30 percent, and dropped to about 20 percent by 1983.
AP January 27, 2014 -
These 5 maps show unions are losing ground in the states
It’s no secret that unions — especially the public-sector variety — have had a big target on them in some states lately.Fifteen state legislatures in 2011 and 2012 passed laws restricting the collective bargaining rights of public-employee unions or their ability to collect dues from nonmembers they represented, according to an analysis conducted for the Economic Policy Institute, a think tank focused on reducing inequality and advancing pro-worker policies. The early 2011 fight in Wisconsin, under Republican Gov. Scott Walker, was perhaps the most high-profile effort. (Disclaimer: The author moderated an EPI panel for the paper’s unveiling.)
The Washington Post January 27, 2014 -
Here is a piece and chart quantifying that trend from Lawrence Mishel of the Economic Policy Institute:
The minimum wage is 23 percent less than its peak inflation-adjusted value in 1968. This is despite productivity (how much output can be produced in an average hour of work in the economy) more than doubling in that time period.
The low-wage workforce has surely contributed to this rise in economy-wide productivity, since as a group they have far more education now than they did then. For the workforce overall, 37 percent in 1968 had not completed high school (or received a GED), which was true for only 9 percent in 2012 (the latest year with comparable data). We can drill down to examine low-wage workers, which we are defining for this analysis as those earning in the bottom fifth of the wage distribution.
The Atlanta Journal Constitution January 24, 2014 -
On this MLK Day nearly 46 years after King’s death, persistent discrimination means that black Americans are more likely than their white counterparts to struggle economically. And it’s much harder for them to pull themselves out of that financial insecurity. One prominent example of how racism affects black Americans’ economic prospects is in the job market, where they’re much more likely to be unemployed than white Americans.
Some of that has to do with lower rates of educational attainment and a lack of access to hiring networks. But even when you account for all of those things, “the leftover bit is the out-and-out discrimination,” said Heidi Schierholtz of the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank. There are a number of reasons why the playing field is so unequal.
The Huffington Post January 24, 2014 -
The effects of such a reconsideration could be far-reaching. If workers can benefit from contracts without paying even what it costs the unions to secure those contracts, those unions would suffer revenue declines that could render them toothless. Once their unions lost power, home-care givers — a group that is overwhelmingly female, disproportionately minority and almost universally poor — would be highly unlikely to get any more raises. Turnover rates within the care-provider workforce would surely rise.
The Washington Post January 24, 2014 -
“The continuing, record-breaking growth and strength of tourism in Los Angeles is a shining light for our economy, creating good-paying jobs for our families, benefiting local businesses, and generating significant revenue for the city,” said Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti at a Jan. 6 press conference celebrating the record number of visitors.
But an analysis of U.S. Census data found about 40 percent of hospitality workers in Los Angeles County live below twice the federal poverty level, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
National Journal January 24, 2014 -
The reasons are many, among them the depth of the Great Recession and the toll of the president’s healthcare reform effort, which has dragged down assessments of the president’s competence and trustworthiness.
The most important factor, though, may be the widely held view that, statistics aside, the economy is struggling and many, if not most, Americans have not benefited from the lumbering recovery. Significantly, millions who want to work still can’t find jobs.
“People are hunkered down,” said Lawrence Mishel, president of the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning Washington think tank that focuses on how policies affect low- and moderate-income families. “Very few are having an easy time of it.”
It is not unusual for widespread pessimism to fly in the face of upbeat economic news, even long after recovery has taken hold.
Los Angeles Times January 24, 2014 -
The reality of rising American inequality is stark. Since the late 1970s real wages for the bottom half of the work force have stagnated or fallen, while the incomes of the top 1 percent have nearly quadrupled (and the incomes of the top 0.1 percent have risen even more). While we can and should have a serious debate about what to do about this situation, the simple fact — American capitalism as currently constituted is undermining the foundations of middle-class society — shouldn’t be up for argument.
But it is, of course. Partly this reflects Upton Sinclair’s famous dictum: It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it. But it also, I think, reflects distaste for the implications of the numbers, which seem almost like an open invitation to class warfare — or, if you prefer, a demonstration that class warfare is already underway, with the plutocrats on offense.
New York Times January 24, 2014 -
Other recent research underscores the value of raising the minimum wage now and deflates many conservative talking points. David Cooper of the Economic Policy Institute shows that, contrary to the conservative notion that the typical minimum wage-earner is a kid supplementing his middle-class family’s income, 52% are in households with income of less than $40,000 a year. One third are ages 30 to 55 — in fact, more are older than 55 than are teenagers. The average share of family income that would be provided by a minimum wage earner at $10.10 is 50%.
Findings like these are helping to drive the movement for increases in the minimum wage at the state and local level.
Los Angeles Times January 17, 2014 -
PRESIDENT OBAMA has assured American workers that he won’t let Congress keep him from lending a hand during these tough economic times. “I will not allow gridlock, inaction or willful indifference to get in our way,” he said in a speech last year. “Whatever executive authority I have to help the middle class, I’ll use it.”
The problem is that most presidential actions that could help significant numbers of middle-class workers do require congressional participation. But here’s one that doesn’t: raising the salary threshold for the exemption to the overtime rules of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938.
New York Times January 17, 2014