In 2021, the Economic Policy Institute estimated that the Trump regulation would have reduced worker compensation (transferring it to employers) by at least $3.3 billion annually.
Centre Daily Times
February 2, 2024
According to Heidi Shierholz, president of the Economic Policy Institute, a pro-union think tank which focuses on policy for lower-income workers, this lack of progress in the numbers seem at odds with the growing prominence of unions on the labor landscape.
It’s not a lack of support from the public that’s holding unions back from making more progress in growing their ranks. Even before the big wins of 2023, polling conducted in recent years showed rising union popularity, with support at its highest level since 1965, according to 2022 data from Gallup.
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“Even though there is this huge popularity of unions, a great deal of interest in them, and rising union activity, we still have just extremely weak labor law that makes it really, really easy for employers, or state lawmakers to really crush union organizing,” Shierholz said.
CNBC
February 2, 2024
The slow pace of unionization has helped drive rates down, as unionized workers are laid off or retire as part of the natural churn of the economy, Heidi Shierholz, president of the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank, said in a commentary.
“As a result of the growing employer opposition to unions and the failure of policy to stem it, workers are unable to organize new union members fast enough under current labor law to keep pace with the natural ‘churning out’ of unionized jobs,” she wrote.
Investopedia
February 2, 2024
The decline of union power since the 1980s has coincided with stagnating wages in many sectors and a rise in economic inequality, now higher than it’s ever been since the Great Depression. Research by the progressive Economic Policy Institute shows union workers earn about 10.2% more in hourly wages, while nonunion workers benefit in highly unionized industries.
Minnesota Reformer
February 2, 2024
An analysis of the numbers from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) finds that unionization among workers of color, and young workers in particular, accounted for the small gains in the absolute number of workers represented by a union (up 191,000), with black workers having the highest unionization rate (13.1 percent). According to the EPI, losses in state and local government employment were a major blow for the public sector rate, as were the growing number of laws blocking public sector workers’ path to a union.
Jacobin
February 2, 2024
A 2013 study by the Economic Policy Institute reveals that if a college-educated worker becomes unemployed they are as likely as any other worker—of whatever level of education—to get trapped in long-term unemployment.
Time Magazine
February 2, 2024
“The GDP data yesterday and the income-expenditure data today point really strongly to an economy that is settling into a very good groove,” said Josh Bivens, research director for the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank in Washington.
“GDP growth has accelerated in recent quarters while inflation has decelerated,” Bivens wrote to VOA in an email exchange. “Real [inflation-adjusted] measures of wages and disposable personal income are growing at a rising rate.
“If we manage to keep the labor market healthy with 4% unemployment or below for the coming year, I think inflation will be normal enough throughout 2024 that it could be a very good year for most U.S. families.”
Voice of America
February 2, 2024
“Recent improvements are taking place against a backdrop of many decades of too slow wage growth, increasing inequality, and a lot of misdirected public investment that has led healthcare and education to be a source of economic stress,” Moore says.
America was pulled out of a recession because of some “smart spending” such as stimulus checks, but that hasn’t fixed the persisting issues.
“The economy isn’t sick right now,” Moore says. “We don’t have the flu. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have chronic conditions that need to be treated.”
CNBC
February 2, 2024
With the federal wage remaining so pitifully low and decades out of date (according to the Economic Policy Institute, its relative value is at a 66-year nadir), it’s no coincidence that, as the API’s proposal notes, “Many of these job openings are in the retail and food services industries” — i.e. jobs that pay minimum wage or potentially less, in the case of waitstaff.
Truthout
February 1, 2024
West Virginia AFL-CIO president Josh Sword says that the law has had a negative effect on local unions and will hurt workers’ long-term ability to organize and advocate for better benefits; research from left-leaning groups like the Economic Policy Institute have found that employee wages are lower in states with “right-to-work” laws.
Mountain State Spotlight
February 1, 2024
“We’re getting a lot of stories about a specific chunk” of the labor market, said Heidi Shierholz, president of the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, DC. By and large, blue-collar jobs have been in good shape — it’s the white-collar, professional services jobs in areas such as finance and technology that have been struggling. “But that level of layoffs is actually a normal part of our labor market,” she said.
Shierholz also explained that layoffs and unemployment insurance claims have been lower than they were before the pandemic.
Bloomberg
February 1, 2024
“Recent improvements are taking place against a backdrop of many decades of too slow wage growth, increasing inequality, and a lot of misdirected public investment that has led healthcare and education to be a source of economic stress,” Moore says.
America was pulled out of a recession because of some “smart spending” such as stimulus checks, but that hasn’t fixed the persisting issues.
“The economy isn’t sick right now,” Moore says. “We don’t have the flu. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have chronic conditions that need to be treated.”
CNBC
January 26, 2024
This year’s state and local minimum wage increases are estimated to impact 9.9 million workers, according to the Economic Policy Institute, which tracks minimum wage changes.
Of those 22 state increases on Jan. 1, 14 were due to automatic inflation adjustments. Two other places have automatic adjustments on July 1 each year: Washington, D.C., and Oregon. But the state with the highest increase as of Jan. 1 was Hawaii: a $2 increase to $14, representing a 28% bump.
NerdWallet
January 26, 2024
Between 2019 and 2022, the lowest-wage American workers (those in the 10th percentile of wages) saw their hourly wages grow 9 percent, adjusted for inflation, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), more than any other income bracket. The highest-wage workers’ earnings only grew around half as much:
Bank Rate
January 26, 2024
According to the Economic Policy Institute, Florida is one of 25 states (plus Washington D.C.) that have enacted such standards for minors 16 and older.
Orlando Weekly
January 26, 2024
Since 2021, lawmakers in at least ten states have introduced or passed legislation that would weaken child employment rules, according to a December 2023 report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).
“Instead of competing in a race to the bottom on child labor standards, states can eliminate significant gaps and exclusions in existing child labor laws, strengthen protections beyond the minimal and limited standards mandated by federal law, and improve job quality for workers of all ages,” the report reads.
The Independent
January 26, 2024
Real wages increased marginally over the last 12 months, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, but remained flat in real terms dating back to the late 1970s, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Restaurant Dive
January 26, 2024
Raising the minimum wage is good for workers, business and the economy, according to Ben Zipperer, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). Zipperer said boosting the national minimum wage is long overdue.
“Workers today who are paid the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour are, after adjusting for inflation, paid 29 percent less than their counterparts 50 years ago,’’ said Zipperer.
WorkersCompensation.com
January 26, 2024
According to the Economic Policy Institute, “the federal minimum wage is worth 30% less today than when it was last raised 14 years ago.”
The Nation
January 26, 2024
Along with the passage of laws unfavorable toward labor unions, some corporations invest money into programs and consultants who engage in union-suppressing tactics, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). A 2019 analysis from the EPI found that companies spent $340 million a year on “union avoiding” consultants who help deter organizers. And employers were charged with violating federal law in 41.5% of all union election campaigns.
USA Today
January 26, 2024
The gains in private sector union membership came courtesy of younger workers and people of color, according to an analysis of the BLS data by the Economic Policy Institute.
Huffpost
January 26, 2024
These are just a few of Robb’s greatest hits—see this report from the Economic Policy Institute for a full accounting of the disastrous policies pursued under his leadership.
The New Republic
January 26, 2024
“Workers want unions, but a broken system is undermining their efforts to organize at every turn,” said Heidi Shierholz, president of the Economic Policy Institute. “Employers have exploited weaknesses in U.S. labor law, and federal and state policymakers have failed to prevent this from happening.”
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EPI’s Shierholz said the smaller premium may also owe something to “spillover effects” when wider pay standards set by unions help boost non-union pay. It’s a phenomenon she said played out “in real time” recently in the pay increases for non-unionized autoworkers after strikes by the United Auto Workers at Ford, General Motors and Stellantis resulted in substantial union pay hikes.
“So the union premium is reduced by the spillover effect, but that’s all good as far as workers are concerned,” Shierholz said.
Reuters
January 26, 2024
“Misclassification is a problem that affects many low-paid industries like construction, transportation, home health care,” says Sally Dworak-Fisher, senior staff attorney at NELP. But “people in every occupation at all types of pay levels” can be vulnerable to it, says Samantha Sanders, director of government affairs and advocacy at the Economic Policy Institute.
CNBC
January 26, 2024
Jennifer Sherer, a director at the Economic Policy Institute, sees a silver lining in the data: People ages 16 to 45 are driving union membership growth and have decades of employment ahead of them.
“That’s not just polling and survey data, but that’s young people going through the very challenging and courageous process of organizing new unions even against the odds,” she said.
KCUR public radio (Kansas City)
January 26, 2024
The gains in union membership in 2023 were driven entirely by workers under the age of 45, says Heidi Shierholz, president of the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.
“I think that does point to a shift that may be a more lasting shift… in interest and popularity of unions,” says Shierholz.
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Shierholz says weaknesses in labor law are responsible for the significant gap between the number of workers who are represented by unions and those who want to be represented by unions but aren’t.
“That gap is labor law not truly protecting workers’ right to organize,” she says, noting that employers face little more than a slap on the wrist for violating that right.
NPR
January 26, 2024
Indeed, it is unlawful for employers to “interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of their rights,” which includes the right to organize, according to the National Labor Relations Board. That puts some union avoidance strategies in treacherous legal territory. In fact, a 2019 report from the Economic Policy Institute found that in 41.5 percent of all union election campaigns, U.S. employers were charged with violating federal law.
Inc.
January 26, 2024
This disconnect is largely a product of how difficult it has become for American workers to join unions, said Heidi Shierholz, president of the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank in Washington, D.C. Unionization is often an arduous process that can take months or even years. When businesses form, jobs start off as nonunion positions. Workers can gain union status through democratic elections that typically occur one workplace at a time.
Maintaining union membership rates requires “really active [union] organizing just to keep up with the natural churn in our labor market,” Shierholz said. “It’s a long slog that goes on and on.”
Adding to the challenges, U.S. labor law is “highly stacked against workers,” Shierholz added, with current penalties for illegal retaliation against workers hardly serving as a deterrent for employers looking to crush union activity.
The Washington Post
January 26, 2024