Earlier this month the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute argued that the recent proposals targeting state child labor protections are part of “an intentional tactic to generate pressure for subsequently lowering federal standards, reflecting long-standing interests of some industry groups.”
Mountain State Spotlight
February 23, 2024
According to the Economic Policy Institute: “Misleadingly named right-to-work (RTW) laws do not, as some unfamiliar with the term may assume, entail any guarantee of employment for people ready and willing to go to work. Rather, by making it harder for workers’ organizations to sustain themselves financially, state RTW laws aim to undermine unions’ bargaining strength. Because RTW laws lower wages and benefits, weaken workplace protections, and decrease the likelihood that employers will be required to negotiate with their employees, they are advanced as a strategy for attracting new businesses to a state. But EPI research shows that RTW laws do not have any positive impact on job growth.”
Indeed, the institute noted several years ago, “RTW laws are associated with lower wages and benefits for both union and nonunion workers. In a RTW state, the average worker makes 3.2 percent less than a similar worker in a non-RTW state.”
Capital Times
February 23, 2024
Unemployment benefits for striking workers: Labor unions want the state to extend unemployment benefits for striking workers, which would give unions a significant advantage in protracted work stoppages. New York and New Jersey already allow striking workers to apply for unemployment, with more than half a dozen other states also considering it, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Minnesota Reformer
February 23, 2024
The reimbursement rate increases come at a time when Massachusetts remains one of the most expensive states when it comes to childcare.
The Economic Policy Institute, a non-profit think tank specializing in economic research, found the average annual cost of infant care in the Bay State is nearly $21,000.
WAMC Northeast Public Radio
February 23, 2024
The Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, calls this difference the “teacher pay penalty.” EPI calculated that, in 2022, teachers earned only 74 cents on the dollar compared with comparably educated professionals. The right-leaning Hoover Institution reached a similar conclusion in its 2020 report on educator compensation, showing that, even adjusting for factors such as talent and experience, “teachers are paid 22 percent less than they would be if they were in jobs in the U.S. economy outside of teaching.”
The Washington Post
February 23, 2024
A 2022 study by the Economic Policy Institute found that average weekly wagers for teachers have remained “relatively flat” since 1996, with teachers making more than 14% less in Ohio when compared with other college-educated workers.
The 74
February 23, 2024
Nebraska’s unemployment rate ranks among the nation’s lowest, with the statewide rate at 2.3% for the last three months of 2023. But estimates from the Economic Policy Institute show unemployment among Black workers in Nebraska at 3.5% during the same period and Latino unemployment at 3%.
Omaha World-Herald
February 23, 2024
Generally, employers can get away with paying lower wages in states without strong unions: According to the Economic Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank focused on low- and middle-income workers, unionization rates in Michigan declined faster than unionization rates nationally after that state passed right-to-work laws in 2012; wages, which had been higher than the national median, fell below it. (That legislation was repealed in 2023, making Michigan the first state in more than half a century to repeal its right-to-work-law.)
Cost of Living Project
February 23, 2024
Reprint of Daniel Costa and Heidi Shierholz blog, “Immigrants are not hurting U.S.-born workers.”
In These Times
February 23, 2024
A new report from the Economic Policy Institute shows Georgia joins nearly three dozen other states where childcare is now more expensive than some college tuitions. According to their numbers, parents in the peach state spend an average of $8,530 dollars a year on childcare per child. That comes out to more than $700 per month. The Economic Policy Institute says it now costs $1,324 a year more for daycare in Georgia than the average in-state tuition for a four-year public college.
13 WMAZ
February 23, 2024