It is no secret, Black and brown people with criminal records are stigmatized in a way that prevents them from enjoying the basic rights and privileges we often take for granted. Among them are job opportunities and long-term employment. In mid-2020, the Economic Policy Institute reported that the Black unemployment rate was nearly twice that of the overall unemployment rate in Maryland. The disparity in these figures has remained consistent throughout the pandemic, which shows no sign of slowing down.
Baltimore Sun
February 22, 2021
Before the crisis, families paid two out of three dollars spent for early care and education — the Economic Policy Institute calculated that $42 billion was spent by families out of the total $64 billion spent privately and publicly for this essential service. This crisis showed how unstable that financing system made child care programs on which working families rely.
EdNC
February 22, 2021
“You have one swath of the economy getting absolutely slammed and then a huge swath of workers who haven’t seen a decline in pay,” said Heidi Shierholz, director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute. “In a normal recession they’d be helping to keep the economy going but that is not at all the case now.”
Lessons from previous recessions, Ms. Shierholz continued, show that without a concerted effort to provide relief to those hard-hit low-wage workers — particularly by eliminating the subminimum wage for tipped workers — any economic recovery will compound existing wage gaps.
New York Times
February 22, 2021
— Heidi Shierholz, former chief economist at the Labor Department, “thinks the best answer to how many people are still affected economically by the pandemic is 25.5 million.”
Politico Morning Shift
February 22, 2021
The wage hit its peak in inflation-adjusted terms in 1968 at just over $12. Though it has been raised 14 times since then, it has not kept pace with the cost of living. The current nearly 12-year stretch is the longest it’s gone without a boost.
That means minimum wage workers are getting poorer over time, said Josh Bivens, director of research at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.
“Every year that Congress does not raise it, people get a pay cut,” he said.
CNN
February 22, 2021
Shierholz, the former Labor Department economist, says she thinks the best answer to how many people are still affected economically by the pandemic is 25.5 million.
Washington Post
February 19, 2021
U.S. Rep. John Yarmuth (D KY 3rd, Louisville), chair of the House Budget Committee; then William Spriggs, Howard University economics professor, chief economist to the AFL-CIO, U.S. Assistant Secretary of Labor for Policy (2009-2012) and Thea Lee, president of the Economic Policy Institute
WNYC
February 19, 2021
The letter from 88 groups was organized by the Center for American Progress, Public Citizen and Americans for Tax Fairness. It was signed by the AFL-CIO and other unions and by think tanks including the Economic Policy Institute and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.
The Fiscal Times
February 19, 2021
According to the Economic Policy Institute, nearly 31 percent of Black workers and 26 percent of Latinx workers would immediately benefit with an increase to $15 an hour. Increasing the minimum wage advances the cause of racial justice.
Boston Globe
February 19, 2021
Source: Brookings analysis of American Community Survey 2019 data and Economic Policy Institute Family Budget Calculator data.
Brookings Institution
February 19, 2021