Education has long been considered a calling, but that doesn’t mean teachers and staff won’t leave if they are substantially underpaid. An analysis this month from the Economic Policy Institute spells out how teachers in the early 1990s were, on average, paid about 5 percent less than college graduates in other professions. Today, they are paid close to 25 percent less. There is no shortage of people who want to work in education, the report concludes, but there’s a scarcity of qualified teachers who are “willing to work at current wages and under current working conditions.”
The Washington Post
January 6, 2023
An estimated 3.2 million Californians — 18.9% of the workforce — are getting raises, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington-based think tank.
LA Times
January 6, 2023
“The big ugly fact out there is that since modern recorded history, only about half of workers have ever had a retirement plan,” says Monique Morrissey, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute, referring to savings vehicles like 401(k)s. “More than half of workers either have little or nothing.”
NPR
January 6, 2023
Not only do right-to-work laws undermine unions, they also hurt workers’ wages. The Economic Policy Institute found that workers in right-to-work states earn 3.1 percent less than comparable workers in states without such laws, after adjusting for differences in the cost of living. That means a worker’s pay is on average around $1,600 less per year.
The New Republic
January 6, 2023
In 2021, housekeepers made an average hourly wage of $14.22 per hour, while home health aides made $14.07 per hour, according to the Department of Labor. Childcare workers made an average of $13.31 per hour. Domestic workers are three times as likely to be living in poverty as other workers, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Fast Company
January 6, 2023
In 2017, the FBI reported the cost of street crime at about $13.8 billion, the same year that the Economic Policy Institute released a study saying that just one form of wage theft — minimum wage violations — costs U.S. workers even more: an estimated $15 billion annually, impacting an estimated 17% of low-wage workers.
The American Prospect
January 6, 2023
Margaret Poydock, a policy analyst with the Economic Policy Institute who studies the labor movement, said the increased interest in workers’ rights from Gen Z workers stems in part from the time they’ve grown up. The pandemic, for example, put added stress on so-called “essential workers” or frontline workers in the retail industry at grocery stores, restaurants and shops.
Modern Retail
January 6, 2023
A new year means higher minimum wages in 23 states, leading to increased pay for an estimated 8.4 million US workers, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Business Insider
January 6, 2023
According to an analysis from the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, 8.4 million workers will start getting a higher paycheck come January 1. That’s due to a combination of inflation adjustments, legislation, and ballot measures. Taken together, the increases will boost pay for those 8.4 million workers by over $5 billion — and women and workers of color, who are all more likely to be low-wage workers, will be disproportionately impacted.
Business Insider
January 6, 2023
About 188,000 Ohioans will see direct wage gains while about 275,000 other workers across the state are likely to see bigger paychecks as employers adjust their pay scales, says Policy Matters Ohio, citing estimates from the Economic Policy Institute.
Springfield News Sun
January 6, 2023