Areas of expertise
Education • Labor markets • Income distribution and poverty • Industrial relations • Technology and productivity • Wages • Unions and collective bargaining
Biography
Lawrence Mishel is a distinguished fellow at EPI after serving as president from 2002–2017. Mishel first joined EPI in 1987 as research director. In the more than three decades he has been with EPI, Mishel has helped build it into the nation’s premier research organization focused on U.S. living standards and labor markets.
Mishel has co-authored all 12 editions of The State of Working America, a book that former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich says “remains unrivaled as the most-trusted source for a comprehensive understanding of how working Americans and their families are faring in today’s economy.” The State of Working America has been an invaluable resource in newsrooms, classrooms, and halls of power since 1988.
Mishel’s primary research interests include labor markets and education. He has written extensively on wage and job quality trends in the United States. He co-edited a research volume on emerging labor market institutions for the National Bureau of Economic Research. His 1988 research on manufacturing data led the U.S. Commerce Department to revise the way it measures U.S. manufacturing output. This new measure helped accurately document the long decline in U.S. manufacturing, a trend that is now widely understood.
Mishel leads EPI’s education research program. He has written extensively on charter schools, teacher pay, and high school graduation rates. His research with Joydeep Roy has shown that high school graduation rates are significantly higher than the rates that are often cited by education analysts. This work has enabled policymakers to more accurately assess the state of U.S. public education.
Mishel has testified before Congress on the importance of promoting policies that reduce inequality, generate jobs, improve the lives of American workers and their families, and strengthen the middle class. He also serves frequently as a commentator in print, broadcast, and online media.
Prior to joining EPI, Mishel held a number of research roles, including a fellowship at the U.S. Department of Labor. He also served as a faculty member at Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations. Mishel also served as an economist for several unions, including the Auto Workers, Steelworkers, AFSCME, and the Industrial Union Department, AFL-CIO. Mishel holds a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Originally from Philadelphia, he has four children and two grandsons and lives with his wife and his dog, Bella, in Washington, D.C.
Education
Ph.D., Economics, University of Wisconsin at Madison
M.A., Economics, American University
B.S., Pennsylvania State University
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What we learned from The UK case rendering Uber drivers employees
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Wages for the top 1% skyrocketed 160% since 1979 while the share of wages for the bottom 90% shrunk: Time to remake wage pattern with economic policies that generate robust wage-growth for vast majority
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Teacher Compensation Penalty: Impact on teachers, education, and society
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Centering Unequal Workplace Power: Shattering the assumption that employees and employers have equal bargaining power
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Teacher pay penalty dips but persists in 2019: Public school teachers earn about 20% less in weekly wages than nonteacher college graduates
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CEO compensation surged 14% in 2019 to $21.3 million: CEOs now earn 320 times as much as a typical worker
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Let Them Eat Tweets: How the Right Rules in an Age of Extreme Inequality
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A majority of workers are fearful of coronavirus infections at work, especially Black, Hispanic, and low- and middle-income workers: Those facing risks are not proportionately receiving extra compensation
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Top 1.0% of earners see wages up 157.8% since 1979
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CEO compensation has grown 940% since 1978: Typical worker compensation has risen only 12% during that time
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Worker bonuses slump 22 percent after GOP tax cuts
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Don’t be fooled by calls for a ‘regional’ minimum wage
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The teacher weekly wage penalty hit 21.4 percent in 2018, a record high: Trends in the teacher wage and compensation penalties through 2018
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Bonuses are up one cent in 2018 since the GOP tax cuts passed
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Bonuses are up $0.02 since the GOP tax cuts passed
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Top 1.0 percent reaches highest wages ever—up 157 percent since 1979
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Further evidence that the tax cuts have not led to widespread bonuses, wage or compensation growth
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The teacher pay penalty has hit a new high: Trends in the teacher wage and compensation gaps through 2017
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CEO compensation surged in 2017
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Social Security data confirm same old pattern: Self-employment headcount has risen but economic impact remains small
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News from EPI › New U.S. Census Bureau nonemployer establishment data for 2016 show continued growth in self-employment, but little economic impact as revenues barely grew
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Nonemployer establishments grew in 2016 but their real revenues were stable: This confirms other data on self-employment showing more activity, but little economic impact
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Has self-employment surged? Data on nonemployer establishments confirm other data showing more activity, but not much economic impact
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How big is AI-related employment? Not that big at all—despite what Stanford’s AI Index Annual Report tries to claim
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News from EPI › Contingent Worker Survey is further evidence that we are not becoming a nation of freelancers
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Uber and the labor market: Uber drivers’ compensation, wages, and the scale of Uber and the gig economy
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As cities and states pass bold increases in the minimum wage, we need to update our thinking about its costs