For Immediate Release: Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Contact: Phoebe Silag or Karen Conner, news@epi.org 202-775-8810
EPI honors Ray Marshall, Wisconsin labor leaders and Paul Krugman at 25th anniversary dinner
Last night, the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) presented awards to former Secretary of Labor and EPI co-founder Ray Marshall, Wisconsin labor leaders Kim Hoffman and Mahlon Mitchell, and Nobel laureate and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. EPI honored the award recipients at a dinner celebrating its 25th anniversary.
Alexis Herman, Secretary of Labor under President Clinton, presented the Lifetime Achievement Award to Ray Marshall, who served under President Carter.
In her remarks, Herman highlighted Marshall’s “unique ability to marry economic theory with practical solutions.”
“Abraham Lincoln said, ‘I’ll get ready, and my time will come,’” Marshall said while accepting his award. “I think as long as we have a strong EPI and economists like Paul Krugman to help us get ready, our time will come.”
Rep. George Miller (CA) introduced Kim Hoffman of the Wisconsin Education Association Council and Mahlon Mitchell of the International Association of Firefighters. In his remarks, Rep. Miller denounced the “amazing effort by the governor of Wisconsin to strip workers of their rights.”
“But the workers of Wisconsin had another idea,” Miller said.
“I’m just one of the many people willing to take this movement to the next level in Wisconsin,” Hoffman said in accepting the award. “Thank you on behalf of Wisconsin’s public-sector workers for reminding us we are not alone in this fight.”
“This is so much more than a union fight,” Mitchell said. “This is an attack on the middle class, on our way of life, on our children.”
Leo Gerard, president of the United Steelworkers and a member of EPI’s Board of Directors, presented the Distinguished Economist Award to Krugman.
“Simply put, he’s the single purest voice today explaining what really matters in our public debates over economic policy,” Gerard said.
In his remarks, Krugman focused on the work of EPI experts rather than on his own work.
“EPI is scholarship on behalf of truth, justice and a decent country for all of its citizens,” Krugman said. “That’s a powerful thing. It is something that transcends the scale of the organization. It is what needs to be done.”
EPI was founded in 1986 by Barry Bluestone, Jeff Faux, Robert Kuttner, Ray Marshall, Robert Reich, Lester Thurow. Faux served as EPI’s first president. In 1988, EPI published the first edition of what became its flagship publication, The State of Working America. EPI released an online version of The State of Working America last year, which can be accessed at www.stateofworkingamerica.org.
New videos featuring Ray Marshall and Paul Krugman are available on EPI’s website.