Tag Archives: EPI

Report on the impact from the expanded unemployment insurance, economic impact payments, aid to states and localities, child tax credits, and temporary protection from eviction amongst other measures as reported by the authors. These actions provided relief to workers and their families to help them weather the recession. These measures also fed the surge in employment, wages, and gave low-wage workers better job opportunities and leverage to see...

 by Elise Gould EPI Average hourly wage growth has exceeded inflation for 12 straight months, according to new Bureau of Labor Statistics data released this morning. This real (or inflation-adjusted) wage growth is a key indicator of how well the average worker’s wage can improve their standard of living. As inflation continues to normalize, I’m optimistic more workers will experience real gains in their purchasing power. The dark blue line...

AB: The link below the chart developed by Josh Bivens is to find subsidies or funds granted to towns, cities, counties, and states under the American Rescue Plan Act. For example, one small city i live in was granted $6.7 millions to which they wish to apply for an eight-mile water pipeline to an area northwest of the city. It is for new construction rather than improving the infrastructure they already have in place. Mind you, we are living on the...

Corporate profits have contributed disproportionately to inflation. How should policymakers respond? Economic Policy Institute, Josh Bivens The inflation spike of 2021 and 2022 has presented real policy challenges. In order to better understand this policy debate, it is imperative to look at prices and how they are being affected. The price of just about everything in the U.S. economy can be broken down into the three main components of...

This is a brief and targeted commentary by EPI’s Josh Bivens to which I have added input. The Fed has been flailing away at the economy in the belief Labor is the issue. Josh contends, product or profit markups have been a major issue. He does provide a foundation for his posit. I look to the supply chain issue(s) as the basis for the higher profits. I experienced similar in getting componentry in 2008-2010. With less supply and a lengthen (and...

This is a mixture of my comments and comments pulled from multiple sources (BLS, Cosmopolitan, , Why do Child Labor Laws Matter? Federal laws provide a minimum of protections for child labor. The laws were enacted nearly a century ago in reaction to children being exposed to dangerous activities. Edwin Markham “Child at the Loom.” Cosmopolitan There was a time in this country when young children routinely worked legally. As industry grew in the...

“Inequality in annual earnings worsens in 2021.” This report is a couple of weeks old. Still relevant and supports what NDd has been saying as well as others here at Angry Bear. This is taken from EPI. Partial read of a larger report. Details from year twenty-one finds annual wages rising the fastest for the top 1% of earners (up 9.4%) and top 0.1% (up 18.5%) Those in the bottom 90% saw their real earnings fall 0.2% between 2020 and 2021. Workers...

New data by the AFL-CIO Executive Paywatch, available here. Note that union members do much better than nonunion members, and certainly than minimum wage workers. For more context read this EPI report. You must admit that the use of flawed neoclassical thinking is sometimes amusing. In this Bloomberg post, an 'expert' (aka hired gun) from a free market think tank (pro-corporations propaganda machine) says that the "AFL-CIO study [is] 'useless' because it compares two different labor markets...