May 6, 2022
Unemployment data–April 2022 graphs: CBPP Chart Book Tracking the Post-Great Recession Economy Top Charts of 2021 EPI State of U.S. Workers on Labor Day-charts
Brown CEPR 5/6/2022 “he overall labor force participation rate (LFPR) declined 0.2 percentage points to 62.2 percent, returning to the January 2022 level. This marks the first time since May 2021 that the LFPR has experienced a month-over-month decline…..Significant wage growth over the last year has been important in offsetting the pace of inflation for workers. Growth has been especially prominent for workers at the lower end of the wage distribution over the last two years. However, more moderate overall wage growth will be expected if inflation is going to return to more palatable levels. Overall wage growth showed signs of slowing this month.”
EPI jobs blog, 5/6/22 “While the share of the population with a job ticked down slightly in April, it has been trending strongly in the right direction for months. I’m optimistic this will simply be a blip on the way to a full recovery in EPOPs by the end of 2022. pic.twitter.com/xn9ompXluD The labor market bounce back remains very strong as job growth over the last year averaged 550k a month. Strikingly stronger than the prolonged recovery from the Great Recession. The labor market is now just below pre-pandemic levels. pic.twitter.com/szj7jegrPy— Elise Gould (@eliselgould) May 6, 2022 It’s not yet mission accomplished! The recession left a huge hole, and depending on how you measure the counterfactual, the total gap in the labor market right now is somewhere between 4 and 6 million jobs. But that gap is closing rapidly. Also, wage growth appears to be moderating. Over the last three months, wages grew at an annualized rate of 3.7%. In the 12 months before that, they grew 5.4%. Remember, the rise in inflation has not been driven by anything that looks like an overheating labor market—it’s been driven by supply-chain bottlenecks and higher corporate profit margins. 6/ https://t.co/IHU2mcLKhh — Heidi Shierholz (@hshierholz) May 6, 2022
Bartash, Marketwatch 5/6/22 “The size of the U.S. work force shrank in April for the first time in seven months. A sign the tightest labor market in decades is getting worse? A bad omen for the economy? Don’t bet on it, at least not yet, economists say. They point out the labor force has expanded sharply in the past year, and with job openings at a record high, wages soaring and the pandemic fading, more people are expected to look for and find work….Even with businesses complaining mightily about a scarcity of labor, companies are findings ways to lure workers. Higher pay and benefits is one of them….The one potential negative in another wise strong jobs report was the first decline in the size of the labor force since last September. ….For now economists are inclined to dismiss the drop in the labor force given the volatile nature of the household survey from which it is drawn. The figures are often revised, sometimes heavily so…..the decline in the labor force last month was mostly concentrated among young workers under the age of 25. They didn’t go back to school given the nature of the academic calendar year, so it was a viewed as a head scratcher. Why would they suddenly drop out of the hottest labor market in modern times?”
Smith, Casselman NYT 5/6/22 “The U.S. economy has regained nearly 95 percent of the 22 million jobs lost at the height of coronavirus-related lockdowns in the spring of 2020. And labor force participation has recovered more swiftly than most analysts initially expected, nearing prepandemic levels. The labor supply over the past year has not kept up with a record wave of job openings, however, as businesses expand to meet the demand for a variety of goods and services. That has helped push up wages — the April survey showed average hourly earnings 5.5 percent higher than a year earlier — but those gains for workers have been largely offset by a surge in prices…..The slow return of workers to the labor force had been one of the biggest challenges facing the economy last year…..Even before the setback in April, however, there had been little sign that the return of workers was making it easier for employers to hire. That’s because demand for workers has risen even faster than supply.”
Bivens & Shierholz, EPI 12/18 What labor market changes have generated inequality and wage suppression?
Equitable Growth Research showing rising mortality rates among white Americans suggests that increasing economic insecurity for this group may play a role in increasing mortality. New research shows that one form of insecurity—higher unemployment rates—is strongly associated with higher opioid death rates. The paper, … a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper, looks at the connection between unemployment and opioid abuse.
The EMRATIO [the ratio of employed to the the civilian noninstitutional population aged 16 years and over] that is employed.has not fully recovered its pre-crisis level. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?graph_id=453007#0
Labor force participation rate [labor force as a % of civilian noninstitutional population] recovery since the recession by age, Fed. Res., St Louis. Note: except for those 55 and over, labor force participation rates have not yet recovered pre-crisis levels. 9/19 data. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?graph_id=316679#0
Full-time workers: http://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea06.htm
Worker Rights and Wages Policy Watch, EPI
Blue Collar Jobs Tracker, CEPR
Most Price Increases from Inflation Have Gone to Corporate Profits The inflation panic is causing some Democrats to pivot from social spending to deficit reduction. That’s exactly the wrong approach. / In These Times 5/22
Botched policy responses to globalization have decimated manufacturing employment with often overlooked costs for … workers of color, Scott etal, EPI 1/22
Union membership resumes its fall, Henwood, 1/22
Record number of minimum wage increases set for 2022, Gonzalez, Axios 12/21
The Great Escape The most vulnerable people in America have started the closest thing we’ve seen in a century to a general strike. Dayen, TAP 11/21
A record number of workers are quitting their jobs, empowered by new leverage Rosenberg, Wash.Post, 10/21
Quantifying the Impact of the Fight for $15: $150 Billion in Raises for 26 Million Workers…, Lathrop, Lester, & Wilson, NELP 7/21
The Bureau of Labor Statistics Counted Only Eight Strikes in 2020, Payday Report Counted 1,200, Leon & Elk, INET 7/21
Reforming unemployment insurance, EPI 6/21
American workers are quitting at the highest rate in decades, Fernholz, Quartz 6/21
Identifying the policy levers generating wage suppression and wage inequality, Mishel & Bivens, EPI 5/21
Covid Is Hitting Workers Differently Than the Financial Crisis, Fazzari & Needler 4/21
The Black-White Wage Gap Is as Big as It Was in 1950, , NYT 6/20
Bosses in the US Have Far Too Much Power to Lay Off Workers Whenever They Feel Like It, Sheehan, Jacobin, 6/20
Obsession With Fraud Sabotages U.S. Aid to Millions Without Jobs, Kochkodin, 5/20 Bloomberg
Replacing workers has many costs, Carleton, Conversation 4/20
You’re the Real Job Creator: An interview with Stephanie Kelton, N+1 4/20
What the historically low U.S. unemployment rate means for women workers, Cumming, Equitable Growth, 3/20
The Robots Are Not Coming, Henwood, Jacobin 2/20
Low-wage work is more pervasive than you think” Ross & Bateman, Brookings, 11/19
Labor Historian Staughton Lynd’s Book Is Embraced by Google Workers and Uber Drivers, 10/19
The Military-Industrial Jobs Scam, Tomgram: Harris, Stimpson, and Freeman, 8/19
Black workers are being left behind by full employment, Perry, Brookings 6/19
Want to decrease suicide? Raise the minimum wage, researchers suggest, Cerullo, CBS News, 4/19
The Bogus Justification for Worker Non-Compete Clauses, Vaheesan, On Labor 4/19
Major Work Stoppages in 2018, BLS 2/19
Updated employment multipliers for the U.S. economy, Bivens, EPI 1/19
“…one new manufacturing job in the U.S. results in 7.4 new jobs in other industries. Whereas one new retail job creates just 1.2 new jobs.The only two industries with higher indirect job losses are utilities (9.6 to 1) and real estate and rental leasing (8.8 to 1).” J. Bivens, EPI GRAPHIC 1/19
How shareholder profits conquered capitalism – and how workers can win back its benefits for themselves, Brennan, Conversation, 10/18
Standards Go Out The Window As Employers Struggle To Fill Jobs,
Anti-Union Measure in Missouri Loses by Massive Margin, Baker, CEPR 8/18
Mystery of the Underpaid American Worker, Lindorff, Counterpunch 8/18
Huge Increase in Large Work Stoppages Seen in 2018, Dirnbach, Medium, 7/18
The economy is hot, yet many U.S. workers feel left behind. A new report sheds some light, Van Dam, Wash Post
“In total, RTW laws have led to a 14.2% increase in occupational mortality through decreased unionisation.” Does ‘right to work’ imperil the right to health? The effect of labour unions on workplace fatalities, Zoorob Occup. Envir. Med. 6/18
Disability applications plunge as the economy strengthens, Schwartz, CNBC 6/18
Grand Theft Paycheck: wage theft is pervasive in Corporate America. Good Jobs First, 6/18
Contingent and Alternative Employment Arrangements —MAY 2017, BLS 6/18
Federal investigators this month identified the largest cluster of advanced black lung cases ever officially recorded.
Medicaid Work Requirement Would Harm Unemployed, Not Promote Work, Katch, CBPP 1/18
Seattle’s $15 Minimum Wage Experiment Is a Success, 1/18
Union membership rate, at 10.7%, is unchanged in 2017, BLS 1/18
German workers strike for right to two-year, 28-hour working week: metalwork union’s campaign to improve work-life balance, 1/18
Minimum wage hikes in 18 states set for new year, The Hill, 1/18
Employment Hysteresis from the Great Recession, Yagan NBER 9/17
Employment in Europe and the US: the EU’s remarkable strength, Darvas & Pichler, Bruegel 9/17
Where Have All the Workers Gone? An Inquiry into the Decline of the U.S. Labor Force Participation Rate, Krueger, Brookings 9/17
How today’s unions help working people: Giving workers the power to improve their jobs and unrig the economy, Bivens et al, EPI 8/17
US Opioid Use Linked To Unemployment, Moreno, ibtimes, 8/17 NBER study
New Report Finds Corporate Tax Cuts Boost CEO Pay, Not Jobs, Anderson, IPS 8/17
Macroeconomic Conditions and Opioid Abuse, Hollingsworth et al, NBER 2/17
Why I Dissented, Kashkari explains his vote at FOMC 3/17
‘Superstar Firms’ May Have Shrunk Workers’ Share of Income, Cohen, NYT 3/17
Falling Labor Force Participation: Demographics or Lack of Jobs? Dantas & Wray, Levy 2/17
Union membership rate in 2016 is 10.7%, down from 11.1% in 2015 BLS, 1/17 CEPR
Economic Realities in America: By The Numbers, Pearle ABC News 1/17
American Marriage in the Time of the Recession, Campbell, Atlantic 11/16
The U.S. Job Recovery Is a Global Laggard, Kocherlakota, Bloomberg, 10/16
Happy Labor Day! There Has Never Been a Middle Class Without Strong Unions, Schwarz, Intercept 9/16
The State of the Unions 2016: A Profile of Organized Labor in NYC, NYS, & the US, Milkman and Luce, Murphy Ctr for Worker Education, 9/16
Black Workers, Unions, and Inequality Bucknor, CEPR 8/16
When workers don’t get paid sick days, everyone else is more likely to get sick, Paquette, Wash. Post, 8/16
‘Middle class’ used to denote comfort and security. Not anymore Quart, Guardian 7/16
“There are three main reasons the vaunted economic recovery still feels false to so many. The first is the labor participation rate, which plunged at the start of the Great Recession and discounts the millions of Americans who have been out of work for six months or more. The second is “the 1099 economy,” … the soaring number of temps, contractors, freelancers, and other often involuntarily self-employed workers. The third is a surge in low-wage service jobs, coupled with a corresponding decrease in middle-class jobs.” Why America’s impressive 5% unemployment rate feels like a lie for so many Kendzior, Quartz 4/16
Business Leaders Have Abandoned the Middle Class, Haque, HBR, 6/16
Producing Poverty: The Public Cost of Low-Wage Production Jobs in Manufacturing Berkeley Labor Ctr 5/16
Report of 10,000 severe workplace injuries might be only half the problem, Wash. Post, 3/16
The missing puzzle piece of the global economic recovery is finally falling into place, Bird 6/15
State, Met. Area Employment and Unemployment Data, BLS
The Missing Piece of the Global Recovery
Interactive map: Unemployment rates by state, BLS
International Labor Comparisons, BLS
At Amazon.com “cheap” comes at a very hefty price, Hightower 8/14
Report Uncovers the Real Costs of Outsourcing Public Services, JwJ 3/14
Do You Have Job Fear? What’s Why We Need Full Employment, Johnson CAF 8/13
Millions of Americans live in extreme poverty, Matthews, 5/13
Going Nowhere: Workers Wages since the Mid-1970s, TCF, 1/13
How Do States’ Safety Net Policies Affect Poverty? Wheaton et al, Urban Instit, 9/11
Who Has Benefitted from the Post-Great Recession Recovery? Sum &McLaughlin 7/11
How Government spent your income taxes, National Priorities Project
International Unemployment Rates and Employment Indexes 2008-2009, BLS
How America Can Create Jobs, Andy Grove, Intel, BW 7/10
How a New Jobless Era Will Transform America, D.Peck,, Atlantic, 3/10
Unions and Other Community Groups Benefit Local Economic Development 8/09
Welfare Aid Isn’t Growing as Economy Drops Off, NYT, 2/09
Why labor law doesn’t work for workers, Bacon [EFCA], 3/09
Illegal Firings During Union Election Campaigns, CEPR 3/09
Conference Board Employment Trends Index
The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly: Job Quality in the United States over the Three Most Recent Business Cycles, Schmitt, CEPR, 11/07
No-Benefit Jobs Leave Parents Struggling, H. Boushey, Sojourners, S/O 07
Unemployment may depress immune function, 4/07
Data–employment, earnings, family income, hours, prices, unionization
Finding the better fit: Receiving unemployment insurance increases likelihood of re-employment with health insurance, Heather Boushey
Ownership Society–Social Security Is Only the BeginningWray, Levy Inst.
Millions of Working People Don’t Get Paid Time Off for Holidays or Vacation , EPI, 8/05
Injuries to All [workplace injuries]
Government Budget Calculator, CEPR
The Rise in Job Displacement, 1991-2004, Crisis in Manufacturing, CEPR, 8/04