Labor

The McKinsey report’s highlighting of an extremely high job vacancy ratio in recent years does not reflect the true state of the U.S. labor market.

An expert panel will discuss the latest research on the experiences of workers facing volatility of their time and income, how this volatility impacts their financial outcomes over time, ways current policies help or hinder workers cope with labor market volatility, and other possibilities for change.

When working within the same employment spell, female workers, particularly those of color and those working in low-wage service and care jobs, earn significantly less when facing greater volatility than their male counterparts or those working in non-service, non-care occupations.

Research on labor market experience does not explain the link between the volatility low-wage workers encounter and their earnings and it leaves open numerous pressing questions, such as what, if anything, can be done to reduce racial and ethnic differences in economic well-being.

Recent developments in AI have added fuel to debates that have long simmered amongst economists, which could lead to a rethinking of economics itself.

Losing jobs isn’t the only thing workers have to worry about. AI may make many jobs worse.

Growing consolidation in localized hospital markets appears to restrict nurse wage growth

Increased hospital system consolidation in small Metropolitan Statistical Areas is adversely related to nurse wage growth.

Setting the record straight and identifying less destructive pathways forward than round after round of interest rate increases.

Salaries in the U.S. aren’t keeping up with inflation, despite pandemic-related increases in some sectors. That’s a major threat to the future for all working Americans – especially the youngest.

EEO-1 employment data document the vast over-representation of Asian Americans and vast under-representation of African Americans at tech companies in recent years. How did this happen?

EEO-1 employment data document the vast over-representation of Asian Americans and vast under-representation of African Americans at tech companies in recent years. How did this happen?

The youth paradox is accentuated by the effects of Covid-19, while the concrete short- and medium-term prospects for young people remain unclear.

In the era of COVID and digital movements, strikes look radically different from traditional labor strikes

Canadian economist Mario Seccareccia, recipient of this year’s John Kenneth Galbraith Prize in Economics, says it’s time to reconsider the idea of full employment. He spoke to Lynn Parramore of the Institute for New Economic Thinking about why 2021 offers a rare opportunity to rebalance the economy in favor of Main Street.

How once-promising Black upward mobility reversed course, and what can be done about it

Unlike the Great Recession, the pandemic has hit women workers harder than men, and disproportionately hurt the job prospects of lower education workers.

Unlike the Great Recession, the pandemic has hit women workers harder than men, and disproportionately hurt the job prospects of lower education workers

Like Republicans with political polls, unemployed Black workers are underrepresented in federal employment data because of non-response.

A large and growing percentage of households are missed in the monthly Current Population Survey (CPS).

How the dream of a middle class existence collapsed, first for Blacks, then for more and more white American workers and what the Biden administration could do to retrieve the situation.

By fully utilizing the power of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), President Biden could take meaningful steps to keep workers safe during the pandemic, even without Congress’s help

A summary of INET’s latest Future of Work episode

The combination of technological disruption and economic globalization have resulted in stagnating wages, middle class job losses, and declining labor power in many developed countries. How did this happen and how could we respond?

INET explores how technological and economic changes are affecting employment

Human societies have always coevolved with technology, but how can we think of technology? Is it an external force outside our control, or do we have a say in its direction, development and deployment?

Persistent changes in unemployment have lasting consequences for income distribution

Our findings confirm the existence of a negative relationship between labor market slack and the wage share, and we find no tendency to return to a ‘normal’ unemployment rate associated with a stable wage share.

The Occupational Safety Health Administration was created 50 years ago. Today, it’s in dire straits, say OSHA’s leaders during the Obama administration

Rising inequality has focused attention on the benefits of new technologies. Do these accrue primarily to inventors, early investors, and highly skilled users, or to society more widely as their adoption generates employment growth?

What counts as work and what doesn’t?

States can be sorted into two groups with statistically significantly different productivity regimes. In this sense, the US economy shows signs of dualism—which is the idea that the economy consists of heterogeneous units that exhibit different behaviors and levels of performance.

This paper analyzes regional contributions to the US payroll share from 1977 to 2017 and the four major business cycles throughout this period.

Just before the crisis, European countries were designing austerity reforms that would increase inequality and reduce internal demand. Could they return?

Establishing legal responsibility in the fissured workplace

This article proposes a new “Concentric Circle framework” which would improve workers’ access to civil, labor, and employment rights.

What will empower a worker to be able to make greater demands on a profitable economy or employer? The answer may be summed up in one word: leverage.

The U.S. economy is increasingly becoming a dual economy, where high productivity sectors—such as manufacturing—and high pay sectors—such as finance and professional services—co-exist with low pay and low productivity sectors that employ most workers.

This paper provides novel insights on the changing functional distribution of income in the post–war US economy.

Artificial intelligence promises to make our lives easier. But is the cost losing some of our humanity?

Economist Marie Mora discusses the deep economic crisis that has afflicted Puerto Rico for years

With journalism moving from a stable to a precarious profession, digital media workers have become some of the most organized in the startup world

Artificial intelligence doesn’t have to be a job killer—if we use it right

One of America’s leading socialists discusses how a collectively owned economy would be structured, the limits of the welfare state, and what Keynes understood that Marx didn’t

When workers are classified as independent contractors instead of employees, they fall into a hole not covered by many labor protections

As automation takes on more routine tasks, work will become more about creativity, ethics, and empathy

As technology and deregulation continue to shape the labor market, maintaining strong worker protections is as important as ever

US counties with prison labor often have lower wage and employment growth

Prisoners employed in manufacturing constitute 4.2% of total U.S. manufacturing employment in 2005; they produce cheap goods, creating labor demand shock.

Decades before it caught on with other economists, Sadie Alexander was the first economist to recommend a government jobs guarantee in the US

Economic distress in rural areas and opioid exposure in cities are key indicators of overdose deaths

For years, governments in India and much of the developing world have followed the advice of a paper arguing that labor regulations actually hurt workers. The problem? The research was wrong.

For years, governments in India and much of the developing world have followed the advice of a paper arguing that labor regulations actually hurt workers. The problem? The research was wrong.

Chaired by Nobel laureates Joseph Stiglitz and Michael Spence, INET has assembled a global team of leaders and scholars calling for new thinking & new rules for the world economy

The Rise of China and the Future of WorkArtificial intelligence could replace routine jobs but allow us to “pursue dreams”

William Lazonick has shown how the doctrine of “shareholder value” has hurt wages in the United States. But in Latin America, where family corporations dominate, the story is more complicated.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised to replace routine jobs, says Dr. Kai-Fu Lee. But done right, that process could allow us to “pursue dreams, spend time with our loved ones and find out why we exist as humans”

Economists who dismiss inequality as a problem secondary to poverty miss the point: Inequality is part of what drives poverty

“We don’t look after each other at all,” says Jeffrey Sachs on America today

This paper examines the relationship between placement of publications in Top Five (T5) journals and receipt of tenure in academic economics departments.

Getting published in a top five economics journal is a near-requirement for tenure. But it’s a poor measure of research quality within a system that punishes creativity.

In Europe and the United States, stock-based compensation discourages long-term corporate sustainability

When a small group of companies can dominate a labor market, wages—and workers—suffer

To understand labor productivity—and growing inequality—you have to look at the “dual economy”

“Dualism” in the structure of production across sectors of the US economy, employment by sector, productivity levels and growth, real wages, and intersectoral terms-of trade increased markedly between 1990 and 2016.

A new report examines the path to global social progress. Unfortunately, there are no easy answers

Gay men earn 20% less than straight men, but gay women earn up to 20% more than straight women. Why?

13 million people looking for living wage work is not a “full employment” economy

When politics is defined in terms of “populism” vs. “the mainstream,” the possibility for real economic reform is diminished.

Edoardo Nesi’s new book tracks the destructive march of globalization and neoliberal capitalism through his own life and the places, like Italy, that lie broken in its wake.

The World Bank and IMF say developing economies can’t afford to have strong labor laws. Actually, they can’t afford not to.

Labor market regulation is a controversial area of public policy in both developed and developing countries.

Adair Turner, Chair of the Institute for New Economic Thinking, Lecture at School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, Washington DC April 10th 2018

It’s time to connect political violence with economic violence.

Wage suppression—not monopoly power—is fueling corporate profits and the growing gap between rich and poor

“Meso” level analysis of 16 producing sectors sheds light on broad forces shaping growth of employment and profits. 

For the BRICS countries to not just grow their economies but also raise the standard of living of their people, inclusive growth that prioritizes poverty reduction is a must

The vision of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. 50 years later, and the relevance of his economic ideas today

Reflections on the Radical Vision of Martin Luther King Jr.’s Last Major Speech

Workers, innovation, and productivity all suffer when corporations spend their new U.S. tax breaks on stock buybacks.

By pushing workers into precarious, part-time work, “Third Way” governments of the past 20 years helped to create the disturbing economic trend that’s vexing orthodox economists

In the face of  laissez-faire capitalism at home and resurgent nationalism across the globe, INET offers an innovative look at the causes of—and solutions for—the problems that ail a fissuring world economy.

Ed Pavlić discusses the role of music in communicating suffering and resistance in the African-American experience

Economist Morton Schapiro, president of Northwestern University, and his colleague, literary critic and Slavic studies scholar Saul Morson, argue that—contrary to popular belief—studying the humanities is the key to not getting outsourced.

Contrary to the neoclassical model’s assumptions, shifts in aggregate demand have persistent effects on GDP

The prevailing wisdom that aggregate demand ‘shocks’ determine short-run cyclical fluctuations around a supply-determined equilibrium growth rate and an associated equilibrium unemployment rate (or NAIRU) has been called into question by various streams of literature in the last decades. Specifically, a recently revived literature on hysteresis finds significant persistence in the effects of recessions and negative aggregate demand shocks (Blanchard et al. 2015; Martin et al. 2015).

In their op-ed in the Washington Post, INET grantee William Lazonick and Rick Wartzman show how companies are spending their tax savings on investors, not workers.

The corporate titans of yore once offered a sizable wage premium over smaller employers—but not anymore. What happened?

A critical analysis of Piketty’s work

Behind towering figures like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. were the taxi dispatchers, pharmacists, grocers, and other small business owners who were instrumental in making civil rights a reality.

A large literature has detailed the seminal roles played in the Civil Rights Movement by activists, new political organizations, churches, and philanthropies. But black-owned businesses also provided a behind-the-scenes foundation for the movement’s success.

Inequality isn’t driven by taxes—it’s driven by the power of capital in relation to workers

The World Economic Roundtable seeks to help the business, investment, and policy communities understand ongoing changes in the world economy and to promote a discussion of ideas that can advance the goal of a widely shared global prosperity.

With unemployment reaching very low levels in major economies, despite low – and slowly rising – inflation, it’s time for central banks to rethink their reliance on the so-called natural rate. No numerical target for this rate can serve as an anchor for monetary policy.

From the Rust Belt to Rural America, Economic and Social Distress Helped Shape the 2016 US Presidential Election Outcome

As the old lines continue to blur, what does inequality mean in the modern global economy? And, how does the economy need to evolve to address these changes?

Can a Policy of Guaranteed Basic Income Return Mature Market Economies to les Trente Glorieuses?

Building symbiotic public-private partnerships

What can policy do to remedy the spread of dual economies in the developed world?

Untangling the Facts about Immigration in the World Economy.