EPI Research (Page 23 )

  • The Living Wage: Survey of Labor Economists

    August 2000

    The 2000 Living Wage Survey was conducted by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center for the Employment Policies Institute in February and March, 2000. Three hundred thirty-six (336) labor economists in the United States completed mail questionnaires for the survey. A list of economists was obtained from the American Economic Association (AEA) and consisted of all AEA members who indicated that their primary or…

  • Living Wage Policy: The Basics

    August 2000

    The “living wage” movement has captured the hearts of many policy makers. Unfortunately, their minds have lagged dangerously behind.

    Thrust into the public forum by the AFL-CIO, the New Party and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), the living wage move-ment
    is now being debated and has been adopted in dozens of cities and counties across the nation. More often than…

  • The Relative Compensation of Part-Time and Full-Time Workers

    July 2000

    Since the UPS strike in 1997, organized labor and some policy makers have been highly critical of part-time employment. At the root of these criticisms is the alleged wage gap experienced by part-time employees. At first glance it appears that part-timers earn substantially less than their full-time counterparts. Dr. Barry Hirsch shows in this study that the apparent wage gap is not nearly as large…

  • National Good Times, Local Bad Times: The Local Area Unemployment Crisis

    July 2000

    In the midst of the national economic boom, regional pockets of the economy are surprisingly weak. The following list comprises counties and cities (each with a population of at least 10,000 people) struggling with unemployment rates that are more than twice the national average. These localities are encountering great difficulty keeping their citizens productively employed. They face even greater challenges moving low-skilled people from welfare…

  • Correcting Part-time Misconceptions

    July 2000

    In the last few years union activists and some policy makers have increasingly portrayed part-time work as problematic. Phrases such as “dangerous part-time work,” “exploited part-time workers,” “non-standard workers,” and sound bites such as “part-time America doesn’t work,” are finding their way into mainstream media. Policy makers have described part-time work as “insecure,” and a result of “defective growth,” in proposed laws. These misconceptions could…

  • Rising Above The Minimum Wage

    January 2000

    Proponents of a higher minimum wage often imply that entry-level employees go years without a wage increase. Common sense suggests otherwise: the vast majority of those who start at the minimum wage do not remain there for long. In this report, William Even of Miami University, Ohio and David Macpherson of Florida State University provide a valuable in-depth analysis of how quickly most people move…