EPI in the news

• Trump tries shifting child care funds to stay-at-home parents

  The Economic Policy Institute said the Trump plan would “strip resources from low-income working families,” and that paying benefits to stay-at-home parents when CCDF is already underfunded “hits low-income families, families with infants and toddlers, and families headed by single parents the hardest.”

  Baptist News Global | October 21, 2026
• Episode 6: Making ends meet

  Powers: According to the Economic Policy Institute, worker pay hasn’t kept up with inflation since the 1970s. Incomes for the top 1 percent have risen almost five times faster than the bottom 90 percent.

  Milwaukee NPR | October 21, 2026
• A Capitalist’s Case For Changing The System

  According to the Economic Policy Institute, CEOs at the 350 largest publicly traded U.S. companies earned 281 times as much as a typical worker in 2024, compared with 21 times as much in 1965. 

  Katie Couric Substack | October 21, 2026
• Black unemployment recently spiked. It that a warning for the economy?

  Valerie Wilson, director of the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity, and the Economy, told USA TODAY something else may also be at play in the September results.

  “It could be just the fact that we’re dealing with a smaller sample size for the survey and, depending on who responds, how many people respond to the survey, that also can create some noise in terms of the measurement,“ Wilson said. “But the 2 to 1 disparity is almost always present, whether things are booming or not.”

  USA Today | October 21, 2026
• Labor union support rises, Iowa workers face barriers to workplace protections

  Jennifer Sherer, deputy director of the Economic Analysis and Research Network and director of the State Worker Power Initiative, said the growing support for unions reflects the concerns about economic equality, stagnant wages, and affordability among Americans. 

  Unions can help workers negotiate for a greater share of the economic value they produce, Sherer said, particularly when wages do not keep pace with productivity or the cost of living.

  “Workers across the board are very aware of that economic imbalance,” she said. “There’s an imbalance of power, both in their workplaces, but in the economy and our broader political system.” 

  The Daily Iowan | October 21, 2026
• Black Unemployment Hints at a Job Market in Worse Shape Than It Seems

  In 2025, Black women experienced far greater employment losses than other women, especially college graduates and public-sector workers, according to data analyzed by Valerie Wilson, an economist. 

  New York Times | October 21, 2026
• A woman NFL head coach kicks off a football ‘Othello’ for Pittsburgh

  McDill also notes the recent precipitous decline in employment among Black women nationally, who according to one recent study “bore the brunt of the economic slowdown.” (That Economic Policy Institute report attributed the job losses largely to “massive federal layoffs and buyouts” under the Trump administration, which disproportionately affected Black women with college degrees.)

  WESA (Pittsburgh NPR) | October 21, 2026

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