EPI in the news

• Will Trump’s pick for Labor Secretary be able to act on her pro-union ideas?

  “One thing to keep in mind is that the secretaries serve at the pleasure of the president. … It is not an independent role,” says Heidi Shierholz, a former chief economist in the Labor Department during the Obama administration and the president of the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank. “There’s a real, very clear restriction on how far they can go, away from what Trump and his key advisers want.”

  VOX | November 27, 2024
• Trump’s controversial pick for Labor secretary.

  For the Economic Policy Institute, Celine McNicholas outlined “the policies that will determine whether Trump’s labor secretary pick supports workers.”

  “Chavez-DeRemer has stated that ‘working-class Americans finally have a lifeline’ with President-elect Trump in the White House. If workers truly have an ally in Chavez-DeRemer, she will advance policies that improve workers’ lives. Here are a few policies that will reveal whether the second Trump administration will actually aid working-class Americans,” McNicholas said. “Win funding for the Department of Labor (DOL) that enables the agency to serve the U.S. workforce… Chavez-DeRemer should fight for and secure at least a $14 billion budget to ensure that U.S. workers have health and safety inspectors and wage and hour investigators on the job to enforce their rights.”

  Tangle | November 27, 2024
• “Full-blown panic”: MAGA meltdown over Trump’s “anti-conservative RINO” labor secretary pick

  On the left, meanwhile, cautious optimism is paired with the memory of what happened before, when Trump first entered the White House. As the Economic Policy Institute notes, the president-elect has a proven record of coupling “populist pro-worker rhetoric” with “an anti-worker agenda.”

  Salon | November 27, 2024
• 3 Ways Workers’ Rights Are on the Chopping Block Under President Trump

  Much of the Trump-Vance campaign’s platform was designed to provoke outrage rather than to supply policy details. So, if you’re trying to figure out what to actually expect from the coming second Trump administration, it’s helpful to look at the record of Trump’s first term in office, as well as the individuals and organizations that influenced the 2024 GOP campaign. When it comes to workers’ rights, that record is crystal clear: from attacks on unions and workers’ freedom of speech to rolling back laws that would have boosted paychecks or expanded worker safety protections, Trump has been a disaster.

  These are just a few of the major changes in policy that workers can likely expect in the Trump-Vance administration: 

  In These Times | November 27, 2024
• When Students Miss School, Teachers Enjoy Their Jobs Less

  For public sector education jobs, the recovery in employment from the COVID-19 crisis was slow. It only occurred by October of 2023 using federal relief dollars, according to economic analysis from the Economic Policy Institute. 

  EdSurge | November 27, 2024
• Outgoing Mayorkas Gives US Workers Middle Finger

  The Economic Policy Institute, with supporting government data, wrote that no shortage exists among the top 15 H-2B employers that includes landscapers, forest and conservation workers, housekeepers and other positions that Americans would, assuming a fair wage, eagerly fill. 

  Substack | November 27, 2024
• Horseheads Central School District continues to face bus driver shortage

  According to the Economic Policy Institute, school bus driver employment is still struggling to recover to pre-pandemic levels. Richard Micelotta, the Director of Transportation for the district, says many of the bus drivers were older and decided not to return to work after the pandemic.  

  WENY | November 27, 2024

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