1) Rebalancing the Economy Toward Workers as well as Wages (March 5, 2018)
I quote John Bates Clark , in all probability the most eminent American economist of his fourth dimension inward his 1907 book, Essentials of Economic Theory
"In the making of the payoff contract the private laborer is at a disadvantage. He has something which he must sell as well as which his employer is non obliged to take, since he [that is, the employer] tin decline unmarried men alongside impunity. ... H5N1 menstruation of idleness may increment this disability to whatever extent. The vender of anything which must live on sold at in 1 trial is similar a starving human pawning his coat—he must bring whatever is offered."Are at that topographic point some ways to tip the residue a flake to a greater extent than toward workers? Jay Shambaugh as well as Ryan Nunn withdraw keep edited an ebook, Revitalizing Wage Growth: Policies to Get American Workers a Raise, alongside nine chapters on causes of wage stagnation as well as policy proposals to address it
2) "The Job Guarantee Controversy" (April 30, 2018)
With Senator Bernie Sanders inward the forefront, some Democratic members of Congress are planning a nib to guarantee jobs that pay $15 per hour, non including mandatory benefits packages, for all Americans. Legislative details withdraw keep non yet been announced (!), but several sets of computer program withdraw keep been published recently, including on the website of the Sanders Institute, which was founded past times Jane O'Meara Sanders, married adult woman of the senator. Here, let's run through a duet of the to a greater extent than prominent plans, as well as and hence listing on criticisms that withdraw keep been bubbling up--with a focus on critiques from writers typically identified every bit existence on the political left. ...
Ultimately, it feels to me every bit if proposals for a federal task guarantee proposal are a outcry of despair, erupting from an exhausted patience. To me, the underlying message is: "Stop existence distracted past times small-scale arguments as well as day-to-day political compromises, driblet the cautious incrementalism, as well as pay the coin to assist those who desire to work. Stop quibbling, as well as only instruct inward happen!" Righteous exasperation ever has a rhetorical appeal. But the existent basis is total of costs as well as tradeoffs, as well as if the USA political organisation wants to brand some dramatic moves to assist USA workers, considerably improve options than a federal task guarantee are available.
3) "The Rising Importance of Soft Skills" (January 30, 2018)
Leading tech companies similar Google withdraw keep flora that their most productive as well as valuable employeees are frequently non those alongside the most technical skills or cognitive ability. Instead, the most valuable employees withdraw keep the soft skills inward communication, teamwork, as well as seeing the large picture.
The evidence for the ascent importance of soft skills goes beyond the anecdotal. David J. Deming provides an overview of economical enquiry on this subject inward "The Value of Soft Skills inward the Labor Market" (NBER Reporter, 2017 Number 4). Deming cites evidence that for the USA economic scheme every bit a whole, the number of STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) jobs rose quickly from 1980 to 2000, but has declined since then. Moreover, the labor marketplace returns to higher levels of cognitive science withdraw keep declined, too.
"While cognitive skills are even hence of import predictors of labor marketplace success, their importance has declined since 2000. An of import recent newspaper finds significantly smaller labor marketplace returns to cognitive skills inward the early on as well as mid-2000s, compared alongside the belatedly 1980s as well as early on 1990s. ... In a 2017 study, I replicate this finding as well as also present that returns to soft skills increased betwixt the 1979 as well as 1997 NLSY waves. ... We are non witnessing an halt to the importance of cognitive skills — rather, potent cognitive skills are increasingly a necessary — but non a sufficient — status for obtaining a good, high-paying job. You also demand to withdraw keep social skills. Between 1980 as well as 2012, social skill-intensive occupations grew past times nearly 12 percent points every bit a part of all U.S. jobs. Wages also grew to a greater extent than quickly for social skill-intensive occupations than for other occupations over this period."
4) The Modern Shape-up Labor Market (July 23, 2018)
The “shape-up” organisation of hiring was described past times journalist Malcolm Johnson inward his Pulitzer-prize winning articles most criminal offense on the docks of New York City inward the belatedly 1940s (Crime on the Labor Front, quotation from pp. 133-35). The description is perchance best-remembered today for how it was depicted inward the 1954 moving-picture present “On the Waterfront.” But it's a scenario that I intend also captures some of the concerns of modern workers inward the "gig" economy, where to a greater extent than as well as to a greater extent than workers are theme on finding a novel gig every calendar month or calendar week or day. Johnson described the procedure for a longshoreman of seeking as well as getting a task dorsum inward the 1940s inward this way:
“The scene is whatever pier along New York’s waterfront. At a designated hour, the longshoremen get together inward a semicircle at the entrance to the pier. They are the men who charge as well as unload the ships. They are looking for jobs as well as every bit they stand upward at that topographic point inward a semicircle their eyes are fixed on 1 man. He is the hiring stevedore as well as he stands alone, surveying the waiting men. At this crucial minute he possesses the crucial mightiness of economical life or expiry over them as well as the men know it. Their faces betray that cognition inward tense anxiety, eagerness, as well as fear. They know that the hiring boss, a spousal human relationship human similar themselves, tin bring them or decline them at will. He tin hire them or ignore them, for whatever argue or for no argue at all. Now the hiring boss moves amidst them, choosing the human he wants, passing over others. He nod or points to the favored ones or calls out their names, indicating that they are hired. For those accepted, relief as well as joy. The pinched faces of the others reverberate bleak disappointment, despair. …
“Under the shape-up, the longshoreman never knows from 1 twenty-four hr menstruation to the side past times side whether he has a task or not. Under the shape-up, he may live on hired today as well as rejected tomorrow, or hired inward the morning time as well as turned away inward the afternoon. There is no security, no dignity, as well as no judge inward the shape-up. … The shape-up fosters fear. Fear of non working. Fear of incurring the displeasure of the hiring boss.”
5) "Four Examples from the Automation Frontier" (February 12, 2018)
Cotton pickers. Shelf-scanners at Walmart. Quality command at edifice sites. Radiologists. These are only 4 examples of jobs that are existence transformed as well as fifty-fifty sometime eliminated past times the newest moving ridge of automated as well as programmable machinery. Here are 4 curt stories from diverse sources, which of course of study stand upward for a much broader transformation happening across the global economy.
6) "Active Labor Market Policies: Time for Aggressive Experimentation" (November 15, 2016)
Paying unemployment insurance is a "passive" labor marketplace policy. Assistance alongside task search as well as preparation is an "active" policy. Compared alongside other high-income economies, the USA does relatively piddling "active" labor marketplace policy--and should consider doing more. See also this follow-up post, "Improving How Job Markets Function: Active Labor Market Policies" (December 30, 2016)
The welfare reform legislation of 1996 overall seemed to produce goodness many families that were fairly around the poverty line--but it has worsened the status of families inward "deep poverty." Robert A. Moffitt as well as Stephanie Garlow write:
"The welfare rolls indeed plummeted nether the influence of welfare reform. If anything, some of the early on studies underestimated the causal final result of welfare reform itself (as against the effects of economical expansion). Did it increment employment? Although at that topographic point remains some ambiguity on the relative importance of the EITC as well as welfare reform inward accounting for changes inward employment, it is clear that welfare reform played an of import role. In the initial years afterward reform, many to a greater extent than women joined the labor strength than fifty-fifty the reform’s most ardent supporters had hoped. Did it cut down poverty? There are ii sides to the response to this question. It would appear that, piece welfare reform assisted families alongside incomes around the poverty threshold, it did less to assist families inward deep or extreme poverty. Under the electrical flow welfare regime, many unmarried mothers are struggling to back upward their families without income or cash benefits. Even women who are willing to operate frequently cannot notice good-paying, steady employment."The Winter 2018 number of Pathways, published past times the Stanford Center on Poverty & Inequality, offers nine curt as well as readable essays past times social scientists as well as a few politicians on what happened alongside the 1996 welfare reform, as well as what should locomote on next
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