EARN in the South

EARN in the South, launched in 2017, was created in collaboration with southern members of EARN and grassroots organizations that expressed a desire for closer partnerships, greater information and strategy sharing among states in the region, and a shared economic narrative and strategy for policy change that is grounded in, and responsive to, the unique historical and political climate of the South. The collaboration between EARN members and grassroots organizations aims to advance pro-worker economic, racial, and gender justice policies throughout the region through deep cross-state collaboration between EARN members and grassroots organizations led by, representing, and building power with, directly affected communities – particularly women and Black and Brown people. The EARN in the South cohort is made up of the EARN organizations and their grassroots partners in thirteen Southern states: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia.

Read about the Agenda for a Thriving South: A shared vision statement by Southern members of the Economic Analysis and Research Network (EARN). 

Alabama Arise, Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families, Every Texan, Florida Policy Institute, Georgia Budget and Policy Institute, Invest in Louisiana, Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, OneVoice Mississippi, North Carolina Budget and Tax Center, North Carolina Justice Center, Oklahoma Policy Institute, The Commonwealth Institute, Think Tennessee, and the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy.

Arkansas Public Policy Panel, Advocates for Women’s and Kids’ Equality (AWAKE Tennessee), Barred Business, Greater Birmingham Ministries, Power Coalition for Equity and Justice, Mississippi NAACP, Fight for $15, National Domestic Worker’s Alliance- NC, New Virginia Majority, RaceMatters, and UE Research.

EARN in the South Partnership Fund

Publications

Publication

State of Working North Carolina 2020: Curing What Ails Us

Every year, the NC Justice Center releases our State of Working North Carolina report, which tells you what you need to know about how workers in our state are doing. This year, we focus on how historic barriers aren’t just immoral and oppressive to the people they constrain, they hold our whole state back from reaching its full social and economic potential.

Worker Power Key to a Better Balance in Georgia

Key Takeaways:

  • This Labor Day, we are reminded that there are still anti-labor policies on the books in Georgia that diminish worker power and economic opportunity for all.
  • Unions play a significant role in shaping a better future for Georgia’s workers, their families and the economy overall.

Why it matters

At the expense of low-wage workers, those who wield more than their fair share of corporate and political power have facilitated and benefited from a historic rise in racial and economic inequality. Policymakers and business interests have collaborated long enough through state and local policies to make Georgia simultaneously the No. 1 place to do business and home of the No. 1 place for income inequality.

The weakening of labor protections in Georgia allowed for policies like Georgia’s Senate Bill (SB) 359 to ram through this legislative session. This bill shields businesses from liability by creating a near-impossible standard to prove gross negligence if a worker contracts COVID-19 on the job. In other words, state lawmakers bolstered protections for employers, but not for the people they employ who were forced to return to work prematurely during a deadly pandemic in a state with one of the highest infection rates, particularly among Black and Latinx Georgians.

Enhanced child care funding makes life better for Alabama’s children and families

Maintenance of federal CCDBG funding at the 2018 level is critical for continued progress in the provision of child care for low- and moderate-income children in Alabama. Increased funding would allow Alabama to expand the number of children who receive assistance by increasing income eligibility to 85% of median family income. It also would allow Alabama to increase per-child subsidies to programs. And that would improve the incomes of child care teachers and the retention of well-qualified and educated teachers.