Media
From PRI:
Last week it was reported that average hourly wages of American workers grew 2.9 percent over the past 12 months. It’s a good sign, but American workers still have a lot of catching up to do and income inequality and wage stagnation remain major concerns…Yes, national wages inched up last year. But consider this statistic from Michelle Webster with the Colorado Center on Law & Policy: “In 2016, median earnings for workers in the state were 2 percent less than what they earned in 2000″ when adjusted for inflation.
Media
Recent signs suggest worker pay is finally rising after years of stagnation despite an economy that has been steadily chugging along since 2009. The latest jobs report from the Labor Department shows that low unemployment is pushing up wages a bit. Employers added 200,000 jobs in January and private-sector workers, on average, saw their paychecks increase nearly 3 percent, compared to a year earlier.
The change was a long time coming, and no doubt most workers won’t find the modest bump much to crow about. Policy makers and good corporate citizens still have a lot of ground left to recover. For starters, the great bulk of hourly workers averaged only a 2.4 percent gain, as the increases for the salaries of managers contributed to the overall findings.
And our readers might remember that under a December editorial headline “Shame on Grinch America for workers’ stagnant wages,” we bemoaned the findings from the Colorado Center on Law & Policy that Colorado’s median hourly wages were $18.92, which was about 4 percent lower when adjusted for inflation than in 2007, the last year before the horrors of the Great Recession.
The center went on to note that 2016’s median pay was 2 percent lower, after accounting for inflation, than in it had been 2000.
Michelle Webster, the center’s manager of research and policy analysis, tells us the recent gains, while encouraging, have a long way to go to make up for years of lethargy.
More than 104,000 teens (16- to 19-year-olds) work and actively contribute to the Massachusetts economy. As working teens, they learn job skills and gain experience and responsibility. Many working teens also play important roles in helping meet financial needs for not only their families but also for themselves, like paying for college. Most teen workers (about 82 percent) earn near or at the minimum wage, which as of January 2017 was $11 an hour – finalizing a three-year phase-in of an $11 an hour minimum wage in Massachusetts. Currently, teens make up 12 percent of minimum wage earners. This brief looks at who teen workers are, their contributions to family income, how a subminimum wage could affect teen workers, and whether there have been adverse effects on teen employment from minimum wage increases.
In the face of a rapidly evolving economy, Rhode Island’s education and workforce systems need to keep pace, to meet the dual needs of workers (who need to remain employable), and employers (who need skilled workers to produce the goods and provide the services demanded by consumers). As we invest in the Rhode Island workforce, we need to ensure that the existing workforce, especially those currently lacking English language and other foundational skills or higher levels of education, are able to fully engage in the economy, by providing them with the opportunity to “skill up” to shape a more prosperous future for their families, and for Rhode Island.
This report focuses on the role that both education and training play in helping workers thrive, drawing on research at the national and state level to better understand the strategies that work to improve adult education, especially for those currently working in low-wage, lower skilled jobs. While formal postsecondary education – in the form of an Associate’s degree, a Bachelor’s degree, or higher – may be the right path for many, others can benefit from attaining occupational credentials, either via apprenticeship programs, or college-based certificate programs.
Because there will remain many low-skilled jobs, we need to adopt policies that raise the floor for those workers – so that full-time work offers both dignity of work and a livable wage. And we need to be intentional about addressing disparities based on race and ethnicity – such as persist in educational attainment, unemployment rates, and median wages.