After the worst jobs report in months came out last Friday, the President, in an almost Stepford-like fashion, asserted that his tax cuts are working and the economy is “strong and getting stronger.” In fact, fewer than 100 days before the presidential election, unemployment is stuck where it was when the recovery began two-and-a-half years […]
Jared Bernstein
Jared Bernstein is an economist and senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. He was formerly chief economist to Vice President Joe Biden and a member of President Barack Obama’s economic team.
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Pressure Cooler
At the end of June, that very powerful group of bankers, the Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee (FOMC), got together under Chairman Alan Greenspan’s leadership to decide whether they should try to slow down the pace of economic growth by raising the federal funds rate. That’s the interest rate that banks charge each other for […]
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Growing Apart
It’s official: Though the economy is clearly expanding and jobs are coming back, the benefits of growth are once again accruing to the wealthy. After a brief hiatus during the late 1990s, economic inequality is reasserting itself. No less than the nation’s chief economist, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, noted this in recent testimony, stating […]
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Workers, Stiffed
One recent spring day, I found myself before a congressional subcommittee testifying on behalf of increasing the federal minimum wage, which currently stands at $5.15. A bit of context here: The minimum wage was last raised in 1997; inflation has just about fully eroded the value of that increase. Congress will soon tie the record […]
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Working Wounded
Overheard recently: senior staffers of a mid-sized software developer on the West Coast. The names have been changed to protect the innocent. Jeff, a manager (with great enthusiasm): My staff has really been producing lately — I mean these guys have been staying late, missing lunch, you name it. And given that we seem to […]
Posted inEducation in America
School’s Out
Recently, it was my good fortune to be able to testify before the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. But it was my great misfortune to have to follow the Almighty One: Alan Greenspan. Our nation’s chief economist just sucks all the air out of the room. After his two hours of testimony and […]
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Econ Chamber
Every leap year, especially when economic insecurity is high, the question surfaces: When it comes to jobs and growth, do presidents really matter? Already we’re hearing at least three separate responses to that question. First comes the claim that the whole question of presidential impact on the economy and jobs is silly and politically, not […]
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Wise Words
The annual meeting of the nation’s economists isn’t exactly a swinging affair. There’s lots of talk about asset pricing models, and the hotel hallways resonate with arguments about the right way to specify vector autoregressions (don’t ask). But at the meeting that wrapped up last month in San Diego, Alan Greenspan, our eminent chairman of […]
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The Young and the Jobless
It’s not easy being young today. While America moves through an economic recovery, young workers are being left behind. And that’s largely because, since the recovery officially began in November 2001, employment is down by more than a million. Of the 10 economic expansions since World War II, this is the first in which jobs […]
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Snow Job
It was my misfortune to tune in to the Sunday talk shows last weekend, when Treasury Secretary John Snow was making the rounds in support of the administration’s tax-cut plan. Listening to Snow defend this misguided policy was deeply disheartening. You expect spin — that’s what the Sunday morning circuit has come to be about. […]