This week's TTR displays a growing interest in suburban sprawl, inovative tax breaks, employment non-discrimination and, yes, these troubled economic times. Read on:
- Edgeless agony. In a report on American job sprawl released yesterday, Brookings analyzes nearly 100 urban centers -- or rather, non-centers -- to bring this news: Jobs have moved to the suburbs but people have not. Since 1998, almost all job growth in America's biggest cities occurred in their outer loops, at least 10 miles from a city's downtown -- picture suburban highways lined with industrial parks. Since residential development tends to avoid that hum-of-the-interstate atmosphere, people are increasingly separated from their work. This raises commuter congestion and increases infrastructure costs; providing water and sewer services alone expends 20 to 40 percent more resources in low-density areas than in urban centers. Brookings suggests America may see a wholesale decrease in innovation as a result of employment decentralization; patenting rates are higher in urbanized centers, where knowledge spills between industries in close proximity. The report also noted these sprawled jobs (mostly in manufacturing, construction, and retail) appear in higher-income suburbs, distant from the low-income people who actually need a cheap commute to work. -- CP
- Tax breaks for paid leave. The Center for Economic Policy Research proposes giving businesses a tax credit of up to $2,500 per worker for providing paid time off, including family leave, sick days, vacation, and shorter work weeks. This amount would cover about 125 hours of compensation for a worker making the median wage, and as long as demand doesn't change, employers would hire more workers with little change in overall payroll. Not only would workers, their families, and retailers benefit from the paid time off in the short run, society would be healthier in the long term thanks to better labor practices, assuming employers choose to keep new paid leave arrangements after the tax credits expire. -- MK
- When fine dining goes wrong. [PDF] Last week, the Restaurant Opportunities Center of New York released a report on "occupational segregation in the New York City restaurant industry." The report was based on an experimental design that sent equally credentialed pairs of candidates to apply to 138 fine dining restaurants in Manhattan. The Center found pervasive racial and gender discrimination throughout the restaurant community. Applicants of color were 21 percent less likely to receive an interview than their white counterparts; those ethnic minorities who were granted interviews only half as likely to be offered a job. The discriminatory practices did not end with applicant selection. Compared to their white co-workers, non-white restaurant employees with similar levels of education and work experience received $1,400 less in annual added salary. The discrepancy for women was even more dramatic -- compensation for white females was $4,508 less than equally qualified men. ROC-NY recommends a variety of policies to mitigate these problems, including increased employer transparency and collective organizing. It also proposes a new study on the economic costs of discriminatory labor practices to show restaurant employers that providing equal opportunities will increase profitability over the long-term. -- JL
- "No Good News For Workers." Don't get too excited about Wall Street's four week upswing. The outlook for everyone else remains bleak and bleaker. In the 16th month of the recession it is clear that this economic crisis is the worst since the Second World War, in terms of job losses, cut hours, and the number of unemployed. According to recent studies, there are 13.2 million unemployed people, more than at any point since such statistics were regularly calculated. To make matters worse, job losses are likely to continue, while the number of jobs available per unemployed individual continues to shrivel (as of January there were about four unemployed persons for ever job opening). The declining employment rate has hit men harder than women, largely because two-thirds of the job losses have been concentrated in the manufacturing and construction industries, which are predominantly male. Workers of color have suffered disproportionately too, with African-American unemployment spiking from 9.0 percent a year ago to 13.3 percent today and Hispanic unemployment jumping from 7.0 percent to 11.4 percent. -- JB
-- TAP Staff
Previous Round-Ups::