A minimum wage increase goes before the Senate parliamentarian on Wednesday to find out if it passes muster for inclusion in the COVID-19 relief package being passed under budget reconciliation. Democrats feel good that a recent Congressional Budget Office analysis shows the measure has enough budget impact for reconciliation, allowing it to be passed by a simple majority vote. …
President Joe Biden will sign an executive order strengthening Buy American policies on Monday. While such provisions, which encourage federal agencies to buy U.S.-made products, already exist, they’re filled with loopholes and haven’t always been followed. “Existing Buy American rules establish a domestic content threshold—the amount of a product that must be made in the U.S. for …
Biden continues using executive power to help working people Read More »
When he takes office on Jan. 20, Joe Biden will face a gap between Black and white wealth that has grown into a yawning chasm during the past 10 months. The pandemic has shuttered tens of thousands of businesses and left millions out of work. And communities of color have borne the brunt of the …
Biden’s big challenge: A growing racial wealth gap Read More »
The Federal Reserve has doled out billions of dollars in emergency loans to keep the economy afloat during a crippling pandemic, garnering broad bipartisan praise. Now, the lawmaker who is likely to head the powerful Senate Banking Committee if Republicans keep control of the Senate is signaling that the Fed should stop. “If someone wants …
Toomey calls for Fed special loan programs to end, setting up clash with Democrats Read More »
A new phase of the economic crisis is looming for the winner of Tuesday’s presidential election: potentially massive defaults by jobless Americans on consumer loans as the chances for more federal relief this year diminish. Both President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden have called for robust new rescue packages for an economy still suffering …
Jobless Americans face debt crunch without more federal aid as bills come due Read More »
Latina Equal Pay Day was this week, and if it’s not bad enough that it took this long for Latinas to be paid as much as white men made in 2019, the coronavirus pandemic is dumping additional bad news on them. Women are dropping out of the workforce in large numbers, but Latinas are dropping out in …
Latinas are getting slammed in the COVID-19 economy, this week in the war on workers Read More »
The COVID-19 pandemic has killed nearly 25,000 New York City residents. The worst of the public health crisis may have passed, but its dire toll has triggered a second crisis. Shutting down huge swaths of the economy was necessary to save lives, but the deep freeze on economic activity has plunged the city into its …
With City’s Economic Future in Doubt, Can New York Unions Stop the Cuts? Read More »
The democratic principle of tuition-free education in our country pre-dates the founding of the United States. The first public primary education was offered in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1635, and its legislature created Harvard College the following year to make education available to all qualified students. Even before the Constitution was ratified, the Confederation …
The path toward economic recovery in the U.S. has become sharply divided, with wealthier Americans earning and saving at record levels while the poorest struggle to pay their bills and put food on the table. The result is a splintered economic picture characterized by high highs — the stock market has hit record levels — …
‘A tale of 2 recessions’: As rich Americans get richer, the bottom half struggles Read More »
The pandemic has ripped a hole through every state budget in the country to the tune collectively of over $550 billion. That red ink is more than half a trillion dollars in money states won’t have—which translates into millions of people losing their jobs, services being decimated that we all rely on, attacks against people …
Working Life Episode 193: The States Go Broke; The Democratic Convention Approaches Read More »
Madeline Messa is a 3L at Syracuse University College of Law. She graduated from Penn State with a degree in journalism. With her legal research and writing for Workplace Fairness, she strives to equip people with the information they need to be their own best advocate.
