Economic Policy Institute

Around this time last year, we wrote about the remarkable resilience Hispanic workers were showing in the labor market. Despite weaker job growth, the share of Hispanic workers with a job remained high, largely driven by a record-high employment rate among Latina workers. Today, despite the ongoing economic and social toll of Trump’s draconian mass deportation policy, prime-age Latina workers continue to drive much of the strength in the employment rates of Hispanic workers.

This Labor Day, workers across the country are sending a clear message: they want a greater voice on the job. A near-record 71% of Americans approve of unions and surveys show over 50 million nonunion workers would join a union if they could. At a time when many are struggling to afford basic necessities, it’s easy to understand why.

Posted September 4, 2026 at 9:57 am Hiring rebounded in August, but long-term unemployment continued to rise Below, EPI senior economist Elise Gould offers her insights on the jobs report released this morning. Read the full thread here. Today’s #jobs data can be considered a solid bounce back to relative weakness in June and July. Job growth has averaged 71k over the last 3 months.

We envision an economy that is just and strong, sustainable, and equitable--where every job is good, every worker can join a union, and every family and community can thrive. EPI is a leader in the movement for economic justice. We use the tools of economics to win policy change that advances power for workers, economic security for families, and racial and gender equity in our nation.

Worker interest in unions is at historic highs, and nearly 70% of the public approves of unions. Yet most of the 56 million workers who say they want a union contract can’t get one because of weak federal labor law and the spread of state anti-union “right-to-work” (RTW) laws. Suppression of union membership has in turn lowered workers’ wages and benefits while inequality has skyrocketed.

Key takeaways: So-called right-to-work (RTW) laws undermine workers’ ability to form unions. Unionization rates are clearly lower in RTW states—and since unions raise wages, that suppression lowers pay. States with RTW laws are also more likely to have other anti-worker laws and generally weaker labor standards.

Key takeaways: In 2025, the teacher pay penalty stood at an estimated 25.2%—meaning teachers earned about a quarter less than comparable college graduates in other professions. That’s a slight improvement from 2024’s record high of 26.9%, but still more than four times the 6.1% penalty recorded in 1996. Inflation-adjusted weekly wages for public school teachers fell 6.2% over the last three decades, while wages for other college graduates rose 28.8% over the same period.

Methodological note As of 2022 Q2, EPI has updated its methodology for constructing state-level unemployment rates and ratios by race/ethnicity, with the goal of providing a more consistent set of states for analysis from quarter to quarter. The new methodology uses a longer time horizon of state-level unemployment data from the Current Population Survey (12 months vs.

This is an excerpt from an op-ed originally published at In These Times. Read the full piece here. Affordability—or the lack thereof—has dominated the recent political debate in the U.S. And for good reason. Across the country, too many families are struggling to make ends meet. However, almost every conversation about affordability focuses entirely on prices, as if the only way to make life more affordable is to make things cheaper.

Thirty states have passed a version of the CROWN Act to ban hair discrimination: Continued action needed more than ever as Trump administration abandons equity Key takeaways: The CROWN Act is legislation that protects students, workers, and housing applicants from race-based hair discrimination. 30 states have enacted some version of the CROWN Act, building momentum for a federal version to pass in Congress.