Related UI Researchers

Publications on Work/Income

This report summarizes strategies San Francisco employers used to implement the nation's first law requiring paid sick days for all employees, based on interviews with a sample of businesses. Although employers faced three new policies that affected staff wages and benefits, they were able to implement the paid sick leave requirement with minimal impacts to their business. The report details employer responses to the law in their operations, staffing, employee benefit packages, and reporting requirements. By assessing employers' perspectives on the operational challenges of the law, the study provides lessons to inform future research and policymaking.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), the economic stimulus package passed in February, provides significant resources for developing environment-friendly “green jobs.” The act includes $48 billion overall for job training and education, nearly $100 billion for transportation and infrastructure, $20 billion in tax incentives for renewable energy, and more than $41 billion for energy-related programs. But it is unclear how green investments will benefit the country’s most vulnerable individuals: low-wage workers with limited skills.

Recent growth in wage inequality has important implications for Social Security solvency and benefit distributions. Because only earnings below the taxable maximum are subject to payroll taxes, concentrated wage growth among higher earners generates less revenue than more evenly distributed growth. Social Security's progressive benefit formula increases benefit payouts when shares of workers with low wages grow. We use a dynamic microsimulation model to examine aggregate and distributional consequences of alternative scenarios about future wage growth. We find that relatively modest changes in assumptions about wage differentials generate marked changes in projected Social Security benefits, poverty, and long-term financing status.

Over the past several decades, the volatility of family income has increased markedly, and own earnings volatility has remained relatively flat. Volatility may affect retirement wealth, depending on whether volatility affects accrued pension contributions or withdrawals or earnings credited toward future Social Security benefits. This project assesses the effect of the volatility of individual and family earnings on asset accumulation and projected retirement wealth using survey data matched to administrative earnings records.

The U.S. Department of Labor Employment and Training Administration (ETA) provided a three-year demonstration grant to Arkansas and Iowa to develop New Americans Centers (NACs) in high immigrant population areas. The purposes of the grant are to promote stability and rapid employment with living wages, speed the transition of new immigrants into communities, assist employers, and enhance local economic development opportunities. This paper is the first report in an ongoing Urban Institute evaluation of the NACs. It focuses on the initial implementation phase of the NACs, highlighting start-up and early operation as well as the types of services participants receive.