Susan Houseman is a senior economist at the Upjohn Institute in Michigan. I’ve followed her work on employment trends, especially in manufacturing, for years, and wanted to share some of her recent findings that struck me as particularly germane at this point in time. JB: This election has clearly elevated the view that our manufacturing…
[ Adam Behsudi| October 17, 2016 | Politico] Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Trump campaign advisers Peter Navarro and Dan DiMicco blasted the U.S. Treasury Department’s decision on Friday not to declare China a currency manipulator — an action no administration, Republican or Democrat, has taken since 1994. “By refusing to take on China over…
[ Dean Baker | October 10, 2016 |CEPR] Donald Trump has espoused racist and misogynist views in his presidential campaign and throughout his life. For this reason, many people don’t want to be associated in any way with him. This is a problem, since not everything he says is wrong, particularly when it comes to trade. Prominent…
October 25th from 2:00pm-3:00pm 121 Cannon House Office Building [ AFL-CIO| October 10, 2016] International trade and migration are fundamental and interrelated components of globalization that have the potential to improve the lives of working families. For far too long, however, trade and immigration policies have prioritized corporate interests over good jobs and worker rights. Since the…
[Ambrose Evans-Pritchard | October 10, 2016 |Telegraph] The slump in sterling is a blessing in disguise after years of overvaluation and helps to break the corrosive stranglehold of the financial elites over the British economy, according to a former bail-out chief for the International Monetary Fund. “It is desirable from every point of view. The idea that Britain…
[ Dean Baker | October 08, 2016 |Beat the Press] The Brexit vote was a case where the elites were clearly aligned against the U.K. leaving the European Union. While they had many good arguments on their side, and much of what the pro-Brexit crew was saying was nonsense, some of the elite gloating now…
[ Daily News| October 11, 2016 |Inside US Trade] Enough members of Congress will ultimately support the Trans-Pacific Partnership in a post-election lame-duck session largely due to the negative geopolitical implications of failing to ratify the deal, according to Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Russel. “TPP is moving towards…
[ Gilbert B. Kaplan | September 29, 2016 |Huffington Post] In addition to giving rise to a great Broadway hip-hop play, Alexander Hamilton was the founding father of the U.S. pro-manufacturing movement. In 1791, he wrote a report to the Congress extolling the virtues of U.S. manufacturing: “Not only the wealth, but the independence and security…
Tectonic changes are reshaping U.S. workplaces as the economy moves deeper into the knowledge-focused age. These changes are affecting the very nature of jobs by rewarding social, communications and analytical skills. They are prodding many workers to think about lifetime commitments to retraining and upgrading their skills. And they may be prompting a society-wide reckoning…
[Stephen Herzenberg| October 04, 2016 |Philly] IT’S OLD NEWS that some Democrats are tone deaf on trade. Right now would be a pretty good time to get a hearing aid. I had a front-row seat on that tone deafness in the first Clinton administration during its 1993 negotiation of the labor side agreement to…