Tag Archives: Bureau of Labor Statistics

Why don’t more politicians retire? A medical anthropologist explains how the US could benefit from a mandatory retirement age

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By Matthew J. Wolf-Meyer Published 8-19-2024 by The Conversation

Photo: manhhal/flickr/CC

President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are hardly the only examples of politicians who work well into their golden years. Members of the baby-boom generation – Americans born between 1946 and 1964 – are the most numerous in the House, and in the Senate they outnumber lawmakers from all other generations combined.

All told, two-thirds of U.S. senators and nearly half of House lawmakers are eligible for full retirement benefits through the Federal Employees’ Retirement System. And yet they keep working. So do the four Supreme Court justices who are over 65.

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‘We’re Just Getting Started,’ Says Union Leader, as Worker Strike Activity Hits 35-Year High Under Trump

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“Trump’s economy is not a workers’ economy, and workers know solidarity is the best way to fight back.”

By Jessica Corbett, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 2-11-2020

Thousands of members and allies of the Chicago Teachers Union demonstrated in the city’s Union Park during a strike in October 2019. (Photo: CTU/Twitter)

In yet another rebuke to President Donald Trump’s claims that the U.S. economy is “roaring” and his “relentlessly pro-worker” agenda is serving the American public, a report published Tuesday by a progressive think tank revealed that the “number of striking workers surged in 2018 and 2019” after decades of decline.

The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) report, entitled Continued Surge in Strike Activity Signals Worker Dissatisfaction With Wage Growth, noted that the spike marked “a 35-year high for the number of workers involved in a major work stoppage over a two-year period.” Continue reading →

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Real pay data show Trump’s ‘blue collar boom’ is more of a bust for US workers, in 3 charts

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When looking at your paycheck, don’t forget about inflation. Leif Skoogfors/Getty Images

David Salkever, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

If you thought workers’ hourly pay was finally rising, think again.

At first glance, the latest data – which came out on Feb. 7 – look pretty good. They show nominal hourly earnings rose 3.1% in January from a year earlier.

But the operative word here is nominal, which means not adjusted for changes in the cost of living. Once you factor in inflation, the picture changes drastically. And far from representing a “blue collar boom” – as the president put it in his State of the Union address – the real, inflation-adjusted data show most U.S. workers have not benefited from the growing economy. Continue reading →

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‘Big Attack on Working People’: Trump Moves to Redefine Poverty in Order to Slash Social Programs and Services for Millions

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“A novel way to take healthcare, etc., away from people AND make it look like there are fewer poor people.”

By Julia Conley, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 5-7-2019

The Poor People’s Campaign has mobilized nationally to fight the Trump administration’s attacks on the poor. (Photo: Becker1999/flickr/cc)

The Trump administration on Monday moved to change the definition of “poverty” in the United States in a proposal which combines the president’s attempts to portray the U.S. economy as strong with his repeated attacks on the working poor and their access to government services.

In a regulatory filing, President Donald Trump’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) wrote that it may change how inflation is calculated in order to reduce the number of Americans who are living below the federally-recognized poverty line and are therefore eligible for certain government support services and social programs. Continue reading →

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