Key Findings:
Continue reading “Analysis: 86% of Republican Counties in Missouri Voted Against Right-to-Work”
Illinois’ budget crisis can be resolved by raising taxes on the rich and cutting taxes for low-income and middle-class families, according to a new Policy Brief by the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI). The memorandum corroborates recommendations by the non-partisan Civic Federation, the … Continue reading A Graduated Income Tax Could Save Illinois
Frank Manzo IV is the Policy Director of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI). Visit ILEPI at www.illinoisepi.org or follow ILEPI on Twitter @illinoisEPI.
Yesterday the Illinois Policy Institute (IPI) released “The Anatomy of Influence: Government Unions in Illinois,” perhaps-not-so-coincidentally on the same day that Governor Rauner passed an executive order prohibiting public sector unions from paying fair share fees to fund union activities. In usual IPI fashion, the report only tells a small component of the whole story. Below are a few thoughts on the report.
Report quote: ” At both the IEA and the Illinois Federation of Teachers or IFT, the top 20 highest-paid employees all are paid salaries of more than $100,000 annually.”
The IEA and the IFT represent about 214,000 workers in Illinois combined, according to the report. These 40 individuals’ salaries represent 0.02% of all members. By contrast, data from the American Community Survey 1-Year Estimates for 2013 reveal that the Top 10% of all workers in Illinois earned at least $100,000 in real total income and the Top 1% earns $475,000 or more [Note: See the STATA output above, which reports weighted estimates for 59,743 Illinois residents who are in the labor force and are employed]. The fact that 40 salaries in the IEA and IFT are above $100,000 is utterly meaningless when contrasted with the rest of the Illinois labor market.
There is a myth about the “overpaid” labor union leader. In a report released last month with the University of Illinois Labor Education Program, ILEPI debunked that myth (PDF) from a national perspective. The report provides a complete story by comparing and contrasting (perhaps a novel idea these days…). We concluded:
Unions raise and compress wages, and union leaders are compensated accordingly. The typical labor union is neither large nor lucrative, with average compensation packages to employees that are similar to social advocacy, community services, and worker services groups. Payroll costs are much lower in labor organizations than they are in business associations (such as chambers of commerce), in law offices, and among managers of companies and enterprises. Additionally, labor leaders and top administrative staff are not paid more than the market rate for other leaders and administrators. In fact, they tend to earn far less than comparable CEOs and executives in relevant industries. Thus, there is no evidence to support any claim of “Big” labor, with unions governed by overcompensated leaders.
Once again, here is a link to that paper.
Report quote: “The Illinois Policy Institute reviewed campaign-finance reports from 2002 to 2014 and found the five major government unions in Illinois spent a combined $46 million in political campaigns in that time.”
According to FollowTheMoney.org, $1.29 billion has been contributed to statewide political campaigns in Illinois since 2002. In the context of all campaign contributions, the $46 million influence of public sector unions represents just 3.6 percent of all campaign contributions. Furthermore, during that exact same time, Bruce Rauner contributed $39.6 million to political campaigns. Once again, that is $46 million dollars representing hundreds of thousands of public sector workers (3.6 percent) versus nearly $40 million from one businessman (3.1 percent). Let’s get real about the influence of money in politics here. Continue reading “A Quick Comment on Government Unions in Illinois”
Frank Manzo IV is the Policy Director of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI). Visit ILEPI at www.illinoisepi.org or follow ILEPI on Twitter @illinoisEPI.
Today, the Illinois Economic Policy Institute and the University of Illinois jointly released Free-Rider States: How Low-Wage Employment in “Right-to-Work” States is Subsidized by the Economic Benefits of Collective Bargaining [PDF]. The report has three main findings:
A “right-to-work” law reduces worker earnings by 3.2 percent, reduces union membership by 9.6 percentage points, reduces the share of workers covered by a health insurance plan (3.5 percentage points) and by a pension plan (3.0 percentage points), and increases the poverty rate among workers by 0.9 percentage points.
All of this has negative impacts on the public budget. Lower worker earnings decrease income tax contributions: a right-to-work law lowers the after-credit federal income tax liability of workers by 11.1 percent. Lower worker earnings also increase the chances of a worker needing to rely on government assistance programs: workers in collective-bargaining states receive 18.9 percent less in tax relief from the Earned Income Tax Credit and 14.1 percent less in food stamp value than their counterparts in right-to-work states.
Additionally, right-to-work laws have inconclusive impacts on employment. While the report finds that they are associated with a small increase in hours and weeks worked by employees, this is likely because they are forced to work more time to earn anything close to their annual income in a collective-bargaining state. Furthermore, two case-studies using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics illustrate how right-to-work states have negligible impacts on total employment:
Continue reading “Right-to-Work States are Free-Rider States”
Frank Manzo IV is the Policy Director of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI). Visit ILEPI at www.illinoisepi.org or follow ILEPI on Twitter @illinoisEPI. The call by McHenry County Board Members to partner with other county governments to challenge Illinois’ prevailing wage determinations would be a waste of government resources, according to a new study by the Illinois Economic Policy Institute. The report, Building a Strong McHenry: How Prevailing Wage Works [PDF], finds that prevailing wage is necessary to prevent government bodies– such as the McHenry County Board– from using their massive purchasing power to undercut the established labor market. The policy is also … Continue reading McHenry County Should Adopt Its Prevailing Wage Ordinance
Today, the Midwest Economic Policy Institute released Common Sense Construction: The Economic Impacts of Indiana’s Common Construction Wage with the University of Illinois School of Labor and Employment Relations and Smart Cities Prevail. The report finds that Indiana’s Common Construction Wage (CCW) promotes positive labor market outcomes for both construction workers and contractors. Full report [pdf] One-page summary [pdf] Ten facts about the Indiana CCW: 1. The Common Construction Wage keeps Hoosier jobs local. (For more, see pages 5 and 11-13) 2. The Common Construction Wage does not increase total construction costs for public projects. (Pg. 4) 3. The Common Construction Wage promotes an upwardly-mobile, high-road economy for working families. (Pg. … Continue reading The CCW is Common Sense Construction
Frank Manzo IV is the Policy Director of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI). Visit ILEPI at www.illinoisepi.org or follow ILEPI on Twitter @illinoisEPI.
On May 20, 2014, ILEPI Policy Director Frank Manzo IV was a panelist on WTTW’s Chicago Tonight with Ted Dabrowski discussing the pros and cons of raising the minimum wage in Illinois. Manzo supported raising the minimum wage to $10.00 per hour while Dabrowski has endorsed abolishing Illinois’ minimum wage altogether. Here is a link to the segment, and below is additional information on the effects of raising the minimum wage in Illinois.
Should we raise the minimum wage to $10 an hour?
The Illinois economy is still recovering from the Great Recession. The unemployment rate is about one and a half percentage points lower today than it was one year ago. But the recovery has seen an ongoing rise in income inequality in the labor market. To partially offset the income gap– independent of any action (or nonaction) at the federal level– Illinois should raise the minimum wage to $10 an hour.
In 2012, 1 million of the state’s 6 million workers earned less than $10 an hour. Of these one million low-wage earners, 57 percent were female, 45 percent were nonwhite, and 60 percent worked full-time (35 hours a week or more). In a study co-authored with the University of Illinois, ILEPI found that raising the minimum wage to $10 would increase worker income by $2 billion for these low-wage workers and lift 60,000 to 100,000 Illinois residents above the poverty line, reducing reliance on government programs and lowering costs to taxpayers. These workers would then spend that new income back in the economy, resulting in $7 billion in new economic output, and either a very small drop or a very small gain in employment. Thus, in Illinois, a state where the cost of living is higher than the national average, a raise to $10 would be beneficial to the economy. See the full report here [pdf].
Why does the minimum wage have a stimulative impact? What about economic theory which says it reduces jobs?
We know that reality is, unfortunately, far more complex than economic theory. Research shows little to no discernible impact of the minimum wage on employment. Most estimates on the supposed reduction in jobs are between zero percent and less than a fraction of a percent— it would be a false representation of economic research to suggest otherwise. We also know that poorer Americans spend higher shares of their incomes in the economy than richer Americans. One 2009 study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago found that “spending increases substantially after a minimum wage hike.” For every $1 increase in the minimum wage, families with a minimum wage earner raise spending by $744 to $869 per year.
Isn’t the minimum wage a job killer for small businesses? Continue reading “ICYMI: ILEPI on Chicago Tonight Discussing Minimum Wage”
Frank Manzo IV is the Policy Director of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI). Visit ILEPI at www.illinoisepi.org or follow ILEPI on Twitter @illinoisEPI. This post is a response to an article written by Stan Greer of the National Institute for Labor Relations Research on February 10, 2014. The article “reported” (for lack of a better term) on a recent study conducted jointly by ILEPI and the University of Illinois. For reference, our study, Which Labor Market Institutions Reduce Income Inequality? Labor Unions, Prevailing Wage Laws, and Right-to-Work Laws in the Construction Industry can be found here [PDF] and an accompanying Illinois Insights Blog post … Continue reading On the Fallacious Argument of One Right-to-Work Advocate
Frank Manzo IV is the Policy Director of the Illinois Economic Policy Institute (ILEPI). Visit ILEPI at www.illinoisepi.org or follow ILEPI on Twitter @illinoisEPI.
On November 27, the Northwest Indiana Regional Planning Commission (NIRPC) uploaded its completed staff analysis on the Illiana Corridor and its consistency with the organization’s 2040 Comprehensive Regional Plan (CRP). The analysis reviewed all the areas where the Illiana Expressway positively or negatively impacts the quality of life for the residents of Northwest Indiana but did not offer a direct recommendation to the NIRPC Executive Board, which on December 12 will vote on whether the project should go forward.
The analysis identified 62 unique objectives of the CRP, and found that the project is consistent with 13 of those goals, inconsistent with 8, and has mixed, neutral, or uncertain impacts on 41 other goals. Below, we at ILEPI synthesize, discuss, and critique these findings.
The 13 Consistencies
The Illinois Update 