A series of earlier CEPR reports documented a substantial decline over the last three decades in the share of “good jobs” in the U.S. economy. This fall-off in job quality took place despite a large increase in the educational attainment and age of the workforce, as well as the productivity...

The decline in the economy’s ability to create good jobs is related to deterioration in the bargaining power of workers, especially those at the middle and the bottom of the pay scale. The restructuring of the U.S. labor market – including the decline in the inflation-adjusted value of the...

The Great Recession has been hard on recent college graduates, but it has been even harder for black recent college graduates. This report examines the labor-market outcomes of black recent college graduates using the general approach developed by Federal Reserve Bank of New York researchers...

By most measures, the educational attainment of blacks is currently at the highest it has ever been. After decades of stagnation, high school completion rates for blacks have increased rapidly since 2000. This issue brief will focus on the high school status completion rates of blacks ages 20 to...

Relative to any of the most common benchmarks – the cost of living, the wages of the average worker, or average productivity levels – the current federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour is well below its historical value. These usual reference points, however, understate the true erosion in...

This paper provides an overview of major macroeconomic and social indicators and policy changes in Ecuador over the two and a half years since President Rafael Correa took office in January 2007, including economic growth, social spending, fiscal policy, inflation, foreign debt, the trade...

This paper looks at the Honduran economy, including longer-term trends, the pre-crisis years, and recent developments since the June 28th coup. It finds that poverty and inequality decreased significantly during the Zelaya administration, with rapid growth of more than 6 percent during the first...