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In RealTime posts, PIIE senior staff and colleagues discuss the fast-moving economic news, financial developments, and public policy choices confronting the United States and the world.
It looks like the Great Recession did indeed produce the much-anticipated V-shaped recovery—although not the way some economists predicted. US corporations experienced the V shaped recovery, while US workers experienced virtually no recovery (see the circled areas in figures 1 and 2). The ratio of corporate profits to private industry income is at its highest [...]
While the world’s attention is focused on the European financial crisis, a storm is brewing in the Mediterranean that could cause havoc in the region and have wider international consequences. At its center are conflicting claims between the Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots over a potentially large natural gas discovery off the island’s southern coast. [...]
After nine months of being used as a pawn in a partisan battle, Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA)—a small program that provides job search assistance and training to workers, firms, farmers, and fishermen hurt by globalization—is scheduled for a vote this week in the Senate. Hundreds of thousands of workers have been denied assistance since the [...]
As Americans observe Labor Day, and the latest numbers released by the US government show disappointing job growth, the US labor market faces several major problems: First, although private employment has been increasing, it remains below what it was at the outset of the Great Recession. Total private employment has increased by 1.7 million (or [...]
A rancorous debate is taking place over whether to link reauthorization and reform of Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA)—which provides assistance to workers, farmers, fishermen, and firms adversely affected by increased import competition and offshore shifts in production—to other legislation moving through Congress. Given TAA’s small size, the issue isn’t whether to link it or not, [...]
The American people have spoken. They are fed up with stalemate and inaction in Washington. The “old” Congress has an opportunity to prove that it hears the message, even before the “new” Congress is sworn in. Fifteen million Americans remain unemployed and more than 40 percent of them have been unemployed for more than 6 [...]
The President convenes a meeting of corporate executives, union presidents, and economists to discuss the “jobless recovery.” December 2009 in Washington, DC? No, July 1993 in Chicago. We have seen this problem before, in other words. But have we learned the right lessons from the last jobs summit? The first lesson is that there has [...]
Congress will leave town this week without passing another stimulus package or deciding what to do about the failing auto industry. The only thing Congress could agree on was a second temporary extension of unemployment insurance. This extension and the extension passed earlier this year are mere band-aids on a program with serious problems. Given the prospect of a long and deep recession, it will only be a matter of time before Congress will need to take further action.