As we approach this Labor Day, the Pennsylvania economy is growing steadily. Working families are sharing in prosperity in a more sustained way than at any point since 1980--although many families still struggle to make ends meet and, in our polarized nation, a big partisan divide exists in perceptions of whether the economy is better than four…

The COVID-19 pandemic brought unprecedented economic and policy challenges to the United States and other countries. Navigating out of the pandemic slowdown is another novel experience, which makes it more difficult to answer the question addressed each year in the "State of Working Pennsylvania": How is the Pennsylvania economy…

Child care and early education (CCEE) educators typically have low levels of compensation; limited opportunities for education, training, and professional development; inconsistent working conditions; and high levels of stress and burnout. There are also high rates of job turnover, which can strain remaining educators and decrease the quality of…

The United States and Pennsylvania economies are at a pivot point: Will we build forward better or will we build back the same? Will we make things even worse? This report revisits the policy choices that lie ahead. Most of this annual checkup on the Pennsylvania economy, the 26th "State of Working Pennsylvania," presents labor market…

Tom Wilson, the chair of the executive committee of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce published an op-ed titled "Save Capitalism by Paying People More." Wilson acknowledges in blunt terms that ordinary working Americans are not flourishing economically. This year's annual "The State of Working Pennsylvania" documents the accuracy of…

In the aftermath of the financial and economic recession of 2008, 130 Spanish students of five age groups (8 to 17 years) and two socioeconomic backgrounds were individually interviewed about unemployment and lower wages. The participants were presented with two hypothetical situations, and their responses were qualitatively and quantitatively…

Despite decades and hundreds of billions of dollars of federal and state investment in policies to promote postsecondary educational attainment as a key lever for increasing the economic mobility of lower income populations, research continues to show large and meaningful differences in the mid-career earnings of students from families in the…

The author of this article provides an example of how one might incorporate behavioral economics into teaching macroeconomics or labor economics at an undergraduate level. The focus is on two macroeconomic concepts--wage determination and the Phillips curve--and shows that the implications and conclusions of both models differ from their textbook…

Background: Previous research suggests that school exclusion during childhood is a precursor to social exclusion in adulthood. Past literature on the consequences of school exclusion is, however, scarce and mainly focused on short-term outcomes such as educational attainment, delinquency, and mental health in early adolescence. Moreover, this…

Prior work on teacher candidates in Washington State has shown that about two thirds of individuals who trained to become teachers between 2005 and 2015 and received a teaching credential did not enter the state's public teaching workforce immediately after graduation, while about one third never entered a public teaching job in the state at all.…

Using 15 years of student enrollment histories from administrative data spanning the 2004-05 through 2018-19 school years at all public colleges, universities, and technical/trade schools in the state of Ohio, we examine rates of re-enrollment in postsecondary education for individuals pursuing additional credentials following the receipt of a…

This is the technical appendices for the report, "Higher Education and Economic Opportunity in California." Lower rates of college access and completion among Latinos, African Americans, and low-income Californians exacerbate the state's economic divide and puts California further behind in meeting its workforce needs. And even though a…

This completely updated edition of "The Almanac of American Education" helps users understand and compare the quality of education at the national, state, and county levels. Compiled from official U.S. government sources, this book contains historical and current data, insightful analysis, and useful graphs that provide compelling…

The Worker Retraining (WRT) program is a key strategy in meeting the economic and workforce needs of Washington's workers and employers. Funded through the state legislature, the aim of WRT is to ensure dislocated and other unemployed workers have access to education and training that will help them reattach to the labor market in jobs and careers…

This study investigates the role of college major choices in labor market outcomes, with a focus on racial minorities and immigrants. Drawing upon research on school-to-work linkages, we examine two measures, linkage, the connection between college majors and specific occupations in the labor market, and match, the alignment of workers'…