Takeaway: The post-pandemic rise in remote work causally drove a historic surge in full-time employment for people with physical disabilities, accounting for up to 85 percent of their recent job gains. Key Points For every 1 percentage point increase in work-from-home availability within an occupation, full-time employment for workers with a physical disability grew by 1.0 to 1.3 percent. The surge in remote work accounts for 68 to 85 percent of the post-pandemic increase in

Takeaway: As economies grow wealthier, total adult working hours barely fall; instead, economic development reshuffles work across age, gender, and public policy choices. Key Points Economic growth does not automatically buy national leisure: Overall hours worked per adult remain remarkably stable across both rich and poor countries. Work is reshuffled by age and gender: Development pulls young people into school and older adults into retirement, while falling work hours for

This study evaluates the OpenResearch Unconditional Income Study to determine how a guaranteed income affects labor market participation, job quality, time use, and overall well-being among low-income adults in the United States. Takeaway: Receiving an unconditional $1,000 monthly cash transfer for three years led low-income adults to modestly reduce their work hours and earned income, allocating their additional free time primarily to leisure rather than higher-paying jobs o

Takeaway: Working in the same office boosts detailed mentorship and code quality for junior employees, but it requires senior staff to trade away some of their own direct output. Key Points Mentorship thrives in person: Sitting near teammates increases feedback on work by over 18%, helping junior employees build skills and write higher-quality code with fewer errors. Collaboration involves trade-offs: Mentoring takes time. Senior engineers write less code when sitting near co

Key Points The US workforce shank unexpectedly by 23 thousand, despite the unemployment rate staying unchanged. The US civilian labor force has declined in recent months meaning that many individuals have either given up on finding employment or retired. The foreign born labor force has declined, but not significantly. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), there were 23 thousand fewer employees working full-time in July. Despite the slight decline from June, the

Takeaway: Paying generous bonuses to top-rated educators in low-performing public schools dramatically raises student achievement and, those gains disappear if the financial incentives are removed. Key Points Dramatic Learning Gains: Offering annual stipends of $6,000 to $10,000 to highly effective teachers nearly eliminated the math and reading achievement gap between Dallas’s lowest-performing elementary schools and the district average. Persistent Benefits: Students expose

Takeaway: By studying millions of Americans who permanently relocate across different climate zones, researchers found that warmer temperatures reduce worker earnings far less than leading climate-economy models predict. Key Points Short-term shocks vs. long-term climate: Traditional climate models often infer future economic damage from temporary weather spikes, which overstate long-run harm because they ignore human adaptation. Minimal wage penalty: Workers who move to loca

City level unemployment rates vary widely across the US. What is driving these trends? The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its metropolitan area unemployment data for June on Wednesday. Out of the almost 400 metropolitan areas tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), about half (178 cities) showed an increase in unemployment from the previous year. The nationwide unemployment rate for June was 4.2%, however, there is significant variation within each city. T

Takeaway: Business managers become significantly more uncertain whenever their firms experience rapid change, whether good or bad, and this doubt directly prompts them to scale back hiring and lower prices. Key Points Change Breeds Doubt: Managerial uncertainty follows a distinct "V-shape", rising not only when sales drop unexpectedly, but also when they surge unexpectedly. More Than Statistical Risk: Perceived uncertainty isn't just objective market volatility; it reflects m

Revealing salaries can help to reduce pay gaps, but is there a downside? Takeaway: This paper synthesizes international economic research to evaluate how different types of pay transparency laws—peer-to-peer disclosures, managerial pay visibility, and salary ranges in job postings—reshape worker motivation, salary negotiations, and employer hiring strategies. Key Points Peer transparency shrinks wage gaps, but can lower overall pay: Making salaries visible among direct cowork

Why top companies pay top wages Takeaway: High-paying firms owe their wage premia to product market dominance and profit-sharing with employees, demonstrating that collective bargaining power can counteract corporate market power to improve economic welfare. Key Points Profit-Sharing Drives Pay: High-wage firms do not just have higher productivity; they charge higher prices and higher markups, sharing a portion of these product market profits with their employees. Product Dom

Takeaway: Giving one-time cash grants to extremely poor agricultural families leads to lasting improvements in food security and farm profits, even after initial consumer spending sprees fade. Section 3 - Key Points Fleeting spending, persistent food security: Initial surges in retail purchases vanished within six months, but families maintained higher food security for up to two years. Farming as an investment: Families sustained these long-term gains by investing cash in se

Takeaway: The latest data from the BLS shows that while nominal earnings rose, real earnings were flat from the same time last year. The Bureau of Labor Statistics released the Q2 data on weekly earnings this Tuesday, showing small gains in nominal wages. But persistent inflation is wiping out those gains. For the nearly 121 million full-time workers in the US economy, median weekly earnings rose by $55 from the second quarter of last year to $1,258. That's a rise of about 4.

Job openings decline slightly in April, but remain some of the highest ever recorded. By Nate Griffin - Tuesday, June 1st, 2022 The...

The Bureau of Labor Statistics released its monthly Real Earnings report for the month of April. The report shows that real wages fell sligh

As states recover from massive job losses over 2020, which industries have seen the most growth?

Payroll numbers grew by 210,000, but were much lower than expectations. The unemployment rate falls to 4.2 percent. By Nate Griffin –...

New unemployment claims fell sharply from the previous week. By Nate Griffin – November 28th, 2021 According to the latest news release...

By Nate Griffin – November 24, 2021 News Brief: On Tuesday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the County Employment and Wages...

By Nate Griffin – November 22, 2021 Between October 2020 wages and October 2021 wages after adjusting for inflation fell in most...