Brief—  2021 Q1 Status Of Older Workers Report *Arrows reflect the change from the previous quarter’s data. All data represents the most recent numbers released by the BLS. Jobs lost statistic reflects the number of additional jobs older workers would hold if the pre-pandemic older worker EPOP held for the current 55+ population. By Owen Davis, Bridget Fisher, Teresa Ghilarducci, and Siavash Radpour Retirement Boom: At least 1.7 million more older workers than expected retired due to the pandemic recession.  Retirement Inequality: At earlier ages, vulnerable older workers ..read more

Looming over the nation’s workers and their families is the dread of not having enough money in retirement. This dread has been hastened by the calamity of the 2020 recession as those without retirement coverage at work lost one more year of savings and were left out of the stock market boom.    States have been addressing the problem while the federal government fails to act. And now, New York City is the second city (after Seattle) to help its private sector workers save for retirement.  At the end of April, the New York City Council took a bold step and approved a city-sponso ..read more

In a presentation to the Paraja Valley Saves Lives Coalition, SCEPA Director Teresa Ghilarducci describes how Covid-19 is accelerating gaps in race, income and gender inequality and has created new ones in employment, education, and life expectancy. See the full presentation here.  -- Employment  Economists describe inequality of job loss as a K-shaped recession. In a K-shaped recession, the top segment of society climbs back upward while another segment continues to suffer.  A graph of economic growth in this scenario would resemble two diverging diagonal lines of the letter ..read more

  2020 Q3 Status Of Older Workers Report *The 1.4 million older workers still unemployed since April does not include workers who were unemployed in April and have since left the labor force. Arrows reflect the change from the previous period’s data. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and SCEPA calculations based on Current Population Survery (CPS) data. Unemployment Gap Flips: Unemployment rates for workers 55 and older exceeded those of mid-career workers for the length of the pandemic — the first time since 1973 such an unemployment gap has persisted for six months or longer ..read more

 2020 Q2 Status Of Older Workers Report Millions Pushed Out of the Workforce: 2.9 million older workers left the labor force since March. These workers are at risk of having to retire involuntarily due to increased health risks coupled with decreased job prospects. More Involuntary Retirements to Come: If the rate of labor force exits continues over the next three months, we expect an additional 1.1 million older workers to leave the labor force, adding to the 2.9 million who already left. A total of 4 million people potentially pushed into retirement before they are ready wil ..read more

 2020 Q1 Status Of Older Workers Report Increased Downward Mobility At All Earnings Levels: An additional 3.1 million older workers will fall into lifelong poverty in retirement. Overall, the 67 million older workers and their spouses in the U.S. will suffer a decrease of 7 percentage points in their retirement replacement rate. Middle Earners Hit Twice: Middle earners sustain both job loss and market loss, leading to an additional 1.1 million older workers falling from the middle class into poverty. Policy Recommendations: Older workers were left out of the governmen ..read more

This is a transcipt of a keynote orignally presented at the Association of Social Economic's 2020 ASSA Reception.   (Photo by: Martha Susana Jaimes)   The Gray New Deal: General Theory of Employment, Retirement, and Money Teresa Ghilarducci Keynote for the Association Social Economics’ ASSA Reception January 2 6:30 pm San Diego ASSA   Over the last thirty years, we have witnessed a doomsday for pensions. The vast majority of the ten thousand baby boomers turning 65 every day do not have enough income to maintain their standard of living. For the first time in modern history, th ..read more

Brief—  2021 Q1 Status Of Older Workers Report *Arrows reflect the change from the previous quarter’s data. All data represents the most recent numbers released by the BLS. Jobs lost statistic reflects the number of additional jobs older workers would hold if the pre-pandemic older worker EPOP held for the current 55+ population. By Owen Davis, Bridget Fisher, Teresa Ghilarducci, and Siavash Radpour Retirement Boom: At least 1.7 million more older workers than expected retired due to the pandemic recession.  Retirement Inequality: At earlier ages, vulnerable older workers ..read more

Looming over the nation’s workers and their families is the dread of not having enough money in retirement. This dread has been hastened by the calamity of the 2020 recession as those without retirement coverage at work lost one more year of savings and were left out of the stock market boom.    States have been addressing the problem while the federal government fails to act. And now, New York City is the second city (after Seattle) to help its private sector workers save for retirement.  At the end of April, the New York City Council took a bold step and approved a city-sponso ..read more

In March of 2021, SCEPA Director and New School Professor of Economics, Teresa Ghilarducci delivered a presentation on how Covid-19 has exacerbated and worsened economic inequality using research and data from expert economists. See the full presentation here. Professor Ghilarducci expounds on these topics in her piece for Forbes, reprinted below. -- Covid-19 is rubbing “salt in the wound of inequality,” I heard Dr. Utsha Khatri from the University of Pennsylvania say on NPR in March 2020, an observation many economists have found as the profession focuses on the sad unequal effects of the Cov ..read more