State of Working PA

OP-ED: Pennsylvania needs a fairer tax system

Posted by Marc Stier on January 4, 2017 5:44 pm
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This piece originally appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, December 26, 2016.

Pennsylvania faces another budget crisis. The combined deficit for this year and next is roughly $3 billion. It’s time all Pennsylvanians — and especially the members of our General Assembly — recognize that recurrent budget crises won’t stop until we fix our upside-down tax system.

SWPA 2016: College No Longer Guarantees Rising Wages—Degree Holders Need Agenda to Raise PA’s Pay Too

Posted by John Neurohr on October 28, 2016 9:13 am
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The post below is one of a series of posts about specific trends examined in the recently-released annual edition of The State of Working Pennsylvania.

We’ve already laid out how Pennsylvania men without a college degree have not shared in Pennsylvania's economic gains over the past few decades and how women without a college degree are still playing catch up. What about Pennsylvanians with a college degree, though?

For years, having a bachelor’s degree was the key to unlocking jobs with rising wages. Up until 2000, male college graduates in Pennsylvania fared better than those without a four-year college degree when it came to increasing wages. Hourly earnings climbed for white and black men with at least a bachelor’s degree by 23 percent and 14 percent respectively between 1979-81 and 2000-02.

SWPA 2016 Highlight: Non-College Pennsylvania Women Still Playing Catch Up

Posted by John Neurohr on September 23, 2016 3:49 pm
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The post below is one of a series of posts about specific trends examined in the recently-released annual edition of The State of Working Pennsylvania.

We’ve already laid out how Pennsylvania men without a college degree have not shared in Pennsylvania's economic gains over the past few decades. What about women?

White women with less than a bachelor’s degree in Pennsylvania have fared a little better than similarly-educated men, experiencing a 13 percent increase in hourly earnings since 1979-81 -- a one third of one percent increase annually. Black women with less than a bachelor’s degree saw their inflation-adjusted hourly earnings decline 1 percent in the last 36 years. 

An Extraordinary Year of Income Growth in Pennsylvania

Posted by Mark Price on September 16, 2016 10:11 am
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Yesterday the Census Bureau released data from the American Community Survey showing that median household incomes in Pennsylvania rose by just over $2,400 in the last year, strong evidence that an economy nearing full employment generates rising wages for workers. Higher-income families have now surpassed their pre-Great Recession incomes but the lower-income half of families have not.

SWPA 2016 Highlight: Non-College Educated Men in PA Falling Farther Behind

Posted by John Neurohr on September 14, 2016 1:29 pm
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The post below is one of a series of posts about specific trends examined in the recently-released annual edition of The State of Working Pennsylvania, written by Keystone Research Center Executive Director and economist Stephen Herzenberg and Research Director and economist Mark Price.

Many parts of Pennsylvania have been known for decades as blue-collar, working class communities. In these communities, manufacturing jobs sprouted and provided family-sustaining jobs from one generation to another, usually for men. As the economy has shifted, these communities and these men, many with only a high-school degree, have suffered. While this is familiar to most Pennsylvanians, the economic facts that tell the story never fail to stun. For example, let's take a look at wages over time for working-age men (aged 18 to 64) in Pennsylvania with less than a bachelor’s degree. As you do keep in mind that this is a BIG group--seven out of every 10 working-age men in Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania Job Growth in June

Posted by Mark Price on July 22, 2016 3:46 pm
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This morning the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry reported that nonfarm payrolls grew in June by 20,000 and the unemployment rate edged up slightly to 5.6%. A companion survey of Pennsylvania households registered a decline in resident employment in June of 7,000 — the third straight month of declines in this data.

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