Current Evidence on Household Financial Well-Being
Despite strong economic conditions, survey data reveal substantial economic worry and discontent among Americans. Pew survey data from 2024 indicated that “strengthening the economy” was Americans’ top policy priority, above “defending against terrorism,” “reducing crime,” and “dealing with immigration” (Pew 2024). A separate Pew survey from that same year found that only 53 percent of ...
The Age Divide in the American Workplace
Demographic shifts are reshaping the U.S. labor market, as the share of the population within the working age has begun to decline. In The Age Divide in the American Workplace, Nicola Bianchi and Matteo Paradisi address the implications of this decline with a focus on within-firm dynamics. Over the past five decades, longer life expectancy ...
The Economic Case for Smart Investing in America’s Youth
The United States spends a relatively small sum on children, both on a per capita basis and as a share of all spending. In 2019, the federal government spent an estimated $5,595 per child on programs benefiting children under 18, compared to $29,189 per elderly American on entitlement programs alone—a gap that remains wide even ...
March 2024 Jobs Report: Three Things to Know
The BLS estimated that the US economy added 275,000 jobs in February, with the unemployment rate ticking up from 3.7% to 3.9%. Three things stood beneath the headlines of this report. Revisions Take Some Heat of the Economy While the top-line number today beat the consensus market forecasts, the BLS also revised down their ...
Strengthening America’s Economic Dynamism
The Aspen Economic Strategy Group’s seventh annual policy volume focuses on the theme, Strengthening America’s Economic Dynamism. The volume’s publication comes at a time when US policymakers are turning away from free-market principles in favor of protectionist policies and more active government-directed industrial policy. These shifts, combined with growing economic and political difficulties including the ...
2024 Job Market Recap: Slow but Steady Labor Market Growth
The past year has been one marked by several significant swings in the labor market. It featured strong (possibly, immigration-fueled) growth in the labor market at the start, a sharp rise in the unemployment rate that fueled speculation of an incoming recession over the summer, and Hurricane-affected data to round out the fall. After all ...
In Brief: The Recent Rise in US Labor Productivity
BRIEFLY US labor productivity has enjoyed a period of renewed growth over the past year, interrupting a nearly twenty-year decline: the 2.7 percent productivity growth in 2023 outpaces the 1.5 percent annual average since 2004, and it nearly matches the 2.9 percent pace seen during the country’s last productivity surge in the 1990s. While the ...
$15 Trillion on the Table in 2029: Ordinary Taxes to Meet an Extraordinary Fiscal Moment
The US national debt passed 100 percent of GDP in March 2026 and is projected to reach nearly 130 percent by 2039. This worsening fiscal outlook comes at a time when income inequality remains high and advances in AI may drive widespread economic disruption. In $15 Trillion on the Table in 2029: Ordinary Taxes to ...