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Eugene

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Despite the Low Unemployment, Workers’ Wages are Lagging Inflation.

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Despite the Low Unemployment, Workers’ Wages are Lagging Inflation.

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The American Ratio Is Rising to Afford Basic Needs Macro

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by Andrew C.

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Macro Final Project, Essay Technology Impact

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"Overall, women still earn about 20 percent less than their male counterparts.That shortfall can vary widely depending on where you live.In Utah, for example, women only make about 57 cents for every dollar a man does."

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"Overall, women still earn about 20 percent less than their male counterparts.That shortfall can vary widely depending on where you live.In Utah, for example, women only make about 57 cents for every dollar a man does."

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As it stands, a woman makes about 80 cents for every dollar a man does nationwide. But that shortfall can vary widely depending on where you live.

A new report by GOBankingRates determined pay gaps between men and women across each state by analyzing data from the Census Bureau's 2016 American Community Survey.

In some states, like Wyoming and Utah, women make only a little more than half what their male counterparts earn - in part because the jobs in those areas are weighted heavily toward the energy-producing industry.

And there's no state in the country where earnings between the genders are equal, GoBankingRates found.

"In every single state women are earning less" said, Cameron Huddleston, a life and money expert for GoBankingRates, "and, in most states, women are earning less in every career field."

In Washington, D.C., which comes the closest to parity, women earn 83 cents on the dollar. (See map below.)

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These states pay women much less than men

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As it stands, a woman makes about 80 cents for every dollar a man does nationwide. But that shortfall can vary widely depending on where you live. A new report by GOBankingRates determined pay gaps between men and women across each state by analyzing data from the Census Bureau's 2016 American Community Survey.

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"In the U.S. for full-time work (35 hours or more), women annually earned 60 percent in 1955, 79 percent in 2010 and 83 percent in 2014 as compared to men, according to Francine Blau and Lawrence Kahn, J of Economic Literature, in September 2017. This gap has remained almost unchanged in 2018."

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"In the U.S. for full-time work (35 hours or more), women annually earned 60 percent in 1955, 79 percent in 2010 and 83 percent in 2014 as compared to men, according to Francine Blau and Lawrence Kahn, J of Economic Literature, in September 2017. This gap has remained almost unchanged in 2018."

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"#Me Too" movement has drawn attention to the mistreatment, harassment, and sexual assault of women in general and in the workplace. However, it has also rekindled the controversy of wage earnings discrimination against women in the workplace, even though the gap has narrowed since 1955.

In the U.S. for full-time work (35 hours or more), women annually earned 60 percent in 1955, 79 percent in 2010 and 83 percent in 2014 as compared to men, according to Francine Blau and Lawrence Kahn, J of Economic Literature, in September 2017. This gap has remained almost unchanged in 2018. It is narrower between black women and black men as opposed to white women and white men. In Utah the gap is worse (ranking 49th in the nation). What explains the persistence of wage earnings gap and its slow down since the 1980s?

Wage earnings gap will arise if women have skills associated with low-wage occupations. For example, a Utah Women and Leadership Project study from December 2016 finds that more than 40 percent of Utah women work in two occupational groups with income gaps ranging from 14 percent to 59 percent from the average for all professions in the state ($31,446). Women in Utah have lower participation rates in higher paid occupations, such as construction and extractive industry, installation, maintenance and repair, and architecture and engineering.

As compared to other countries, the U.S. has a higher wage gap between lower and higher skills. Thus it creates a greater wage gap in the U.S. since women are concentrated in lower-skilled occupations. The paradox is that in Utah men and women have almost the same levels of education, at the associate and the bachelor's degree levels, but still have one of the worst earnings gap. Studies show that even though women have made much progress in entering higher paid occupations, they still lag behind men in occupations requiring skills in math, science, engineering and finance.

What about the earnings gap within the same occupations, with the same education and experience? It could be due to attributes, such as experience, turnover, absenteeism and part-time work. As the study by Blau and Kahn shows, even though experience in general has narrowed nationally between men and women, the above characteristics could lead to less specific training and experience in particular occupations, lower productivity and hence lower wages. Such factors matter more for women who face the problem of balancing work and family (more so in Utah due to large family size).

The report, Workplace Gender Gap in the Oct. 23, 2018 Wall Street Journal, finds that aside from experiencing harassment in technical and senior management positions, the share of women decreases at every step of the management ladder. Their share in industries, such as health care systems, retail, banking and consumer finance, tech and software, and engineering, declines at each level of senior positions as compared to their share at the entry level.

"#Me Too" movement has made business executives aware of the discrimination against women in the workplace. This movement has also made women realize their self-worth and made them more assertive in demanding equal treatment in the workplace. However, as WSJ reports, women CEO-founders of companies with less than $15 million of investor financing pay themselves less compensation than men, mainly due to the shortage of financial support by venture capitalists.

Evidence cannot discount discrimination against women in hiring, pay, promotion, and lack of mentoring and other support structure in the labor market. According to McKinsey study for US News and World Report, 2018, Utah ranks second from the top in the economy's performance and third from the top in education, but ranks 35th from the top in opportunity. Hopefully, senior executives in businesses and institutions will realize the loss of economic wealth to the nation if women's potential is not fully recognized and utilized.

According to philosopher John Rawls' concept of justice, in the meritocratic system of the free market, the distribution of income and wealth is just, "only if everyone has the same opportunity to develop his or her own talents. Only if everyone begins at the same starting line ... the winners of the race deserve their rewards."

Mathur is former chairman and professor of economics, emeritus, Department of Economics, Cleveland State University, Cleveland, OH. He blogs at mathursblogonomics.blogspot.com.

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"#Me Too" movement has drawn attention to the mistreatment, harassment, and sexual assault of women in general and in the workplace. However, it has also rekindled the controversy of wage earnings discrimination against women in the workplace, even though the gap has narrowed since 1955. In the U.S.

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Alan Greenspan: Tightest labor market I've ever seen

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Alan Greenspan, longtime former Fed chairman (1987-2006), and Adrian Wooldridge of The Economist join 'Squawk Box' to weigh in on the global economy and their new book, "Capitalism in America: A History."

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Bitcoin's holding steady amidst the market chaos, but one trader says now's the time to sell

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A bitcoin safety trade? Trading bitcoin futures now, with CNBC's Jackie DeAngelis and the Futures Now traders, Brian Stutland and Scott Nations, both at the CME.

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"Many countries have issued statements indicating that bitcoin and other digital currencies are not regulated and do not exist as officially sanctioned currencies: a status that could put users at risk but would not have them violating any laws. Bitcoin is outright illegal in some countries, such as Iceland."

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"Many countries have issued statements indicating that bitcoin and other digital currencies are not regulated and do not exist as officially sanctioned currencies: a status that could put users at risk but would not have them violating any laws. Bitcoin is outright illegal in some countries, such as Iceland."

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It's understandable to have questions about the legality of using Bitcoin. The platform introduced a brand new paradigm away from the traditional regulators and regulations that govern fiat currency. Unlike illegal, counterfeit money, which is a blatant example of a "currency" that misrepresents itself as legal ...

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"The population of undocumented immigrants has risen steadily over recent years, remaining the same from 2009 to 2014 at 11.1 million and accounting for roughly 3.5% of the total US population."

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"The population of undocumented immigrants has risen steadily over recent years, remaining the same from 2009 to 2014 at 11.1 million and accounting for roughly 3.5% of the total US population."

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"Estimates of its cost range from President Trump’s proposed $8-$12 billion to New America Foundation’s comparatively higher $27-$40 billion estimate"

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On June 16, 2015, President Donald Trump announced his plan for what would become a divisive yet defining issue throughout the 2016 campaign: the implementation of a border "wall". Now that the new president has settled in, the rhetorical has turned real, and many are wondering what a wall along our southern border will look like. Estimates of its cost range from President Trump's proposed $8-$12 billion to New America Foundation's comparatively higher $27-$40 billion estimate. [2] With such an endeavor, what are the implications for employment, trade, and tax policy? [3]

Construction of the Wall

There is little consensus on precisely how much the wall would cost to build. However, there is one certainty: building the wall would create jobs. [4] Nearly all aspects of the construction - from physical building to servicing workers constructing the wall will undoubtedly require workers. However, despite providing a positive shock on the demand side, our president will soon encounter a critical problem on the supply side: the country's ongoing construction labor shortage. [5] For the president, the shortage will, at best, affect labor costs; at worst, it may compromise the general feasibility of a prompt construction of the wall.

In order to have a sufficiently large workforce to make wall construction feasible, only two options seem plausible: face the increasingly high labor prices in the construction labor market - where demand for workers is steadily increasing - or look to undocumented immigrant workers. [6] The former option presents a question of timeliness and fiscal responsibility. However, the latter - while keeping labor costs down - presents a far more poignant issue that the wall's proponents must address. The prospect of hiring Mexican workers to build a wall dividing the two countries is, according to Michael Camuñez - former assistant secretary of commerce under President Obama - akin to "asking an East Berliner to build the wall that cuts them off from the world."

While many are concerned with the difficulties of a labor shortage, others are quick to point out the issue of how the wall will be financed. In his campaign announcement, President Trump stated that Mexico would pay for the wall. However, after President Enrique Peña Nieto categorically denied any chance of his country footing the bill, the prospect of Mexico directly funding the work grew dim. The task now became how to have Mexico indirectly pay for the wall.

Financing - the Border Adjustment Tax

On January 26, Sean Spicer, the White House Press Secretary, announced that the Trump administration was considering a 20% tariff that would be levied on Mexican imports. This announcement was met with harsh backlash and arguments that this policy would only nominally make Mexico pay for the structure. The real burden would be posed on American consumers. [7] The administration later backtracked on its claim and stated that the 20% tariff was just one idea that they were considering. Soon after, the U.S. House of Representatives Republican Conference released a more diplomatic proposal - a Border Adjustment Tax.

The new Congress is proposing a tax plan [8] that would lower corporate taxes from 35 to 20 percent. This tax would be applied by area of consumption as opposed to area of production. This being said, all imports would be subject to the tax, while exports would have the tax refunded, making them effectively tax-free. [9]

Border adjustment taxes do not hold the same negative connotations as tariffs do. Currently, the United States has tariffs that accounted for $1.4tn in 2015. [10] Though considered protectionist, Border Adjustment Taxes have the diplomatic benefit of applying across the board so as not to single out a specific country. 160 countries have such policies. Whereas a tariff levied on Mexico would certainly strain relations, the United States' neighbor to the south can hardly object to the use of a policy they, too, enforce.[8]

Then the question remains, how much revenue would this plan bring in? If the United States had a trade balance, a numerically equal subsidy to exports and tax on imports would leave no impact on government revenues. [9] However, the United States is running a trade deficit. This being the case, the budget adjustment would bring in revenues.

One of the countries that the United States has a trade deficit with is Mexico. In 2016, the size of this deficit was $63.2 billion. [11] If this level of deficit were to continue and if these net imports were taxed at 20%, this would generate $12.6 billion in additional tax dollars per year. Given that high estimates for the cost of the wall range between $15 and $25 billion, revenue from the border adjustment tax coming from Mexico would pay it in no more than two years - Mexico may effectively pay for the wall after all.

Political Implications of Policy Proposals

In addition to affecting undocumented immigration, the economic and financial impact of the border wall have political implications for the Trump administration [12]. A cornerstone of President Trump's platform was that he would construct the wall without having to raise taxes on Americans. The previously cited initial proposal of a 20 percent border tax represents a major deviation from the President's earlier claims that the wall could be built without incurring the cost on American taxpayers as the proposed plan to levy a border tax would effectively impose financial burdens on Americans of all socioeconomic strata. This stands in stark contrast to Trump's previous claims economic situations would improve, especially for middle class Americans, and that Mexico would pay for the construction of the wall. [13]

Although details are still in-the-works, top GOP lawmakers have confirmed that a Border Adjustment Tax and not a border tax, or tariff, will likely appear in the final GOP tax plan. [14] However, the proposed tax plan has come under fire from retailers and small businesses, especially those that rely on imports. [15] In its current state, the Border Adjustment Tax replaces the US's 35% corporate tax rate with a lower business tax rate of 20%. [16] However, the reduction in the overall tax rate will be compensated for the fact that imports will no longer be counted as a business expense and exports will no longer be counted as business revenues. Moreover, firms will be able immediately write off the value of a depreciated assets. Proponents claim that the dollar will increase in value in response to the new tax plan as to negate any disadvantage for importer or advantage for exporters. [17] However, opponents claim that such a valuation of the dollar is unrealistic as other countries might implement their own retaliatory policies and that too many factors influence currency values to claim that the dollar will increase by a predictable amount.

Although the direct impact of the proposed GOP border tax solution is still unknown, it is clear that President Trump's border initiative will have significant financial and economic implications. From impacting America's standing in the World Trade Organization to providing a positive demand-side shock, one thing is for certain, the consequences of the border wall will stretch far beyond the Mexico-US border.

References

[1] http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/03/5-facts-about-illegal-immigration-in-the-u-s/

[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-trump-mexico-wall/how-much-would-the-wall-cost/

[3] https://www.technologyreview.com/s/602494/bad-math-props-up-trumps-border-wall/

[4] https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-trump-mexico-wall/how-many-jobs-would-it-create/

[5] http://fortune.com/2016/09/06/housing-construction-worker-shortage/

[6] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-26/trump-wants-to-build-a-wall-finding-workers-won-t-be-easy

[7] https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2017/01/27/memo-to-trump-20-mexican-import-tariff-means-americans-pay-for-the-wall/#75e597125a0820% tariff

[8] https://abetterway.speaker.gov/_assets/pdf/ABetterWay-Tax-PolicyPaper.pdf

[9] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/yes-trump-can-make-mexico-pay-for-the-border-wall-heres-how/2017/01/17/7edf7872-dcbf-11e6-ad42-f3375f271c9c_story.html?utm_term=.628bdb2f67e4

[10] http://wits.worldbank.org/CountrySnapshot/en/USA/textview

[11] http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2017/01/taxes-and-tariffs

[12] https://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/assets/documents/2016-Oct/BP%20Southwest%20Border%20Sector%20Apps%20FY1960%20-%20FY2016.pdf

[13] http://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/2017/01/23/trump-doubles-down-on-promise-to-give-americans-tax-break.html

[14] http://www.cnbc.com/2017/03/21/border-tax-has-become-a-given-chief-gop-tax-writer-says.html

[15] http://www.cnbc.com/2017/03/21/border-tax-has-become-a-given-chief-gop-tax-writer-says.html

[16] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/will-the-grand-republican-tax-plan-work/2017/03/03/4e3700e0-fdd6-11e6-99b4-9e613afeb09f_story.html?utm_term=.1685d401a3fb

[17] http://fortune.com/2017/02/10/the-border-adjustment-tax-may-have-zero-effect-on-american-companies/

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Economic Implications of Building a Wall

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On June 16, 2015, President Donald Trump announced his plan for what would become a divisive yet defining issue throughout the 2016 campaign: the implementation of a border "wall". Now that the new president has settled in, the rhetorical has turned real, and many are wondering what a wall along our southern border will look like.

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fact check: construction on a new border wall? - cnn video

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Fact Check: Construction on a new border wall? - CNN Video

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CNN's Jake Tapper looks at President Trump's claim that the US is already building his proposed border wall. Read more at FactCheck.org.

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what the us-mexico border really looks like - cnn video

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What the US-Mexico border really looks like - CNN Video

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Get a birds-eye view of the US-Mexico border which is nearly 2,000 miles long and has 700 miles of fence running along it.

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Right now, approximately 56 million Americans are collecting Social Security benefits.  By 2035, that number is projected to grow to a whopping 91 million.

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Right now, approximately 56 million Americans are collecting Social Security benefits.  By 2035, that number is projected to grow to a whopping 91 million.

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The trustees of the Social Security system had projected that the Social Security trust fund would be completely gone by 2033, but because of the Fed policy of keeping interest rates exceptionally low for the foreseeable future it is now being projected by some analysts that Social Security will be bankrupt by 2023.  Overall, the Social Security system is facing a 134 trillion dollar shortfall over the next 75 years.

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Last week the mainstream media hailed QE3 as the "quick fix" that the U.S. economy desperately needs, but the truth is that the policies that the Federal Reserve is pursuing are going to be absolutely devastating for our senior citizens. By keeping interest rates at exceptionally low levels, the Federal Reserve is absolutely crushing savers and is systematically destroying Social Security. Meanwhile, the inflation that QE3 will cause is going to be absolutely crippling for the millions upon millions of retired Americans that are on a fixed income. Sadly, most elderly Americans have no idea what the Federal Reserve is doing to their financial futures. Most Americans that are approaching retirement age have not adequately saved for retirement, and the Social Security system that they are depending on is going to completely and totally collapse in the coming years. Right now, approximately 56 million Americans are collecting Social Security benefits. By 2035, that number is projected to grow to a whopping 91 million. By law, the Social Security trust fund must be invested in U.S. government securities. But thanks to the low interest rate policies of the Federal Reserve, the average interest rate on those securities just keeps dropping and dropping. The trustees of the Social Security system had projected that the Social Security trust fund would be completely gone by 2033, but because of the Fed policy of keeping interest rates exceptionally low for the foreseeable future it is now being projected by some analysts that Social Security will be bankrupt by 2023. Overall, the Social Security system is facing a 134 trillion dollar shortfall over the next 75 years. Yes, you read that correctly. The collapse of Social Security is inevitable, and the foolish policies of the Federal Reserve are going to make that collapse happen much more rapidly.

The only way that the Social Security system is going to be able to stay solvent is for the Social Security trust fund to earn a healthy level of interest.

By law, all money deposited in the Social Security trust fund must be invested in U.S. government securities. The following is from the official website of the Social Security Administration....

By law, income to the trust funds must be invested, on a daily basis, in securities guaranteed as to both principal and interest by the Federal government. All securities held by the trust funds are "special issues" of the United States Treasury. Such securities are available only to the trust funds. In the past, the trust funds have held marketable Treasury securities, which are available to the general public. Unlike marketable securities, special issues can be redeemed at any time at face value. Marketable securities are subject to the forces of the open market and may suffer a loss, or enjoy a gain, if sold before maturity. Investment in special issues gives the trust funds the same flexibility as holding cash.

So in order for the Social Security Ponzi scheme to work, those investments in government securities need to produce healthy returns.

Unfortunately, the ultra-low interest rate policy of the Federal Reserve is making this impossible.

The average rate of interest earned by the Social Security trust fund has declined from 6.1 percent in January 2003 to 3.9 percent today, and it is going to continue to go even lower as long as the Fed continues to keep interest rates super low.

A recent article by Bruce Krasting detailed how this works. Just check out the following example....

$135 billion of old bonds matured this year. This money was rolled over into new bonds with a yield of only 1.375%. The average yield on the maturing securities was 5.64%. The drop in yield on the new securities lowers SSA's income by $5.7B annually. Over the fifteen year term of the investments, that comes to a lumpy $86 billion.

So what happens when the Social Security trust fund runs dry?

As Bruce Krasting also noted, all Social Security payments would immediately be cut by 25 percent.....

Anyone who is 55 or older should be worried about this. Based on current law, all SS benefit payments must be cut by (approximately) 25% when the TF is exhausted. This will affect 72 million people. The economic consequences will be severe.

In other words, it would be a complete and total nightmare.

Sadly, the truth is that the Social Security trust fund might not even make it into the next decade. Most Social Security trust fund projections assume that there will be no recessions and that there will be a very healthy rate of growth for the U.S. economy over the next decade.

So what happens if we have another major recession or worse?

And most Americans know that something is up with Social Security. According to a Gallup survey, 67 percent of all Americans believe that there will be a Social Security crisis within 10 years.

Part of the problem is that there are way too many people retiring and not nearly enough workers to support them.

Back in 1950, each retiree's Social Security benefit was paid for by 16 U.S. workers. But now things are much different. According to new data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are now only 1.75 full-time private sector workers for each person that is receiving Social Security benefits in the United States.

And remember, the number of Americans drawing on Social Security will increase by another 35 million by the year 2035.

Another factor that is rapidly becoming a major problem is the growth of the Social Security disability program.

Since 2008, 3.6 million more Americans have been added to the rolls of the Social Security disability insurance program.

Today, more than 8.7 million Americans are collecting Social Security disability payments.

So how does this compare to the past?

Back in August 1967, there were approximately 65 workers for each American that was collecting Social Security disability payments.

Today, there are only 16.2 workers for each American that is collecting Social Security disability payments.

The Social Security Ponzi scheme is rapidly approaching a crisis point.

Sadly, the Federal Reserve has made it incredibly difficult to save for your own retirement.

Millions upon millions of Baby Boomers that diligently saved money for retirement are finding that their savings accounts are paying out next to nothing thanks to the ultra-low interest rate policies of the Federal Reserve.

The following is one example of how the low interest rate policies of the Fed have completely devastated the retirement plans of many elderly Americans....

You can understand the impact of the invisible tax on the elderly by watching the decline of interest income from $50,000 invested in a five-year Treasury obligation. As recently as 2000, this would have yielded about 6.15 percent and an interest income of $3,075 a year. Now the same obligation is yielding 0.7 percent and an interest income of $350 a year. This is the lowest yield on this maturity of Treasury debt since the Federal Reserve started keeping an index of the yields in 1953. But it's more than a low interest rate. It's an income decline of nearly 89 percent in just 12 years.

And after you account for inflation, those that put money into savings accounts today are actually losing money.

Of course most Americans have not saved up much money for retirement anyway. According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, 46 percent of all American workers have less than $10,000 saved for retirement, and 29 percent of all American workers have less than $1,000 saved for retirement.

Overall, a study conducted by Boston College's Center for Retirement Research discovered that American workers are $6.6 trillion short of what they need to retire comfortably.

So needless to say, we have a major problem.

Baby Boomers are just starting to retire and the Social Security system is still solvent at the moment, and yet the number of elderly Americans that are experiencing financial problems is already soaring.

For example, between 1991 and 2007 the number of Americans between the ages of 65 and 74 that filed for bankruptcy rose by a staggering 178 percent.

Also, at this point one out of every six elderly Americans is already living below the federal poverty line.

So how bad are things going to be when Social Security collapses?

That is frightening to think about.

In the short-term, millions upon millions of retired Americans that are living on fixed incomes are going to be absolutely crushed by the inflation that QE3 is going to cause.

Just like we saw with QE1 and QE2, a lot of the money from QE3 is going to end up in agricultural commodities and oil. That means that retirees (and all the rest of us) are going to end up paying more for food at the supermarket and gasoline at the pump.

But those on fixed incomes are not going to see a corresponding increase in their incomes. That means that their standards of living will go down.

Things are tough for retirees right now, but they are going to get a lot tougher.

Right now, there are somewhere around 40 million senior citizens. By 2050 that number is projected to increase to 89 million.

So how will our society cope with more than twice as many senior citizens?

Sadly, we will likely never get to find out.

The truth is that our system is almost certainly going to totally collapse long before then.

We are rapidly approaching a financial crisis unlike anything we have ever seen before in U.S. history, and the foolish policies of the Federal Reserve just keep making things even worse.

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Last week the mainstream media hailed QE3 as the "quick fix" that the U.S. economy desperately needs, but the truth is that the policies that the Federal Reserve is pursuing are going to be absolutely devastating for our senior citizens.

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Why baby boomers need immigrants to fund their retirement, in 2 chartsThe Trump administration’s immigration policies will hurt elderly Americans.

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Why baby boomers need immigrants to fund their retirement, in 2 chartsThe Trump administration’s immigration policies will hurt elderly Americans.

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The Social Security system is in trouble. It's not just a future problem; America's retirement insurance program is in trouble now. The federal government will start dipping into its Social Security savings account this year to help pay retirement benefits to millions of Americans.

In 2018, the federal government expects to receive about $2 billion less in payroll taxes and investment income than it will need to pay workers through the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance program.If nothing changes, that savings account will run dry by 2034, right around when the last of the baby boomers reach retirement age. After that, the government will only have enough money to pay retirees and disabled workers 79 cents for every dollar they're owed.

These findings were recently published in the Social Security Administration's 2018 trustees report, prompting the expected torrent of alarming headlines, such as " Get Ready for the Great Depression" and " Social Security & Medicare are slowly dying, but no one in Washington will lift a finger."

The annual report, prepared by government economists at the SSA, cited many reasons for the crisis, but it basically comes down to this: More Americans are retiring, and they are living longer. And there is no economic boom in sight.

But buried in the trustees' report were a few calculations that point to a potential silver lining, though it's one that the Trump administration probably doesn't want to hear. Economic estimates show that immigration would help save the Social Security system. Not just legal immigration - illegal immigration too.

Undocumented immigrants and immigrants with legal status pay billions of dollars each year into the Social Security system through payroll taxes. Based on estimates in the trustees report, the more immigrants that come in, the longer the Social Security system will stay solvent. That's because immigrants, on average, are a lot younger than the overall US population, so their retirement is far off. And undocumented immigrants pay for Social Security, but they're not allowed to get benefits.

Here are two charts that show the impact of immigration on the Social Security system. The first chart shows how the Social Security Trust Fund (essentially a savings account) will run out of money if Congress doesn't do something to boost its reserves, such as increasing legal immigration and closing a tax loophole for rich workers.

The reason for that nose dive is because, for the first time in more than 30 years, the Social Security system is running a deficit. That means that in 2017, the federal government cut more Social Security checks to retirees and disabled workers than it collected in payroll taxes from the current workforce. The federal government will have to start dipping into the $2.9 trillion trust fund to keep paying out benefits. This year, the government will probably have to take about $2 billion from the trust fund, according to the report.

Furthermore, Social Security now costs more than before because more Americans are retiring, and they are living longer. In 1960, about 5.1 workers supported each person receiving a retirement or disability check, and that ratio has been shrinking ever since. In 2013, there were 2.9 workers for every beneficiary. So the current level of payroll taxes is no longer enough to keep the program afloat.

But here's how immigration could change that:

The number of immigrants in the US peaked in 2005, when the population had 2 million more immigrants than the previous year. That number reached a historic low in 2008 at the start of the Great Recession but has been ticking back up. In 2014, there were about 1 million more immigrants in the US than the previous year.

Even though the economy has improved as more immigrants join the US workforce, the Trump administration has insisted on restricting legal avenues for immigration. That will hurt Social Security, according to the SSA report.

If Trump allowed current immigration levels to stay the same (about 1.6 million more immigrants lived in the US in 2017 than the year before), then Social Security would have a better chance to stay solvent. The SSA's estimates include authorized immigrants, unauthorized immigrants, and foreign workers on temporary visas.

As the chart shows, any growth in immigration lowers the Social Security deficit. The higher the growth, the lower the deficit.

According to the SSA, the reason is pretty simple. Immigrant workers tend to be younger, so they have a lot more years to work and pay taxes before they retire. But another reason that goes unmentioned in the report is that undocumented immigrants, ironically, provide an added boost to the system because they pay into the Social Security system, but they can't receive benefits.

Undocumented immigrants pay billions of dollars in federal taxes each year. Payroll taxes for Medicare and Social Security are still withheld from their paychecks, even if they use a fake Social Security number on their W-2 form. The IRS estimates that unauthorized workers pay about $9 billion in payroll taxes annually.

A portion of the payroll tax withheld from undocumented immigrants - like all workers -goes into the Social Security Trust Fund (that savings account in the first chart). In 2013, the agency reviewed how much money undocumented workers contributed to the retirement trust fund. The number was even higher than average that year: $13 billion.

The chief actuary of the Social Security Administration, Stephen Goss, estimated that about 1.8 million immigrants were working with fake or stolen Social Security cards in 2010, and he expected that number to reach 3.4 million by 2040.

"We estimate that earnings by unauthorized immigrants result in a net positive effect on Social Security financial status generally," Goss concluded in the 2013 review.

These numbers are a stark contrast to the often repeated rhetoric that undocumented immigrants are a drain on the US economy - rhetoric repeated by President Donald Trump. But working-class Americans, including many who voted for Trump, need immigrants to help pay for their retirement.

Congress needs to close the tax loophole

Boosting immigration alone isn't enough to save the Social Security system. Immigration lowers the deficit, but it doesn't eliminate it. One of the main problems is that low-wage and middle-class workers are paying a disproportionate share of their income into the Social Security system. More affluent workers don't have to pay the 6.2 percent tax on any income they earn above $128,400, so a worker who earns $128,400 a year is paying the exact same amount in Social Security taxes as a billionaire. It's basically a tax loophole for the wealthy.

In July 2017, a group of Congressional Democrats, led by Rep. Ted Deutch (FL) and Sen. Mazie Hirono (HI), introduced a bill to gradually phase out that cap. Under the bill, named the Protecting and Preserving Social Security Act, all wages would be subject to the 6.2 percent tax within seven years. It would also adjust the formula to calculate annual cost of living increases for retirees who get Social Security checks, so that the increase better reflects the spending habits of elderly Americans, who tend to spend more of their income on prescription drugs and energy bills.

The proposal would nearly close the deficit. An analysis by the Social Security Administration said it would keep enough money in the trust fund to pay retirees their full retirement benefits for an extra 25 years.

The bill was sent to three House committees. It's been one year since then, and Republican leaders still haven't put it up for a vote.

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Why baby boomers need immigrants to fund their retirement, in 2 charts

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The Social Security system is in trouble. It's not just a future problem; America's retirement insurance program is in trouble now. The federal government will start dipping into its Social Security savings account this year to help pay retirement benefits to millions of Americans.

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Ellen Zentner of Morgan Stanley gives her take on how the storm may weigh on the economy.

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Treasury Department data shows Russian holdings of US debt plunged

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Russian holdings of Treasury securities declined 84 percent between March and May, falling to $14.9 billion from $96.1 billion in just two months. Russia's sell-off of U.S. debt in May occurred around the same time the benchmark 10-year Treasury note yield rose to its highest level since 2011.

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US debt issuance plans rising as Fed moves to trim balance sheet: Economist

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US debt issuance plans rising as Fed moves to trim balance sheet: Economist

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2017 U.S. Debt USA Debt U.S. Debt Comparison Singapore National Debt U.S. Debt Clock Us Debt Relief Center National Debt Clock History of Us Debt United States Debt by Year U.S. Debt Explained Who Owns United States Debt Who Owns U.S. Debt Us Debt by President Us Debt to China 2007 U.S.

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Peterson's Kirkegeaard Says Global Terror Fight Continues

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Peterson's Kirkegeaard Says Global Terror Fight Continues

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What is the economic impact of terrorism?

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What is the economic impact of terrorism?

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What is the economic impact of terrorism?

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The World Economic Forum is an independent international organization committed to improving the state of the world by engaging business, political, academic and other leaders of society to shape global, regional and industry agendas. Incorporated as a not-for-profit foundation in 1971, and headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, the Forum is tied to no political, partisan or national interests.

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How Will Immigration Reform Impact the U.S. Economy?

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How Will Immigration Reform Impact the U.S. Economy?

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immigratipon and us economy video - Bing video

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Total Collapse of Us Economy 2017 U.S. Economy U.S. Economy Bloomberg U.S. Economy Over Time What Would Happen If the U.S. Economy Collapsed 2016 U.S. Economy Global Economy Future of Us Economy Prediction Economy 2017 2018 U.S. Economy U-Economy Funnels System 2018 Us Economy in 2020 Us Economy in 2015 U.S.

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Technological change is part of the economic process. The economist Joseph Schumpeter once described economic innovation as "the perennial gale of creative destruction." He meant that the competition and the drive to find better, more efficient ways to produce goods and provide services leads businesses to take advantage of every new technology. Technological innovation comes with a price, however, destroying some jobs while creating others.

Technology in History

The impact of technology has been felt for centuries. The woolen mills of the early Industrial Revolution put cottage industries operating hand looms out of business. The internal combustion engine left many harness makers and blacksmiths jobless. The more contemporary technological revolution has displaced secretaries, postal workers and telephone operators. Technological innovation makes it possible to do more with less. Facebook bought Instagram in 2012 for $1 billion. Instagram had 30 million customers and just 11 employees. By contrast, Kodak, which had just filed for bankruptcy, had 145,000 employees at the height of its operations. Displaced workers are usually first to feel the impact of innovation, with the middle and under classes bearing the brunt of unemployment.

Technology and Economic Growth

According to classical economic theory, the accumulation of physical capital - tools, trucks, bulldozers and assembly lines, for example - is responsible for increasing human productivity. You can drive a nail with a rock, a hammer or a nail gun, but you will be most productive with the latter. However, capital goods do not account for all economic growth. Technology plays a significant role in fueling economic growth. The impact of technology can be seen in advances in manufacturing where robots perform precision operations and in hospitals where robots are used to make medical procedures less invasive. Advances in technology are improving batteries to create better performance in everything from hand-held devices to electric automobiles. Predicting the advances made possible by technology is challenging, but they will continue unabated.

The Downside of Technological Change

A negative aspect of technological change is its impact on income distribution. Workers who are displaced by technological advances may find it difficult to become re-employed as new jobs require advanced skills they do not possess. Technology impacts the number of jobs needed to produce goods and services. At the turn of the 20th century, a third of American workers were employed in agriculture. As of publication, only 2 percent of the labor force works on the farm, producing more than their predecessors. A report from Oxford University states that 47 percent of all jobs may be automated in the coming decades. Middle-class jobs will be lost, and the gap between the haves and the have-nots will widen.

Prospering with Technological Change

The rate of technological change makes it necessary to take a fresh look at education. While the technological revolution opens opportunities for better jobs, workers must be retrained and re-educated to take advantage of them. Education must be less by rote and more focused on creative thinking. The Internet has made online learning an alternative to traditional classroom instruction, and many academic institutions are turning to blended learning - a mix of classroom and online. Online opportunities such as Khan Academy or the colleges that post their academic courses for anyone to audit online, such as Massive Online Open Courses (MOOCs), are examples of the technological wave that can give workers the knowledge to gain higher-paying jobs.

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Technological change is part of the economic process. The economist Joseph Schumpeter once described economic innovation as "the perennial gale of creative destruction." He meant that the competition and the drive to find better, more efficient ways to produce goods and provide services leads businesses to take advantage of every new technology.

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GARY SHILLING: Tech innovation will drive economic growth

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GARY SHILLING: Tech innovation will drive economic growth

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video about new technology and economic growth - Bing video

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What does a trade war look like? We explain

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Venezuela Economic Crisis Venezuela Food Crisis Venezuela Inflation Days Ago Venezuela Ecosystem Venezuela Economy 2017 Venezuela Economy YouTube Venezuela Population Venezuela Violence Venezuela Crisis ABC News Venezuela Shopping Venezuela Financial Crisis Venezuela Economy 2018 Latest Venezuela Crisis Venezuela Today Chile Economy

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Private Student Loan No Cosigner Student Loan How Does Student Loans Work Student Loan Consolidation Gov Student Loan GuideWell Financial Chinese Student Loans Federal Student Loans Login Loans for Poor Credit Are Student Loans Forgiven Obama Student Loans Unsecured Loans Student Loan Network Consolidation Review Student Loan Calculator

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A look at why the United States and China are moving closer to a potential trade war

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http://aceproject.org/ace-en/focus/procurement/specific-procurement-issues-for-the-introduction/the-impact-of-introducing-new-technologies

Hypothesis:
If the United states keeps introducing new technologies in the world then I think overtime the unemployment rate will go up.

What are you interested in macro economics?-
I want to know how U.S. products are altered to fit the governments needs.

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Crude Oil Price, Oil, Energy, Petroleum, Oil Price, WTI & Brent Oil, Oil Price Charts and Oil Price Forecast

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Crude Oil Prices Charts. Latest News on Oil, Energy and Petroleum Prices. Articles, Analysis and Market Intelligence on the Oil, Gas, Petroleum and Energy Industry. Accurate Oil Price Forecasts

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The United States and Mexico Border Wall, an Economic Problem.

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The United States and Mexico Border Wall, an Economic Problem.

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The United States and Mexico Border Wall

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Research Project macroSouth Africa’s Economy

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Research EssayVenezuela A Dwindling Economy 1

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Economics Soon to be Problems with College Price

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  The Economic Issues With The National Debt 

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  The Economic Issues With The National Debt 

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The Economic Issues With The National Debt  

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Dylan P.The Demise of Public Education ECON

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continuously updated us national debt clock real time us debt clock

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US National Debt Clock : Real Time U.S. National Debt Clock

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The United States could simply make more money to pay its bills, said Stephanie Kelton, an economics professor at Stony Brook University. But taken to an extreme, that could lead to higher inflation. - Mark Wilson/Getty Images

The federal deficit - the gap between the revenue the government brings in and what it spends - grew to nearly $780 billion in the 2018 fiscal year, according to the Treasury Department.

That's an increase of nearly 17 percent over the previous year, driven largely by the Trump tax cuts, as well as increased military spending. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell called the numbers "very disturbing" in an interview with Bloomberg, pinning the blame for the increase on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

While there are economic limits to how much the U.S. government can and should borrow, what that limit is or how close it may be tough to say.

"There's no quick and easy answer," said Harvard economist Kenneth Rogoff. "It's clear that the U.S. can bear a lot more debt than it has at today's low interest rate."

Even with higher annual deficits spurred by tax cuts that will add over a trillion dollars to the debt in the next 10 years, the United States is not nearing unsustainable debt levels, said Stephanie Kelton, a professor of economics and public policy at Stony Brook University.

"Some people would say the red lights are flashing, and we're all sticking our heads in the sand and ignoring the clear and present danger," she said. "I don't see a clear and present danger."

Kelton said the United States, like Japan, will always be able pay its debts since it controls its own currency. It can simply create more money to pay its bills.

Taken to an extreme, that strategy can lead to higher inflation. And Kelton said it matters what the government uses its borrowed money to do - whether or not the spending will make the future economy more productive.

However, while there may be economic room for higher U.S. debt, politically, the threshold may be significantly lower.

"The likely scenario is there will be pressure to cut spending," said Robert Pollin, director of the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. "If the Trump administration is committed to continuing to increase military spending, the only place where you can get a substantial amount of savings out of the rest of the budget is in health care."

"I think the best compliment I can give is not to say how much your programs have taught me (a ton), but how much Marketplace has motivated me to go out and teach myself." - Michael in Arlington, VA

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The federal deficit - the gap between the revenue the government brings in and what it spends - grew to nearly $780 billion in the 2018 fiscal year, according to the Treasury Department. That's an increase of nearly 17 percent over the previous year, driven largely by the Trump tax cuts, as well as increased military spending.

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WASHINGTON - The national debt is $21 trillion and counting.

The federal deficit soared last year to $779 billion and is projected to approach $1 trillion in 2019.

For most Americans, it's difficult to comprehend a dollar figure that has that many digits. ($1 trillion, when written out in long form, is $1,000,000,000,000. Yes, that's 12 zeroes.) The numbers are so huge that they almost seem surreal.

But the impact of the rising national debt and federal deficit is very real, even for average Americans, financial experts warn.

So here's what you should know about the debt and the deficit - and why you should care.

Deficit and debt: What's the difference?

The terms deficit and debt often appear in the same government reports that spell out the country's financial woes. But they're not the same.

Put simply, the deficit refers to the difference between what the federal government spends and the revenue it takes in annually. The debt is the amount of money the federal government must borrow to cover years of budget deficits.

Both are on the rise.

The deficit hit $779 billion in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 because tax revenues are not keeping pace with government spending, the Treasury Department announced Monday. That's a 17 percent increase over the previous year - the highest deficit in six years.

And it could have been worse. The year's deficit would have been even higher if not for a shift in the timing of certain payments, the Treasury said.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin suggested that the rising deficit was the result of "irresponsible and unnecessary spending." But a separate report released earlier this month by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the jump was fueled in part by the tax cuts Congress approved last year.

As for the national debt, it continues to climb at a staggering pace. Right now, it's more than $21 trillion and literally soaring by the second. To keep track, you almost need a clock. Luckily, there are several operated by various groups that show just how fast the debt is piling up.

Things haven't always been this bleak. In 2000, the federal government had a surplus of $236 billion and the national debt was less than $6 trillion, according to the Treasury Department.

What's the impact?

More debt and higher deficits not only harm the economy, they dip into the pocketbooks of average Americans, said Maya MacGuineas, president of the nonpartisan Committee for a Response Federal Budget.

For starters, they drive up interest rates, which leads to slower economic growth. Slower growth leads to lower wages, which results in a lower standard of living for Americans, MacGuineas said.

To pay for years of deficits, the federal government must borrow money. Roughly half of the U.S. debt is held by foreign countries, such as China, Japan and Saudi Arabia. China alone holds more than $1 trillion in U.S. debt.

Borrowing at that level is financially irresponsible, MacGuineas said. "We have a global sugar daddy that is allowing us to borrow at an unsustainable level," she said.

Why is it unsustainable? Because the more we borrow, the more we pay in interest to those countries.

Interest on U.S. debt is projected to total $7 trillion over the next decade and, by 2026, will become the third largest category of the federal budget, according to the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to addressing the country's long-term fiscal challenges.

"That's $7 trillion going out on the door," said Michael Peterson, the Peterson Foundation's chairman and chief executive officer.

Interest on U.S. debt is projected to total $7 trillion over the next decade and, by 2026, will become the third largest category of the federal budget, according to the Peter G. Peterson Foundation. (Photo: J. Scott Applewhite, AP)

In other words, that's $7 trillion that could be spent on things like roads, bridges, schools and other programs that benefit Americans every day.

There are other implications, too.

Higher interest rates reduce the amount of private capital available for investments, which hurts economic growth and wages and leaves the U.S. with less flexibility to respond to a financial crisis like the Great Recession of 2008, Peterson said.

The U.S. had relatively modest debt when the Great Recession hit, Peterson said, so that meant the government could direct many of its financial resources into a stimulus package to help rescue the economy.

Remember what happened then? Some $831 billion was spent on tax credits, health care, schools, energy, roads and other construction projects to save jobs and get the economy back on its feet. Financial analysts disagree on how effective the package proved to be in correcting the economy. But many argue that it was a significant factor in the economic recovery.

If the country continues its current path of mounting debt, it may not have the ability to respond to such unforeseen crises in the future, Peterson said. That means another recession could be deeper, longer and more painful.

How does it affect you?

Let us count the ways.

And we'll start with how much you earn.

Debt not only suppresses economic growth, it suppresses future wages. The Congressional Budget Office projects that average income in 30 years will be $5,000 less per year if the national debt continues its current trajectory. Using that same data, the Peterson Foundation calculates that average income for a family of four will drop by $16,000 over the next three decades if debt rises as projected.

That means you'll have less money to spend on daily necessities like food, gas and clothing or to put extra money in your savings account or your 401(k).

As we've already mentioned, rising debt and deficits can lead to higher interest rates. Higher interest rates mean it will cost more to borrow money to buy a house or a car, and paying for college tuition or starting your own business will become more expensive.

Higher interest rates also affect credit card purchases, so expenses like buying gas or groceries or even going on vacation will cost more.

Government programs like food stamps or unemployment benefits that help the most vulnerable in society could face cuts if the government has less money to spend. It also may be more difficult to prop up financially strapped programs, like Medicare, which is projected to run out of money by 2026, and Social Security, which is expected to be insolvent by 2034, unless benefits are cut or other steps are taken to shore up the programs.

Are Americans worried?

Apparently not.

Americans view economic issues, such as improving the jobs situation, strengthening the economy and reducing the budget deficit, as less important policy priorities than just a few years ago, according to a national survey in January by the Pew Research Center.

Just 48 percent of those surveyed said cutting the deficit should be a top policy priority for the president and Congress, down from 63 percent in 2014. A year earlier, in 2013, roughly 72 percent of Americans cited the deficit as a top priority, the highest at any point in the past two decades.

Getting people to care about the debt and the deficit is a challenge "because you are basically saying to people that we need to raise taxes and cut spending today so that in the future we don't have to raise taxes and cut spending even more," MacGuineas said.

It's a hard sell, she said.

"We would rather have the federal government do a lot of things today and not pay for it rather than put together an economic plan that would help grow the economy in a more continuous and lasting manner," MacGuineas said. "It's greedy. It's those of us who are in charge right now saying we want it all without paying for it."

"It's not what our grandparents would have done," she said. "They said, 'We want to make sure we leave the economy stronger for the next generation.'"

More: 15 ways to make your savings last in retirement and keep pace with inflation

More: Don't make these financial mistakes: 10 ways you should never use your credit card

More: From investing to debt to budgeting, 19 financial mistakes millennials should avoid

More: Tax cuts, spending helping push national debt to historic high, new report says

Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/10/16/government-spending-how-rising-federal-debt-deficit-impact-americans/1589889002/

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The national debt and the federal deficit are skyrocketing. How it affects you

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WASHINGTON - The national debt is $21 trillion and counting. The federal deficit soared last year to $779 billion and is projected to approach $1 trillion in 2019. For most Americans, it's difficult to comprehend a dollar figure that has that many digits. ($1 trillion, when written out in long form, is $1,000,000,000,000.

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Definition: Crude oil is a liquid fuel source located underground. It was created when the remains of prehistoric algae was heated under pressure by the earth itself over millions of years. That's why it's considered nonrenewable.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil is of very high quality because it is light-weight and has low sulphur content. For these reasons, it is often referred to as "light, sweet" crude oil.

These properties make it excellent for making gasoline. That's why it is the major benchmark of crude oil in the Americas.

Brent Blend is a combination of crude oil from 15 different oil fields in the North Sea. It is less "light" and "sweet" than WTI but still excellent for making gasoline. It is refined in Northwest Europe and is the primary benchmark for crude oils in Europe or Africa. Find out more about the difference between WTI and Brent Blend.

Shale oil is crude oil that lies between layers of shale rock. The rock must be broken up to allow access to the layers of oil. New technology has allowed this oil to come to market at a competitive price. As a result, oil prices have dropped. For details, see U.S. Shale Oil Boom and Bust.

Oil shale is oil that's derived from kerogen. That's an early form of oil that requires more pressure and heat to become usable fuel.

Oil Prices

Crude oil prices measure the spot price of various barrels of oil, most common of which are either West Texas Intermediate or the Brent Blend.

The basket price of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and the futures price of the New York Mercantile Exchange are also sometimes quoted.

WTI has historically sold at a $4 per barrel discount to Brent. In December 2015, that price differential fell to $2 per barrel. The U.S. Congress removed the ban on oil exports.

It responded to demands from U.S. shale oil producers. For example, prices for other crude oils in these two continents are often priced as a differential to Brent, i.e., Brent minus $0.50.

The OPEC basket price is an average of the prices of oil from Algeria, Indonesia, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Venezuela and Mexico. OPEC uses the price of this basket to monitor world oil market conditions. OPEC prices are lower because the oil from some of the countries has higher sulfur content. That makes it more "sour" and less useful for making gasoline.

The NYMEX futures price for crude oil is reported in almost every major U.S. newspaper. It is the value of 1,000 barrels of oil at some agreed-upon time in the future. The oil is commonly WTI. In this way, the NYMEX gives a forecast of what oil traders think the WTI spot price will be in the future. But the futures price follows the spot price pretty closely since the oil traders can't know about sudden disruptions to the oil supply, etc.

Impact on Economy and You

Higher crude oil prices directly affect the cost of gasoline, home heating oil, manufacturing and electric power generation. How much? According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, oil is needed by 96 percent of transportation, 43 percent of industrial product, 21 percent of residential and commercial and only 3 percent of electric power.

But if oil prices rise, then so does the price of natural gas which is used to fuel 14 percent of electric power generation, 73 percent of residential and commercial and 39 percent of industrial production. (Source: " U.S. Primary Energy Consumption by Source and Sector," EIA, 2004.)

For this reason, higher oil prices increase the cost of everything you buy, especially food. That's because a lot of food costs depends on transportation. High oil prices will ultimately increase inflation.

Crude oil prices most directly affect you in higher gasoline prices and higher home heating oil prices. This is primarily true for those who live in the Northeast United States. Crude oil accounts for 55 percent of the price of gasoline. Distribution and taxes influence the remaining 45 percent.

Trends

Oil prices rise in the summer.

These are driven by high demand for gas during vacation driving times. It then drops in the winter if it happens not to be so cold. This is because there is lower-than-expected demand for home heating oil.

Until 2015, oil prices seem to be rising earlier and earlier each spring. In 2013, prices started rising in January, reaching a peak of $118.90 in February. In 2012, oil prices began rising in February. The price for a barrel of WTI crude broke above $100 a barrel February 13, 2012. In 2011, prices didn't break $100 a barrel until March 2 and didn't peak until May at $113 a barrel.

Fortunately, none of these peaks were as high as the June 2008 all-time high. This was when the price of WTI crude oil hit $143.68 per barrel. Investors were afraid that China's economic growth would create so much demand that it would overtake supply, driving up prices. But most analysts now realize that the sudden increase in oil prices was due to increased investment by hedge fund and futures traders. By December, it plummeted to a low of $43.70 per barrel.

The U.S. average retail price for regular gasoline also hit a peak in July 2008 at $4.17. This rose as high as $5 a gallon in some areas. By December, it had dropped to $1.87 a gallon. For more, see Gas Prices in 2008. (Source: " EIA Oil Price Trends," EIA.)

To see average, high and low oil prices, and concurrent events since 1974, see Oil Price History. Or you may need the Forecast of Crude Oil Prices.

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Definition: Crude oil is a liquid fuel source located underground. It was created when the remains of prehistoric algae was heated under pressure by the earth itself over millions of years. That's why it's considered nonrenewable. West Texas Intermediate crude oil is of very high quality because it is light-weight and has low sulphur content.

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In a significant shift in thinking, several economists contacted by CNBC now believe a rise in oil prices may not produce very much, if any, drag on U.S. growth.

Some even contend that the nation's new oil-producing prowess make a rise in prices "a wash" for growth.

This is a complete about-face for old metrics where it was practically automatic for economists to mark down growth when oil prices rose.

But the rise of the United States to become the world's second-largest oil producer has changed the calculus for how rising energy prices affect the economy. Consumer pain at the pump is now seen as an offset to an extent by increases in capital spending by U.S. oil companies and by gains in the growing number of regions producing energy. And what once would have been a massive surge in the oil trade deficit, which would subtract from gross domestic product, is now offset to a large degree by U.S. oil exports.

"We think the effect will round to a wash,'' said Michael Feroli, chief U.S. economist with J.P. Morgan Chase. "Our prior modeling would likely have produced a slightly more adverse impact, perhaps annualizing to a quarter point off growth for two consecutive quarters."

Now, Feroli sees a roughly 0.2 percent decrease from lower consumer spending offset by a 0.2 percent gain in capital spending.

To be sure, economists contacted by CNBC said they could not be sure if the positives would offset the negative at any oil price. A return to prices over $100 a barrel could overwhelm the consumer and exert a strong negative drag on the overall economy.

In addition, oil has an outsized effect on American consumers' psyche, beyond the actual costs. A sustained period of $3 a gallon for gasoline could weigh on confidence and spending. Finally, there could well be a mismatch in the timing of an offset to lower consumer spending from capital spending so that one quarter shows a drag while the next one exhibits a boost.

John Ryding of RDQ Economics is not quite ready to say it's a wash, but he offered: "You're not looking at the kind of magnitude that we used to think about oil prices hurting the U.S. I think that it's less than a third of the impact that it used to be."

Ryding said the biggest issue will be one of distribution. Higher oil prices amount to a wealth transfer from consumers to shareholders, and from oil-consuming regions to oil-producing regions. But this time, a lot more of the money will stay within American borders with the question of how petrodollars get divided inside the country.

J.P. Morgan searches for errors

The rethink of the oil price impact is borne of the recent decline in prices in 2014 and 2015 and its failure to boost the economy. J.P. Morgan in a research note did what few economists do these days: They went back and looked at their errors.

It found the oil price impact on consumer spending ended up being 0.7 percent less than what it would have expected, and the drag from capital spending was 0.2 percent more. Put simply, lower oil prices added less to consumption and took away more from investment than the old forecasting metrics would have implied.

Some Federal Reserve officials have learned the lesson. St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard told CNBC on Monday that the negative consumer effects and the positive investment effects "more or less washes out."

"This will also encourage U.S. production, and compared to years past, oil prices have a more neutral effect on the U.S. economy,'' Bullard said. "It used to be a big oil shock was probably bad news, ... but now I think it's neutral."

A key to the offset is whether and by how much companies step up to invest. Many investors and lenders were burned in the last price runup so the sector could have some difficulty attracting long-term capital. And, productivity continues to improve in the oil sector, meaning fewer rigs are needed to extract the same amount of oil as even five years ago. Finally, some of that capital equipment will be imported, a drag on the U.S. trade deficit that will offset at least some of the surge in oil exports.

But that's at the margin of a stark change in the U.S. energy profile. U.S. oil production has surged from a low of 4.6 million barrels a day in 2005 to a new record high of 10 million bpd. It's risen 13 percent in just the past year, following the price of oil higher.

Importantly for balance of payments, the result of more U.S. production is a sharp decline in imports, which have fallen by 42 percent in real dollars since 2005, while exports are up 318 percent. That is, they have gone from a basically a negligible amount to a meaningful offset to imports.

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Rising oil prices, once a big negative, may now be 'a wash' for the US economy

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In a significant shift in thinking, several economists contacted by CNBC now believe a rise in oil prices may not produce very much, if any, drag on U.S. growth. Some even contend that the nation's new oil-producing prowess make a rise in prices "a wash" for growth.

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Immigration has an impact on a country's economy. Studies have shown that when people move to the U.S. from other countries, they add to the economic growth of the country. Immigration can help lead to increased innovation, education, economic productivity, and more.

Unfortunately, however, immigration in the U.S. is long-rooted in a past of the mistreatment of people and its impact on the nation's economy is a topic that is still debated among lawmakers. Below, we'll dive deeper into immigration in the U.S. and how it impacts the economy.

Immigration in the U.S.

Throughout history, people from all over the world moved to the U.S. However, not all people who immigrated to the U.S. chose to do so, nor have they been treated with the same respect and human rights. For example, prior to the Civil War, many people from Africa and other continents and countries were enslaved and brought to the U.S. to work in poor conditions without rights. During World War II, Japanese-Americans were forced into internment camps where the government required them to live and stay for months with little privacy or rights. And even in the 21st Century, some people who have come to the U.S. have been forced to enter detention centers where living conditions are inhumane and medical care is lacking.

In the fourth quarter of 2020 (October to December), 26,000 people received lawful permanent resident status after arriving in the U.S. from other countries. An additional 104,500 people already in the U.S. received lawful permanent resident status during that same quarter. This number does not include the 4,000 refugees who came to the U.S. in that time. The U.S. considers a refugee someone who has left their country of birth or citizenship and cannot return for fear of persecution based on their religion, race, nationality, opinions, or political memberships. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services determines whether someone has "suffered past persecution or has a well-founded fear of future persecution based on race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion in their home country."

The federal government also tracks the number of people who come to the U.S. seeking asylum. People who seek asylum are refugees who are already in the U.S. or at a port of entry and meet the criteria to be considered a refugee. If they have a "credible fear" of persecution or torture in their home country, they can apply for asylum to prevent deportation.

If approved for asylum, a refugee can stay in the U.S., receive authorization to work, and apply for a Social Security card. They can apply for Medicaid or Refugee Medical Assistance and petition to bring family members, who are fearing persecution, to the U.S.

Not all people who immigrate to the U.S. enter legally and thus they are not counted for in the nation's immigrant population. It can be difficult to know how many people are undocumented in the U.S. at a given time, but the Department of Homeland Security last estimated that there were close to 11.4 million undocumented immigrants in 2018.

Immigration Laws in the U.S

Over the years, the federal government has passed immigration laws to allow for more or less people to enter the country. These laws are often tied to the needs of businesses, jobs, and employment in the U.S.

In January 2021, President Joe Biden proposed a new law on immigration, known as the U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021. This bill-which as of September 2021 is still seeking approval from the House of Representatives-outlines plans to help undocumented immigrants become legal U.S. citizens, as well as update border controls, improve immigration courts, and more. In the interim, the Biden administration has also reversed several immigration laws put in place by past presidents.

Prior to Biden taking office, President Donald Trump had a wall built along the border between the U.S. and Mexico. The Trump administration also detained and deported thousands of undocumented people who entered the U.S., and limited the number of refugees and asylum seekers looking to come to the U.S.

Back in the 1990s, there was the Immigration Act of 1990 which created visa priorities for immigrants who had "extraordinary abilities" in science, arts, education, business, or athletics. Professors and researchers were prioritized, as were executives, managers, and holders of advanced degrees.

In the mid-1980s, the U.S. was recovering from a recession, and unemployment was high. More workers were unnecessary and so President Ronald Reagan proposed the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 which was eventually passed. Under the law, businesses were not allowed to knowingly hire undocumented immigrants, but it legalized any who had entered the country before 1982. Undocumented farmworkers who could validate 90 days of employment were granted lawful permanent residence status.

The Refugee Act of 1980 was another immigration law that was passed to encourage refugees from war-torn areas to enter the U.S. While the law encouraged refugees from conflicted and dangerous regions, entry specifically depended on employment and housing opportunities, available resources, and the likelihood of refugees becoming self-sufficient.

A few other notable immigration laws in the U.S. include the Immigration and Nationality Act, which eliminated quotas based on nationality and favored highly skilled immigrants or those joining families already in the U.S., and the Bracero Agreement of 1942 which allowed Mexicans to assist farmers during the World War II labor shortage.

How Immigration Affects the Economy

Studies have shown that immigration can have a positive effect on a country's economic growth and productivity, innovation, education, and more.

In July 2019, there were approximately 44.9 million immigrant people in the U.S., making up 13.7% of the nation's population at the time, according to data from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey.

One common misconception is that immigrants take jobs away from native citizens of a country. Studies suggest that while some jobs are taken, the most likely scenario is that jobs are actually created. In a 2020 study, Azoulay et al. posit that immigrants are 80% more likely to become entrepreneurs and create jobs for people in the country. Most immigrants are of working age and they move to a new country to find (or create) jobs, thus having a positive impact on the labor force. An increasing number of immigrants have higher-level degrees, too, which can help increase innovation. Immigrant people make up 18% of the labor force that is 25 years and older; hold 26% of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) jobs; and hold 28% of high-quality patents.

Immigrants are good for a nation's businesses, too. First and second generation immigrants have founded 43% of Fortune 500 companies in the U.S. and 28% of main street businesses were founded by immigrants.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), immigrant people in the U.S. are also more likely to work in service occupations, natural resource jobs, construction, maintenance, transportation, production, and material moving roles. This helps ensure businesses can continue serving consumers.

Immigrant people who get a job after moving to the U.S. and pay taxes contribute to economic growth by spending money and consuming goods and services. The money paid in taxes also goes toward government employees, local and national projects, and more. If someone comes to the U.S. and does not have a Social Security number yet, they can use an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN). According to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, undocumented immigrants pay over $11 billion in taxes per year.

Both documented and undocumented immigrants pay into social programs via taxes, but those without documentation may not receive many of the benefits that come from paying taxes. For example, undocumented immigrants are not eligible for Medicaid or Medicare because of their immigration status, but Medicaid funds are given to hospitals to help cover the costs of undocumented immigrants who need medical care at their facilities.

What Is the Future of Immigration in the U.S.?

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, increased immigration to the U.S. over the next 40 years would mean a "faster growing, diverse, and younger population in the country." However, the population is aging and is expected to continue to do so until about 2060. Increased or decreased immigration during that time could help shift that timing, but it will all depend on how many people come to the U.S.

With an older population, the U.S. will need more young people to work and sustain economic growth, employment, and more in order to continue the path of economic growth the country has been on for decades. Immigrants, both documented and undocumented, will play an essential part in that. It is necessary to continue accepting working-age people into the U.S. (or giving them a path to legal permanent residence if they are undocumented) in order to continue the economic growth of the country.

Frequently Asked Questions

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Immigration has an impact on a country's economy. Studies have shown that when people move to the U.S. from other countries, they add to the economic growth of the country. Immigration can help lead to increased innovation, education, economic productivity, and more. Unfortunately, however, immigration in the U.S.

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Housing Affordability Crisis in America 

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Housing Affordability Crisis in America 

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FINAL Housing Crisis Economic Essay updated

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How to prepare for the next global recession

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Hypothesis: With the unemployment rates being at a 49 year low, there is not much to complain about. When seeing how well the economy is doing, people would think that there shouldn't be anything to worry about, but all might not be as good as it seems. As the research shows, anytime the unemployment rate has fallen below 4% a recession has followed. Usually the low employment rates and economic boom are always pre-cursor to an economic crash. I believe that this is the biggest problem our economy faces today

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The strong job market has become a reason for optimism for many Americans in the past couple years in stark contrast to the dark days of the Great Recession and the ensuing "jobless recovery." The unemployment rate fell beneath 4% for the past several months, weekly jobless claims are at a 49-year low, and wages are growing at their fastest rate since 2009. So, what's not to like? Obviously, everyone likes good news on the economic front, but these strong job market statistics are a sign that the economic cycle is much closer to the end (including a recession and bear market) rather than the beginning.

As the chart below shows, when the U.S. unemployment rate falls under 4%, recessions follow soon after (recessions are marked by the gray shaded areas on the chart). Historically, U.S. unemployment under 4% is quite rare and typically occurs after a long, powerful economic expansion. By the time the unemployment rate is under 4%, the economic cycle is already mature, the labor market is tight, and inflation is becoming a concern. At this time, the Federal Reserve has been hiking interest rates steadily, which eventually causes the demise of the economic cycle.

According to Nicole Smith, chief economist at the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce:

"The 4 percent number is not exactly a number that economists are necessarily happy with." "What's been happening here is, if we look historically at other times when the unemployment rate has fallen below 4 percent, it's times where it was the boom phase just before recession or just after a major war period."

Smith went on to say:

"What we find is that the low unemployment rate is often associated with a boom phase just before a recession." "It's almost a precursor for a recession or a precursor for another slumping economy. "

The last two times the U.S. unemployment rate fell below 4% was in the late-1960s, which preceded the economic turmoil and bear market of the 1970s, and during the late-1990s dotcom bubble that culminated in a powerful tech stock crash and recession in 2001. This time around, the 4% U.S. unemployment rate is occurring as a result of what I call the " Everything Bubble" or a bubble that is inflating in a wide range of global assets and sectors as a result of incredibly stimulative central bank policies since the Great Recession (please visit my website to learn more). Essentially, the " Everything Bubble" is artificially boosting the U.S. economy and financial markets, which is leading to a jobs boom. Unfortunately, this boom is smoke and mirrors and will end in another crisis when the cycle inevitably turns.

As discussed earlier in this piece, the Federal Reserve is raising interest rates as it typically does as economic cycles mature. Economic recessions, financial crises, and bear markets have occurred after virtually all Fed rate-hike cycles, and there is no reason to believe that the current one will be an exception. What is particularly concerning is the fact that U.S. interest rates have remained at record low levels for a record length of time, which has created unprecedented imbalances and distortions throughout the economy. These distortions will be unwound one way or another, which will result in serious pain. Because of the record debt burden in the U.S. economy, interest rates do not have to rise nearly as high as they did in prior cycles to cause another recession or crisis.

The 10-Year/2-Year U.S. Treasury bond spread is another indicator that tells us that the current U.S. economic expansion is becoming long in the tooth. This spread warned about every U.S. recession in the past half-century, including the Great Recession, so it is wise to pay attention to what it is saying. When the spread drops below 0% - a condition known as an inverted yield curve - a recession is likely to occur shortly after (recessions are marked by the gray shaded areas on the chart). At the current rate the yield curve is flattening, it could invert within the next several months.

The prospect of recession and bear market in the not-too-distant future is alarming for stock market investors, especially considering that the U.S. stock market is experiencing a dangerous bubble rather than a healthy bull market. Please read my recent detailed stock market bubble report in Forbes for more information.

After rising over 300% since the Great Recession, the S&P 500 is quite inflated:

By many measures, the U.S. stock market is more overvalued than it was at important historic market peaks. According to the U.S. stock market capitalization-to-GDP ratio (also known as Warren Buffett's "favorite indicator"), the market is more overpriced than it was during even the dot-com bubble:

Though the current economic cycle and bull market are not likely to end tomorrow, we are hurtling closer to the day of reckoning when society pays the price for the Fed's market meddling once again. Unfortunately, the next crisis is likely to be even worse than 2008 due to how much more debt we have now. The time to be concerned and start preparing is when unemployment is under 4% - not when it is already at 10%, as it was in 2009.
We at Clarity Financial LLC, a registered investment advisory firm, specialize in preserving and growing investor wealth in times like these. If you are concerned about your financial future,click here to ask me a question and find out more.

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Why America's Sub-4% Unemployment Rate Means A Recession Is Not Far Off

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The strong job market has become a reason for optimism for many Americans in the past couple years in stark contrast to the dark days of the Great Recession and the ensuing "jobless recovery." The unemployment rate fell beneath 4% for the past several months, weekly jobless claims are at a 49-year low, and wages are growing at their fastest rate since 2009.

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Hypothesize:
The US economy will take a big hit to the economy because of this trade war while China will come out looking victorious.

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Donald Trump's 25 per cent tariffs on $34bn worth of Chinese imports have come into effect - and the US president has promised much more to come unless Beijing bends to his will.

China has accused the US president of launching the "largest trade war in economic history" and has retaliated by imposing levies on imports from America of a similar value.

But how will this trade war affect those two economies? What will be the spillover effects on countries like the UK?

And are hostilities likely to escalate further?

What are these new tariffs?

These are the first part of the $50bn of tariffs that Trump promised last month on Chinese imports that contain "industrially significant technologies".

These include jet engines, robotics, cars and machinery.

Trump accuses China of effectively stealing American industrial intellectual property.

The targets this week include items such as industrial lathes and electric vehicles.

Tariffs on the second $16bn tranche of goods will come into effect in two weeks.

And Mr Trump said yesterday that the US is ready to target the entire $500bn a year value of Chinese imports if Beijing does not give in to his demands to prise open its domestic markets to US goods and respect American intellectual property rights.

How is China responding?

The response has been immediate.

China has slapped import levies on US-grown soybeans, medical equipment and crude oil.

Customs authorities in Shanghai are already reportedly delaying the passage of US imports.

How will this trade dispute affect the two economies?

On the macroeconomic level, Oxford Economics, an economic consultancy, estimates that these tariffs will knock around 0.1 to 0.2 per cent off each country's growth rate this year.

This might not sound too drastic, but given the size of the US economy last year was $19.4 trillion and the Chinese economy was $12 trillion, this adds up to a loss of between $30bn and $60bn.

Moreover, Oxford Economics stresses that "traditional macroeconomic model simulations underestimate the effects from rising business uncertainty, decreased private sector confidence and supply chain disruption which can exacerbate the economic shocks."

On a microeconomic level, the many Chinese firms that export to the US will suffer.

And US tariffs will cost American sales to a major, growing export market.

If Trump does extend the tariffs to all Chinese goods imports, he will also be damaging many US firms, such as Apple, that have outsourced industrial production to China.

But US consumers will also suffer just as much as US businesses, as the goods they buy, many of which are imported, will become more expensive.

The Peterson Institute for International Economics, a Washington think tank, concludes the US-China tariff war "will be self-destructive for both sides".

What about the rest of the world?

Trump is not simply hitting China with tariffs. He has also slapped large levies on European, Canadian and Mexican steel and aluminium.

He is also exploring tariffs on US's imports of cars and auto parts. That promises to have a disastrous impact on the European auto industry, including that of the UK.

The Bank of England has done some simulations and estimated that a full-blown global trade war could end up hitting global GDP by 2.5 per cent over three years, with the UK economy suffering a 2 per cent hit.

The Bank's simulations show that the US would actually be the biggest loser, with a 5 per cent hit to growth.

What will happen next?

This trade war is being instigated by the White House, so that largely depends on Donald Trump.

And there is little reason to believe that he will change his mind any time soon.

Trump has asserted that "trade wars are easy to win" and believes, mistakenly, that the fact the US runs a trade deficit with the rest of the world means the rest of the world has much more to lose than the US - and that he will therefore ultimately be able to dictate terms.

One possibility is that a domestic US backlash might force Trump to back down.

But this may not happen without a fight. When the US motorcycle manufacturer Harley-Davidson announced last month that it was moving more production outside the US to avoid the new EU tariffs imposed in response to Trump's steel tariffs, the president accused the Milwaukee-based company of "surrendering", and threatened it with taxation.

This suggests that Trump is likely to first seek to blame others for the negative economic blowback from his trade war, rather than changing his actual policy.

The strength of the US economy, where unemployment is as low as it was in the Clinton boom of the early 2000s, may also help him ride out any localised discontent.

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What will the impact be of 'the largest trade war in economic history'?

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Donald Trump's 25 per cent tariffs on $34bn worth of Chinese imports have come into effect - and the US president has promised much more to come unless Beijing bends to his will. China has accused the US president of launching the "largest trade war in economic history" and has retaliated by imposing levies on imports from America of a similar value.

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Macro Final Project, EssayTechnologies Impact on Economy

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Examination of Venezuela’s Economic Decay 

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Examination of Venezuela’s Economic Decay 

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Examination of Venezuela’s Economic Decay

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Farmers vs. Tariffs: Trump’s Protectionist Policies Hurt America’s Food Producer

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Farmers vs. Tariffs: Trump’s Protectionist Policies Hurt America’s Food Producer

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Infographics on the distribution of wealth in America, highlighting both the inequality and the difference between our perception of inequality and the actual numbers. The reality is often not what we think it is.

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Economic inequality is the unequal distribution of income and opportunity between different groups in society. It is a concern in almost all countries around the world and often people are trapped in poverty with little chance to climb up the social ladder. But, being born into poverty does not automatically mean you stay poor. Education, at all levels, enhancing skills, and training policies can be used alongside social assistance programs to help people out of poverty and to reduce inequality.

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Why do we have to pay sales tax on a used car?

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Why do we have to pay sales tax on a used car?

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Consider an example. When you buy a used car from a dealer, they are going to charge you sales tax on the sale of the car. “If you purchase something and do not pay sales tax, you are supposed to report it to your state and pay use tax. Of course, most people don't do this, but that does not make tax go away. Cars are generally more "formalized" transactions involving state registrations, so it is an opportunity for your state to enforce the tax on you, a tax you genuinely owe. "

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The tax rates on inheritances can be as low as 1 percent or as high as 20 percent of the value of property and cash you inherit. Inheritance should not be taxed because the owner already payed tax for that.
Most people won't have to deal with federal estate taxes, which in 2015 is triggered when an estate has more than $5.43 million of assets.

"But the bar for state estate taxes be can much lower," says A. Timo Lipping, a CFP in New York City, who specializes in estate planning.

"Where the person you are inheriting from lived can make a big difference in how much you actually get to inherit," he explains.

For instance, taxes in Massachusetts and Oregon are levied on estates worth more than $1 million. Meanwhile, New Jersey taxes estates valued at more than $675,000 and residents are also subject to an inheritance tax with a marginal rate up to 16 percent, Lipping adds.

Do you agree? Explain.

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The ways that this Author has brought his is with a list. This told you what happens when you apply for loans or scholarships. With the increase of financial-aid and the availability of loans colleges rise prices due to the increase of people being able to attend the schools. Kenneth Gould writes about politics mostly. With his view of how the government and economic stand point is, we see that this is mostly about how we are impacted the government has stepped in and made it worst for the American people. Gould has not been active on posting recently on articles about either politics or economic issues.

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Josh Kirdy knows how to hustle.

When he's not working full time as an assistant store manager at Universal Orlando, the 26-year-old is on the prowl for side work, landing stints walking dogs and putting in part-time hours at a local mall retailer.

He developed this juggling act to put extra payments toward his $37,000 student-loan debt.

"I'm happy with my life today and with the education I received, but it's unfortunate that I'll be paying for it for another seven years at least," Kirdy, who attended a four-year public university, told Business Insider. He's set to pay roughly $300 a month in student-loan repayments until he's 35.

"There are many factors behind the cost of college, and some people have stressed one or another," Richard Vedder, an author and distinguished professor of economics emeritus at Ohio University, told Business Insider.

But the ultimate driver of cost, Vedder said, is the sheer number of people vying for a college education. Higher enrollment has brought an expansion of financial-aid programs, a need to increase budgets for faculty pay and on-campus student services, and a decline in financial support from state governments.

College tuition has more than doubled since the 1980s

Kirdy is just one of the more than 45 million Americans with student-loan debt and contributing to a whopping national total of $1.5 trillion, according to Student Loan Hero. The average student debt per graduate who took out loans is higher than ever, at $29,800.

These stats are especially troubling considering their effects on people's long-term goals. Millennials are facing unique financial struggles previous generations weren't, like having to save longer for increased housing costs, something that hasn't been helped by the burden of student-loan debt.

"I feel like buying a house is a total pipe dream at this point in my life, but I'm tightening my belt as much as possible to save for a down payment right now," a water-resources engineer who graduated from a public university with roughly $25,000 in debt told Business Insider.

Four years later, she owes just under $19,000. Her $300 payments are set on autopay, which reduces her interest by 2.5% a month. It's more than her $260 income-driven payment plan requires, but she'll pay it down quicker this way.

"Thankfully, I have USAA, who has a great first-time-homebuyer program, so I only need a 3% down payment to get started," she said. "But without that, I would be trapped in a rent cycle until a second income magically appears in my life."

Boone Porcher, who owes $32,645 after five years at a public university, started paying double his minimum payment two years after graduating so he could pay off his debt in five years.

"I started to think more about their impact when evaluating my long-term planning, and I made the decision that I wanted the debt gone entirely ASAP," Porcher, a 26-year-old supply-chain consultant, told Business Insider. "Personally, I don't feel comfortable taking a loan on a house while having student loans."

A recent Student Loan Hero report found that while wages have increased by 67% since 1970, college tuition has increased at a faster rate, continuing to deliver a fair amount of sticker shock.

Roxy Novo told Business Insider her $60,000 student-loan debt from attending a private college had slowed down her life plans. The 22-year-old commutes two hours every day from New Jersey to her job as a studio artist fellow in New York City because her $500 monthly loan payment is equivalent to a portion of what it would cost to rent an apartment in the city, she said.

"I definitely cannot consider moving closer until I get a higher-paying job and get a good chunk of my debt paid," Novo said. "I'm trying to do the responsible thing and eliminate loans before considering any expensive, fun things, but it can be really hard when your friends are out traveling the world and moving to the city and you're swimming in debt."

College tuition was more affordable for older generations, Student Loan Hero reported, citing figures from the College Board: From the late 1980s to 2018, the cost of an undergraduate degree has risen by 213% at public schools and 129% at private schools, adjusting for inflation.

From the 2016-17 to the 2017-18 school year, the average cost of tuition and fees increased by more than 3% at private and public colleges, according to the College Board's "Trends in College Pricing 2017" report. At a four-year nonprofit private institution, tuition and room and board is $46,950, on average. Four-year public colleges charge an average of $20,770 a year for tuition, fees, and room and board. For out-of-state students, the total goes up to $36,420.

And then there are costs beyond tuition, like living expenses.

"One of the main reasons why I accrued so much debt was because my parents didn't save any money for me to go to college and they couldn't afford to contribute to the cause, so I used student loans not only to pay tuition but also to cover living expenses that my part-time job, which paid $8 per hour, couldn't cover," Kirdy said.

Everyone wants to go to college

"The demand for higher education has risen dramatically since 1985," Vedder said. "Once demand goes up and nothing else happens, that will raise prices."

According to the Department of Education, US colleges expected a total of 20.4 million students in fall 2017, about 5.1 million more than in fall 2000.

"The rewards for college have expanded and grown from 1985 to a little after 2000 and sort of leveled off in the past decade," Vedder said.

The increase in the student population indicates that the advantages college offers outweigh its overwhelming costs.

"There's a fear of failure if you didn't have a postsecondary education," Vedder said.

And yet, he said, the "advantage of a degree today is less than it was 10 years ago, because of the rising cost."

"The return on investment has fallen," he added, "and 40% of kids don't graduate within six years."

Still, it's a vicious cycle of supply and demand. The more students who want to attend college, the more the cost of college increases, and the more students borrow money.

From 2000 to 2012, the percentage of students who took out student loans jumped to 60% from about 50%, according to a report by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. The report also found that they began borrowing more money too - the median cumulative loan amount rose to $20,400 from $16,500 in that time.

Theories suggest financial aid causes tuition increases

More student borrowers might partly explain why government financial-aid programs have grown enormously - but that's also causing tuition increases, according to Vedder.

In 1970, financial-aid programs "were almost nonexistent," he said. "Generally, middle-income people didn't get money from the federal government; the large majority of students did not."

In 1978, Congress passed a bill known as the Middle Income Student Assistance Act. This made all undergraduates regardless of income class eligible for subsidized loans and middle-income students eligible for Pell Grants, according to NASPA, Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education. More and more students started applying for financial aid, Vedder said.

"Knowing that students will get this financial-aid money, the university raises fees and takes advantage to capture that themselves," Vedder explained, referring to an idea known as the Bennett hypothesis.

Named for a former education secretary who believed that more government aid for students led directly to college cost increases, the hypothesis is an ongoing topic of political debate. But it has some vertical support in Vedder's eyes. Citing a statistic from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Vedder said that for every new dollar of federal student aid, tuition is raised by 65 cents.

Though tuition rose in 1978, so did people's incomes, making the burden of college less than it was in the 1940s, Vedder explained. But between 1978 and 2015, the burden of college began to rise again as tuition fees doubled and economic growth slowed.

State funding can't keep up with enrollment

Terry Hartle, a senior vice president of the American Council on Education, boils down the increasing cost of college to this: Many state governments have cut operating support for higher education, for at least a generation, and let colleges replace the lost revenue with tuition hikes.

"States provide less, and students and parents pay more," Hartle told Business Insider. "Studies have shown that when state support is level or increasing, tuition is flat. But when state support declines, tuition goes up. Roughly 80% of America's students attend public colleges, so it's not an exaggeration to say that the biggest determinate of the price they will pay for their education is the budgetary decisions made by state governments."

The College Board's report underscores Hartle's theory. It found that prices at public colleges and universities rise faster when government funding per student sees little growth or is slowing down. In the 2015-16 school year, appropriations - money given to a school by the government - per full-time enrolled student were 11% lower than 10 years before, when adjusted for inflation.

"For public institutions, state appropriations make up a significant portion of the college's revenue, and in recent years, the state appropriations have not been able to keep pace with enrollment," Jennifer Ma, a senior policy research scientist at the College Board, told Business Insider.

Vedder, however, doesn't think state funding cuts are the main culprit, at least at private schools.

"The total number of state dollars has gone up a little, but enrollments have risen dramatically, so on a per-student basis they're getting less money," he said. "It's a factor but not dominant, because private schools don't get money from the state."

Colleges need to pay more professors

Just as it costs money to learn, it costs money to pay teachers. Higher education is a labor-intensive industry, and productivity gains come slowly, Hartle said.

"The primary mechanism for delivering higher education at most institutions are highly educated people," he said. "Acquiring and recruiting highly educated faculty and staff costs money, especially in jobs with significant demand outside academia."

Hartle said the sorts of things that could lower these costs - such as larger classes, more adjunct faculty and fewer full-time professors, shorter hours, and fewer books in the library - were immensely unpopular with students, parents, and the public.

"Colleges spend much of their money on staff and compensation, so they have been experiencing an increasing cost of health insurance and other benefits," Ma said, adding that while university tuition allocations vary by institution, most use a large percentage of tuition to pay professors' salaries.

Vedder believes the percentage of university budgets used for instruction has fallen over the past 50 years.

"A typical university around 1970 would have allocated 40% directly for instruction, mostly professor salaries," he said. "Nowadays, it's more like 30%."

This decline in money for teachers and classes, in addition to state funding cuts, may help explain why the number of part-time faculty members has increased over time, to about 51% of total faculty in 2011 from 30% in 1975, according to research compiled by the American Association of University Professors.

With more part-time faculty members, universities can dole out lower wages and benefits, saving money for noninstructional full-time roles and a smaller group of tenured faculty, whom they can try to attract with higher salaries.

Student services, like counseling and healthcare, are growing

Many of these noninstructional roles are for student services, another increasing cost in campus budgets. Services such as academic support, personal counseling, and healthcare have been on the rise, Hartle said.

"These services are always added because of student needs, and most schools, once they begin to offer them, are very reluctant to take them away," he said, adding that there's also been a reallocation from instruction to administration expenses - known as institutional support - and research.

Vedder says there has been an explosion in the number of non-teaching personnel on campus, with several administrators at top universities making six-figure salaries with fringe benefits and secretarial support. He said about two-thirds of university budgets had nothing to do with teaching but instead go toward things like advocates, dormitories, and facilities.

Is the cost of college worth it?

The irony in the demand for a degree is palpable - by contributing to an increase in tuition, it has perhaps also made the college degree less advantageous over time.

To illustrate the diminishing value of a college degree, Vedder cited figures from the New York Fed, saying that one-third of college graduates are underemployed and 13% are in a low-paying job.

So is the cost of college worth it? It depends who you ask and how you measure the value of a degree.

"Honestly, I don't have a lot of job satisfaction, and I don't plan on being an engineer for the rest of my life," the water-resources engineer said. "In terms of getting me a job that pays well, maybe ... In terms of overall happiness, probably not."

Novo said loans were her only option for her first-choice school. A few schools offered scholarship money, but she said she felt they wouldn't help her reach her goals.

"The debt is definitely worth it," she said. "I picked my college with the hope that it would get me my first job and that it would be in my field and in NYC. I happily have a job with all those requests."

For Porcher, the regret isn't obtaining a college degree, but the lack of planning that put him over $32,000 in debt.

"Looking back, I wish I had worked for a year or two and saved up, or did half college, half work," he said. "But my job now wouldn't be possible without my degree. I'm actually the highest-ranking person without a master's or Ph.D. If I didn't have a good job, this would be an enormous burden."

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College is more expensive than it's ever been, and the 5 reasons why suggest it's only going to get worse

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College tuition has more than doubled since the 1980s, and over 45 million Americans have student-loan debt. See what's driving the cost of college.

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Hypothesis: When the inevitable end comes to our natural resources, we could see a large drop in the US economy

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Hypothesis is If the gap between men and women continues to increase rather than decrease, then the children of women in single-family homes will be more adversely affected not only economically, but emotionally and developmentally. Since women are receiving a fraction of what men are receiving, it's really affecting children of women in single-family homes. Women are penalized for having children while their counterparts are praised. Women who are single parents receiving unequal pay cannot afford the best education for their children or the best health care.

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Hypothesis: If oil firm do not take climate change seriously, then many tariffs and restrictions may be put into effect to help reduce the effect of oil in the environment. This may make oil firms less profitable in the long-run.

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THE oil industry has much to fear from the Paris climate deal of 2015, which aims to limit temperature rises to less than 2°C above the pre-industrial era. To curb carbon emissions, demand for fossil fuels will have to drop in coming decades. That is likely to push down oil prices and the value of investments that firms have made based upon them.

A report published on August 6th by Sarasin & Partners, an asset manager in London, suggests that oil firms are assuming that decarbonisation will be limited and are thus overstating their assets. Sarasin notes that eight European oil giants all used long-term oil price assumptions of $70-80 a barrel, rising by 2% a year with inflation to $127-145 by 2050, to price their assets. But that does not appear to assume any drop in demand. The International Energy Agency predicts a price of just $60 by 2060; Oil Change International, an activist think-tank, estimates one as low as $35 (see chart). Oil firms could face a sticky mess of forced writedowns.
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The picture is complicated by the fact that in Europe oil firms can choose their own long-term prices, whereas in America regulators compel firms based there to use the average price over the past year, which is nearing $70. Executives in both places have their reasons for thinking that prices will be higher than the worst forecasts, particularly as the world is set to miss the Paris goals.

Setting those aside, prices are likely to be lower anyway in the next few decades, says Adam Pilarski of Avitas, a consultancy. There will be ups and downs to do with geopolitics. Prices are up from $26 in 2016 to over $70 mainly because of Venezuela's meltdown and better co-operation between Saudi Arabia and Russia. But the economics on the supply side are clear: plentiful reserves and the falling cost of technology for extracting oil will soften long-term prices.

Natasha Landell-Mills of Sarasin says oil firms should be more transparent about the risk this poses to assets and profits. Other fund managers, such as Aviva Investors, echo that view. In Europe oil bosses are preparing for lower prices, though they are still unwilling to say as much. Shell and its British rival BP are aiming to make new projects break even at just $40. Investors are more worried about the American firms. Rising prices have lured them to start splurging on pricier projects. America may be leaving the Paris deal, but escaping its impact on global oil prices is harder.

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Why oil firms should worry more about climate change

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THE oil industry has much to fear from the Paris climate deal of 2015, which aims to limit temperature rises to less than 2°C above the pre-industrial era. To curb carbon emissions, demand for fossil fuels will have to drop in coming decades.

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The biggest economic problem for the US economy is equal pay. Pay should be equal for both men and woman. Women make up almost half of the workforce, however they are still under payed. For example, in 2015 woman who worked full time earned  80 cents for every dollar that men earned. At the pace that the US economy is going towards woman will not reach equal pay until the year 2059. A woman's earning is fairly important to the economic stability of families. A woman who is either a single mother, head of a household, not depending on the amount of money the make, provide at least 40 percent of couples earnings. Woman are not treated equally in the work place as men, as men don't seem that as an equal and this should change. Equal pay is the biggest issue in the US economy and it shouldn't be.

Hypothesis: If equal pay doesn't change between men and woman, then the economic growth will keep decreasing and will not change in a positive way

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The Impact of Equal Pay on Poverty and the Economy

Women make up almost half of the workforce, yet they continue to earn less than men on average in nearly every single occupation for which there is sufficient earnings data for both men and women to calculate an earnings ratio (Hegewisch and DuMonthier 2016a). In 2015, women working full-time, year-round earned just 80 cents for every dollar that men earned (Hegewisch and DuMonthier 2016b). The pace of progress toward pay equity has been slow, and if progress continues at the same pace, it will take until 2059 for women to finally reach pay equality. For women of color, equal pay is even further away. Hispanic women will have to wait until 2248 to reach pay equality with White men and Black women will have to wait until 2124 for equal pay (Institute for Women's Policy Research 2016).

Despite being paid less, women's earnings are increasingly important to the economic stability of families. In the United States, half of all households with children under 18 have a breadwinner mother, who is either a single mother who heads a household, regardless of earnings, or a married mother who provides at least 40 percent of the couple's joint earnings (Anderson 2016). And many women without children, both single and married, work to support themselves and other family members. Thus, persistent earnings inequality for working women translates into lower pay, less family income, and more children and families in poverty.

This briefing paper summarizes analyses of the 2014-2016 Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic supplement and uses statistical controls for labor supply, human capital, and labor market characteristics to estimate: 1) how much women's earnings and family incomes would rise if working women were paid the same as comparable men (men who work the same number of hours, are the same age, have the same educational attainment and urban/rural status and live in the same region of the country); 2) how much women and their families lose because women earn less than similarly qualified men; 3) how many children would benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers; 4) how many children and families would be brought out of poverty if women received equal pay; and 5) how much the economy as a whole suffers from inequality in pay between women and men.

Findings from this analysis include:

Nearly 60 percent of women would earn more if working women were paid the same as men of the same age with similar education and hours of work. Nearly two-thirds (65.9 percent) of working single mothers would receive a pay increase.

Providing equal pay to women would have a dramatic impact on their families. The poverty rate for all working women would be cut in half, falling from 8.0 percent to 3.8 percent. The very high poverty rate for working single mothers would fall by nearly half, from 28.9 percent to 14.5 percent.

For the 15.3 million single women-divorced, widowed, separated, and never married women living on their own-equal pay would mean a significant drop in poverty rates from 10.8 percent to 4.4 percent.

Approximately 25.8 million children would benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers if they received equal pay.

The number of children with working mothers living in poverty would be nearly cut in half, dropping from 5.6 million to 3.1 million.

The United States economy would have produced additional income of $512.6 billion if women received equal pay; this represents 2.8 percent of 2016 gross domestic product (GDP).[i]

Pay Inequality Stifles Growth of the United States Economy

Table 1 shows women's annual earnings, hours worked, annual family incomes, and poverty rates for all women workers aged 18 and older. Nearly 60 percent (59.8 percent) of women would earn more if working women were paid the same as comparable men. Overall, average earnings for women would increase from $38,972 to $45,842, or by $6,870 (17.6 percent) annually if women were compensated for their labor supply and human capital at least as well as men in their regional labor markets. The poverty rate would be cut in half, falling from 8.0 percent to 3.8 percent among working women.

The United States economy would have produced income of $512.6 billion more if women received equal pay; this represents 2.8 percent of 2016 gross domestic product (GDP). The total increase in women's earnings under a regime of pay equity represents approximately 16 times what the federal and state governments spent in fiscal year 2015 on Temporary Assistance to Needy Families.
The failure to pay women fairly results in the misallocation of human capital and contributes to women working at less productive pursuits than they otherwise would, thus holding back economic growth. For this reason, the estimate of the growth in earnings if women were paid equally with comparable men is very likely an underestimate, since women's work hours, educational achievement, or occupational attainment were not increased, as they almost surely would be if women received pay equal to that of comparable men.

Pay Inequality Contributes to Lower Family Income and Increased Poverty among Families with a Working Woman

Table 2 shows women's annual earnings, hours worked, annual family incomes, and poverty rates in five different types of families with women workers classified according to the status of the family head or spouse: 1) self-supporting single women aged 18 and older, 2) working single mothers aged 18 and older, 3) working married women aged 18 and older, 4) working married non-mothers aged 18 and older, and 5) married working mothers aged 18 and older. Single women-never married, divorced, separated, and widowed-are limited to those who live without other family members; these women are clearly dependent on their own earnings and for them it is easy to calculate household income. Many other single women live in a variety of household formations-and also suffer from wage discrimination-but it is more difficult to determine the relevant household income for complex households, whose members may or may not pool income with each other.

Table 2 reflects gains to family incomes and reductions in poverty rates that would result from boosting women's pay to that of comparable men.[iii] Estimated additional income for the average family of each type is calculated from the earnings gains working women would enjoy if they earned as much as men who work the same number of hours, are the same age, have the same educational attainment and urban/rural status and live in the same region of the country. As shown in Table 2 and Figure 1, raising women's pay would have a dramatic impact on their families:

The 3 million single women living independently of other family members, including divorced, widowed, separated, and never married women, would earn a total of $101.1 billion more if they were paid the same as comparable men. These single working women would earn an average of $6,613 more per year. Single women would also experience a very significant drop in poverty-from 10.8 percent to 4.4 percent, a fall of more than half.

If the 1 million single mothers earned as much as comparable men, their annual earnings would increase by $7,315, on average, or about 22.2 percent. Nearly two-thirds (65.9 percent) would receive a pay increase. Total income gains for this group of families amount to $52.0 billion, and the very high poverty rate for families headed by working single mothers would fall by nearly half, from 28.9 percent to 14.5 percent.

Paying women in the 5 million families with a married working woman the same as comparable men would increase earnings for married working women by an average of 15.6 percent. This translates into an average of $6,957 per year for each woman and a total of $254.2 billion nationwide. Poverty rates would fall by more than half, from 2.1 percent to 1.0 percent.

Among married women, the families of 8 million married non-mothers would earn a total of $147.9 billion if they were paid the same as comparable men, with an average income increase of $7,490 for each woman, while the families of 16.8 million married mothers would earn a total of $106.2 billion, with an average income increase of $6,329 for each woman.

Equal Pay Would Have a Dramatic Impact on the Lives of Children of Working Women

As Table 2 and Figure 1 highlight, equal pay for working women would lead to a significant increase in earnings for millions of families across the country. A substantial number of working women have children who would also benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers under equal pay. Table 3 illustrates this impact by estimating the total number of children living in households with a working mother, how many of them would benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers, how many of them currently live in poverty, and how many would be lifted out of poverty through the increased earnings of their mothers.

In the United States, 43.0 million children live in families with a working mother. Under equal pay, 25.8 million would benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers. The number of children whose families would be brought out of poverty under a regime of pay equality amounts to 2.5 million, which is nearly half of all children living in poverty in these households at present (5.6 million).

About 12.2 million children live in families with a single working mother. If mothers of these children were provided with equal pay, more than 8.3 million children would benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers, and the families of nearly 2 million children would be brought out of poverty.

A total of 30.8 million children live in families with a married working mother. If women were paid the same as comparable men, 17.5 million of these children would benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers and 0.6 million children would be brought out of poverty as a result.

Making Progress on Closing the Gender Wage Gap

As the analyses reported above show, paying working women the wages of comparable men would increase individual earnings and family incomes and dramatically cut poverty-by half overall for all working women and for most family types with a working woman. In single mother families, poverty would be cut by nearly half. Yet the gender wage ratio is currently 80 percent, not very different from the 2002 level, which was 77 percent (Proctor, Semega, and Kollar 2016). If trends of the past five decades are projected forward, it will take more than four decades-until 2059-for women to reach pay equity (Institute for Women's Policy Research 2016).

Strengthened enforcement of state and national equal pay and equal employment opportunity laws, higher minimum wages, stronger collective bargaining, and better family friendly policies, such as paid family leave and subsidized child care, would go a significant way towards ensuring that working women are paid fairly and are better able to support their families.

Notes

[i] According to the U.S. Department of Commerce Bureau of Economic Analysis (February 28, 2017) Current-Dollar GDP, in 2016 the United States gross domestic product (GDP) was $18,565.6 billion.

[ii] Total Federal TANF and State Maintenance of Effort (MOE) Expenditures in fiscal year 2015 were $31.7 billion. Adjusted for inflation to 2016 dollars, this amounts to $32.1 billion.

[iii] IWPR researchers use annual earnings and employment information reported in the Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic supplement (CPS-ASEC) for the years 2014-2016 to estimate women's and men's earnings. For a more detailed discussion of the methodology used for this analysis, please see the Technical Appendix.

References

Anderson, Julie. 2016. "Breadwinner Mothers by Race/Ethnicity and State." Quick Figures, IWPR #Q054. Washington, DC: Institute for Women's Policy Research. <http://iwpr.org/publications/pubs/breadwinner-mothers-by-race-ethnicity-and-state> (accessed October 26, 2016).

Hartmann, Heidi, Katherine Allen, and Christine Owens. 1999. "Equal Pay for Working Families." Report, IWPR #C343. Washington, DC: Institute for Women's Policy Research. <https://iwpr.org/wp-content/uploads/wpallimport/files/iwpr-export/publications/C343.pdf> (accessed March 23, 2017).

Hegewisch, Ariane and Asha DuMonthier. 2016a. "The Gender Wage Gap by Occupation 2015 and by Race and Ethnicity." Fact Sheet, IWPR #C440. Washington, DC: Institute for Women's Policy Research. <https://iwpr.org/wp-content/uploads/wpallimport/files/iwpr-export/publications/C440.pdf>.

---. 2016b. "The Gender Wage Gap: 2015." Fact Sheet, IWPR #C446. Washington, DC: Institute for Women's Policy Research. <http://iwpr.org/publications/pubs/the-gender-wage-gap-2015-annual-earnings-differences-by-gender-race-and-ethnicity>.

Institute for Women's Policy Research. 2016. "If Current Trends Continue, Hispanic Women Will Wait 232 Years for Equal Pay; Black Women Will Wait 108 Years." Quick Figure, IWPR #Q058. Washington, DC: Institute for Women's Policy Research. <http://iwpr.org/publications/pubs/if-current-trends-continue-hispanic-women-will-wait-232-years-for-equal-pay-black-women-will-wait-108-years>.

Proctor, Bernadette D., Jessica Semega, and Melissa Kollar. 2016. Income and Poverty in the United States: 2015 (P60-256(RV)). U.S. Census Bureau. <https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2016/demo/p60-256.pdf> (accessed March 20, 2017).

Technical Appendix

This study updates an earlier study of labor market discrimination and the gender wage gap, Equal Pay for Working Families, first undertaken by IWPR in 1999 (Hartmann, Allen, and Owens 1999). ¹ Using the 2014-2016 Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic supplement (CPS-ASEC), the analysis of women's and family earnings gains is based on a model that predicts women's earnings as if they were not subject to wage inequality. In this model, we control for many factors that contribute to wage differences and account for a portion of the wage gap and then correct women's earnings as if the unexplained portion of the wage gap in this analysis did not exist.

An ordinary least squares (OLS) model is employed that controls for the differences between men and women in age, education, annual hours of work, metropolitan residence, and region of the country. The dependent variable is the natural log of annual earnings. The variables for age and age squared are included as proxies for work experience, since specific information about work experience is not available in the CPS-ASEC. This is a more realistic assumption for men than for women because at any given age, men typically have spent more years in the workforce and fewer years out of the workplace. Use of this experience variable (for lack of a better one in this data set) tends to overstate their earnings losses relative to comparable men (they may be less comparable than the data indicate). On the other hand, including variables such as education and hours of work, which may themselves be affected by labor market discrimination against women (causing them to invest less in human capital and work less than they otherwise would) tends to understate their true earnings losses relative to men.

In this model, men's earnings are predicted based on a sample of men aged 18 or older with positive earnings and positive hours of work during the previous year. Since a key component of the analysis is the contribution of women's earnings to family income and the resulting changes in family poverty rates if women's earnings were not subject to discrimination, the sample of men is restricted to those who earn at or below the 90 th percentile of men's annual earnings, or $112,299 in 2016 dollars. This selection assures that the predicted earnings for those at middle or lower income levels are not upwardly biased by the few high earners in the sample. Poverty rates are calculated using preliminary poverty thresholds for 2016 adjusted for family size provided by the U.S. Bureau of the Census.

Women's earnings are predicted using the coefficients from the men's earnings equation (this method assumes that women retain their own human capital but are rewarded at the same rates as men would be) and calculated only for the actual hours that women worked during the year. Those with reduced predicted earnings are assigned their actual earnings during the year. The average earnings increase calculated for working women includes those with no predicted earnings increases under equal pay.

The model is used to estimate women's earnings in the absence of gender-based wage inequality. The control variables for marital status and the presence of children younger than 18 are explicitly excluded since these characteristics are often linked to gender-based discrimination. For instance, higher earnings are typically predicted by researchers for men who are married, but lower earnings are typically predicted for married women. Likewise, the presence of children often predicts lower earnings for women but does not have a significant effect for men (or in some studies, increases their earnings).

Poverty rates under an equal pay regime are determined by calculating a family's adjusted income if working women were paid the same as comparable men (families whose income is predicted to be lower are assigned their actual income during the year). These income increases are slightly larger than those estimated for individual women in each family type because some families can have more than one working woman (e.g. an adult woman living with her mother who also works). These adjusted income values are then compared with the appropriate poverty threshold in order to determine the poverty rate under equal pay. These estimates do not take into account the impact of increased family income on tax benefits such as the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). Since the EITC was developed to encourage work, for some families the increase in income would actually increase the value of the EITC that could be claimed, but for others with higher incomes the value would decrease with increased earnings. The value of these benefits are used in determining total family income under the official federal poverty measure, thus it is unclear whether the impact of equal pay on poverty estimated here is an under- or an overestimate.

To estimate the impact that equal pay for working women would have on children, we estimated the total number of children living in households with a working mother as well as the number of children with working mothers living in poverty. We then identified the families with working mothers that would experience an increase in income under equal pay and estimated how many children would benefit from the increased earnings of their mothers. Finally, we identified the families with working mothers that would be brought out of poverty because of the increase in income under equal pay and estimated how many children lived in those households that would be brought out of poverty.

1 Also see " How Equal Pay for Working Women Would Reduce Poverty and Grow the American Economy," by Heidi Hartmann, Jeff Hayes, and Jennifer Clark (2014).
Acknowledgements
This briefing paper summarizes work prepared for and funded by LeanIn.Org for #20PercentCounts, a public awareness campaign highlighting the unfairness of the gender pay gap. LeanIn.Org is an initiative of the Sheryl Sandberg & Dave Goldberg Family Foundation to empower women to achieve their ambitions.
The Institute for Women's Policy Research conducts and communicates research to inspire public dialogue, shape policy, and improve the lives and opportunities of women of diverse backgrounds, circumstances, and experiences. The Institute works with policymakers, scholars, and public interest groups to design, execute, and disseminate research and to build a diverse network of individuals and organizations that conduct and use women-oriented policy research. IWPR's work is supported by foundation grants, government grants and contracts, donations from individuals, and contributions from organizations and corporations. IWPR is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization that also works in affiliation with the women's studies and public policy and public administration programs at The George Washington University.

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The Impact of Equal Pay on Poverty and the Economy | Institute for Women's Policy Research

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Equal pay would reduce the poverty rate for children with a working mother by nearly half, lifting 2.5 million children out of poverty estimates that the U.S. economy would have produced additional wage and salary income of nearly $513 billion, equal to 2.8% 2016 U.S. GDP.

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The biggest economic problem for the US economy is education. Education in the US cost too much money. The average cost of a college credit is $594.26 and adding it up it will come up to $14,267 for a year (Kirkham). There is also the extra cost like housing, food, and textbooks. Textbooks also cost way more than they should. People would rather not go to college at all and instead just work full-time which could be good, except for the jobs that they would have gotten if they did go to college are not being filled up.

Hypothesis: If prices for college classes stay this high or get higher then the economy will get worse because their will be no one to do the jobs that you need college for

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It's not always easy to project college costs for incoming students. Even at the smallest unit, a college credit, costs can vary.

That's why, in a new study, we used Department of Education tuition data to take a closer look at what the average cost per credit hour really is these days for incoming freshmen. Spoiler alert: it's probably more than you think.

The study also underlines how widely students' costs can vary - and how much their college choices can impact those costs. Especially since each credit earned is a step toward a 120-credit-hour undergraduate degree, and each step must be paid for.

Here are the bare minimum college costs America's college students are facing today.

The average cost per credit hour is $594

After calculating the average cost per credit hour for colleges across every sector (including private and public, for-profit and not-for-profit, and two- and four-year colleges), the typical cost of a college credit comes out to $594.46.

That's a significant charge that adds up to about $14,267 a school year. Or, $71,335 for the 120 credits typically required for a four-year degree.

But just because that's the average across all institutions for which tuition information is available doesn't mean it's what a typical student pays. Additionally, the type of college a student chooses has a significant impact on how much they pay per credit.

Public two-year colleges are the cheapest at $135 a college credit

Here are the average costs of a college credit for public colleges:

Four-year, public: $324.70

Two-year, public: $135.09

Less than two years, public: $281.17

Two-year public schools, such as community colleges or local technical or vocational schools, have the lowest average cost-per-credit of any college sector.

On average, a two-year public school will cost about 60 percent less per credit hour than a four-year public school. And at just $135 a college credit, local community colleges are one of the most accessible and affordable ways to earn college credits.

With the minimum 120 credit hours required for a bachelor's degree, a student attending a two-year school for their first 60 credits then transferring to a public school would save $11,377 on their college education on average.

Of course, the savings provided by attending two-year public schools will vary by state.

New Jersey, for example, has the biggest dollar-cost difference between two- and four-year public schools, at $169 and $519 per credit, respectively.

Therefore, a student earning his first 60 credits at a New Jersey community college before transferring to a four-year in-state school would save $20,990 on tuition costs.

View our full state-by-state analysis of how much students can save by attending community college.

Four-year private colleges have the highest costs per college credit at $1,039

When it comes to private schools, students are paying the highest cost per credit hour. Here's why:

Four-year, private not-for-profit: $1,038.69

Two-year, private not-for-profit: $556.51

Less than two years, private not-for-profit: $536.72

A college credit at a private, four-year college costs over three times what a college credit costs at a four-year public college.

What's more, when comparing two-year private and public colleges, private schools cost more than four times as much per credit. Therefore, when it comes to higher education, a private college experience comes with a higher premium.

However, students hoping to attend a private college can try the method of attending a lower-cost college first and then transferring. By earning their first 60 credits at a community college before switching to a four-year private college, a college student could save a whopping $54,659 on average.

Plus, by attending a community college first you'll likely need to take out less federal student loans or private student loans to pay for your education.

In many states, the savings are even higher.

For example, in Rhode Island, the state with the biggest difference between private school and public school tuition costs, a four-year degree would average $132,200 more when earned from a private school.

And even in North Dakota, the state with the smallest cost gap between public and private, the savings are still high at $30,300.

For-profit schools cost more but offer less value

Then there are the for-profit schools. Here's the breakdown regarding costs per college credit for these institutions:

Four-year, private for-profit: $647.47

Two-year, private for-profit: $601.05

Less than two years, private for-profit: $523.22

The cost-per-credit at a four-year, for-profit college is cheaper than at private colleges. But it's double what a college credit costs at a four-year public school.

Additionally, among two-year schools, the cost per credit at a for-profit college is about 4.5 times higher on average than at a community college or other public school.

And while for-profit schools cost twice as much or more to attend than their public counterparts, they tend to offer less value to students. In fact, instead of boosting earnings, most students of for-profit schools actually earn less after their degree than they did before.

"On average associate's and bachelor's degree students experience a decline in earnings after attendance, relative to their own earnings in years prior to attendance," the National Bureau of Economic Research reported in a 2016 working paper.

When it comes to college ROI, the high costs of for-profit schools combined with poor outcomes on post-study earnings can make these types of institutions a poor investment for students.

Student loans add 20 percent or more to college credit costs

The figures outlined so far are the upfront costs of earning a college credit at different institutions of higher education.

But how much does a credit cost if a student loan is used to pay for it?

Currently, the Department of Education has interest on federal Direct Loans at 3.76% APR. That is an effective rate of about 20 percent over 10 years.

Therefore, with an average credit cost of $594, that's an extra $120 in interest. And for 120 credit hours, that's an extra $14,400 in interest alone.

Here's how student loan interest costs break down by school credit type:

A two-year public school credit at $135.09 would cost $162 over 10 years ($27 in interest)

A four-year public school credit at $324.70 would cost $390 over 10 years ($65 in interest)

A four-year private college credit at $1,038.69 would cost $1,248 over 10 years ($209 in interest)

Simply using a student loan to cover college costs effectively increases per-credit costs anywhere from $27 to $209. And for a full 120-credit undergraduate degree, additional interest costs can range from $3,240 up to $25,080.

This highlights the importance of avoiding and minimizing student loan debt. It's truly the key to keeping the true costs of college low. Not to mention keeping monthly costs affordable once student debts enter repayment.

Which college you choose truly matters money-wise

Overall, this study underscores the fact that going to college in America is a costly affair.

But it also reveals the wide gap in costs between different kinds of colleges. What's more, it proves there are choices college students can make that can significantly decrease the costs of their studies and degrees.

Overall, choosing public colleges, avoiding for-profit colleges, and earning credits at a community college before transferring, are smart, effective cost-cutting strategies.
Methodology: College credit costs were calculated using tuition data from the U.S. Department of Education. The cost was based on annual tuition and fees for the college, assuming two semesters of full-time enrollment (12 credits). Public school averages are based on the cost-per-credit for all two-year and four-year public colleges for in-state residents. Private school averages are based on all tuition prices at private not-for-profit and private for-profit colleges in each state. Data is for 2014-15 school year, released May 2016.
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Here are our top student loan lenders of 2018!

Lender

Variable APR

Eligibility
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College Ave Student Loans products are made available through either Firstrust Bank, member FDIC or M.Y. Safra Bank, FSB, member FDIC. All loans are subject to individual approval and adherence to underwriting guidelines. Program restrictions, other terms, and conditions apply.

1. All rates shown include the auto-pay discount. The 0.25% auto-pay interest rate reduction applies as long as a valid bank account is designated for required monthly payments. Variable rates may increase after consummation.

2. This informational repayment example uses typical loan terms for a freshman borrower who selects the Deferred Repayment Option with an 8-year repayment term, has a $10,000 loan that is disbursed in one disbursement and a 7% variable Annual Percentage Rate ("APR"): 96 monthly payments of $179.28 while in the repayment period, for a total amount of payments of $17,211.20. Loans will never have a full principal and interest monthly payment of less than $50. Your actual rates and repayment terms may vary.

3. As certified by your school and less any other financial aid you might receive. Minimum $1,000. Information advertised as valid as of 07/1/2018. Variable interest rates may increase after consummation.

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Before taking out private student loans, you should explore and compare all financial aid alternatives, including grants, scholarships, and federal student loans and consider your future monthly payments and income. Applying with a cosigner may improve your chance of getting approved and could help you qualify for a lower interest rate. Ascent Student Loans may be funded by Richland State Bank (RSB) or Turnstile Capital Management, LLC (TCM), which are not affiliated entities. Certain restrictions and limitations may apply. Ascent Student Loan products are subject to credit qualification, completion of a loan application, verification of application information and certification of loan amount by a participating school. All loan products may not be available in certain jurisdictions. Other terms and conditions apply. Ascent is a federally registered trademark of TCM and may be used by RSB under limited license. Richland State Bank is a federally registered service mark of Richland State Bank.

1. Competitive rates calculated monthly at the time of loan approval. (Rates are effective as of 8/01/2018 and include a 0.25% discount applied when a borrower in repayment elects automatic debit payments via their personal checking account.)
Ascent Tuition: Variable rate loans are based on a margin between 2.00% and 11.00% plus the 1-Month London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR), rounded to the nearest 1/100th of a percent. The current LIBOR is 2.069%, which may adjust monthly. Your interest rate may increase or decrease, based on LIBOR monthly changes, resulting in an APR range between 3.82% - 12.82%. Fixed rate loans have an APR range between 5.54% and 14.59%.
Ascent Independent: Variable rate loans are based on a margin between 4.00% and 12.50% plus the 1-Month London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR), rounded to the nearest 1/100th of a percent. The current LIBOR is 2.069%, which may adjust monthly. Your interest rate may increase or decrease, based on LIBOR monthly changes, resulting in an APR range between 5.49% and 12.77%. Fixed rate loans have an APR range between 7.06% and 13.72%.

2. Payments may be deferred. Subject to lender discretion, forbearance and/or deferment options may be available for borrowers who are encountering financial distress.

3. Making interest only or partial interest payments while in school will not reduce the principal balance of the loan. There are three (3) flexible in-school repayment options that include fully deferred, interest only and $25 minimum repayment. Click here for a Tuition repayment example.

4. Flexible repayment plans may be offered with up to a fifteen (15) year repayment term for a variable rate loan and ten (10) year repayment term for a fixed rate loan. Students must be enrolled at least half-time at an eligible school. Minimum loan amount of $2,000. Ascent borrowers who choose a fixed rate option may ONLY select a loan term of five (5) or twelve (12) years (60 or 144 months, respectively). For certain loans with low balances the minimum monthly payment amount may cause the loan amortization schedule to be less than the selected term. Click here for Ascent Tuition cosigned loan current rates and repayment examples.

5. Interest rate reduction of 0.25% for enrollment in automatic debit applies only when the borrower and/or cosigner signs up for automatic payments and the regularly scheduled, current amount due (including full, flat, or interest only payments, as applicable) is successfully deducted from the designated bank account each month. Interest rate reduction(s) will not apply during periods when no payment is due, including periods of In-School, Deferment, Grace or Forbearance. If you have two (2) returned payments for Nonsufficient Funds, we may cancel your automatic debit enrollment and you will lose the 0.25% interest rate reduction. You will then need to re-qualify and re-enroll in automatic debit payments in order to receive the 0.25% interest rate reduction.

6. All applicants (individual and cosigner) are required to complete a brief online financial literacy course as part of the application process to be eligible for funding.

7. Eligibility, loan amount and other loan terms are dependent on a number of factors, including: loan product, other financial aid, creditworthiness, school, program, graduation date, major, cost of attendance and other factors. Aggregate loan limits may apply. The cost of attendance is determined and certified by the educational institution.

8. The legal age for entering into contracts is eighteen (18) years of age in every state except Alabama where it is nineteen (19) years old, Nebraska where it is nineteen (19) years old (only for wards of the state), and Mississippi and Puerto Rico where it is twenty-one (21) years old.

9. 1% Cash Back Graduation Reward subject to terms and conditions, click here for details.

10. Students can apply to release their cosigner and continue with the loan in only their name after making the first 24 consecutive regularly scheduled full principal and interest payments on-time and meeting the other eligibility criteria to qualify for the loan without a cosigner.

* Application times vary depending on the applicants ability to supply the necessary information for submission.

* The Sallie Mae partner referenced is not the creditor for these loans and is compensated by Sallie Mae for the referral of Smart Option Student Loan customers.
⁴ = Sallie Mae Disclaimer: Click here for important information. Terms, conditions and limitations apply.

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1. Interest will continue to accrue during periods of deferment. You will receive quarterly interest statements during this deferment period. Paying the interest as it accrues each quarter will save you money over the repayment term of the loan because any accrued interest that you do not pay will be added to the principal balance at the end of the deferment period.

2. If automatic payment is discontinued, you will no longer receive an automatic payment discount. A federal regulation limits the number of transfers that may be made from a savings or money market account. Please contact your financial institution for more information on transfer limitations on savings accounts.

3. A request to release a co-signer requires that you have made forty-eight (48) consecutive timely payments with no periods of forbearance or deferment within the forty-eight (48) month timeframe. "Timely payment" means each payment is made no later than the 15th day after the scheduled due date of the payment. "Consecutive payment" means the minimum monthly payment must be made for forty-eight (48) months straight without any interruption. To qualify for a co-signer release, the borrower must submit a request, meet the consecutive, timely payment requirements, provide proof of income and pass a credit check.

PNC Bank is one of the nation's largest education loan providers. For over 40 years, PNC has been committed to helping students and their families make possible the adventure of college.

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Before applying for a private student loan, SunTrust recommends comparing all financial aid alternatives including grants, scholarships, and both federal and private student loans. To view and compare the available features of SunTrust private student loans, visit https://www.suntrust.com/loans/student-loans/private.

Certain restrictions and limitations may apply. SunTrust Bank reserves the right to change or discontinue this loan program without notice. Availability of all loan programs is subject to approval under the SunTrust credit policy and other criteria and may not be available in certain jurisdictions.

SunTrust Bank, Member FDIC. ©2018 SunTrust Banks, Inc. SUNTRUST, the SunTrust logo and Custom Choice Loan are trademarks of SunTrust Banks, Inc. All rights reserved.

1. Interest rates and APRs (Annual Percentage Rates) depend upon (a) the student's and cosigner's (if applicable) credit histories, (b) the repayment option and repayment term selected, (c) the requested loan amount and (4) other information provided on the online loan application. If approved, applicants will be notified of the rate applicable to your loan. Rates and terms effective for applications received on or after 10/01/2018. The current variable APRs for the program range from 4.001% APR to 13.001% APR and the current fixed APRs for the program range from 5.351% APR to 14.051% APR (the low APRs within these ranges assume a 7-year $10,000 loan, with two disbursements and no deferment; the high APRs within these ranges assume a 15-year $10,000 loan with two disbursements). The variable interest rate for each calendar month is calculated by adding the current One-month LIBOR index to your margin. LIBOR stands for London Interbank Offered Rate. The One-month LIBOR is published in the Money Rates section of The Wall Street Journal (Eastern Edition). The One-month LIBOR index is captured on the 25th day of the immediately preceding calendar month (or if the 25th is not a business day, the next business day thereafter), and is rounded up to the nearest 1/8th of one percent. The current One-month LIBOR index is 2.250% on 10/01/2018. The variable interest rate will increase or decrease if the One-month LIBOR index changes. The fixed rate assigned to a loan will never change except as required by law or if you request and qualify for the auto pay discount.

2. Any applicant who applies for a loan the month of, the month prior to, or the month after the student's graduation date, as stated on the application or certified by the school, will only be offered the Immediate Repayment option. The student must be enrolled at least half-time to be eligible for the partial interest, fully deferred and interest only repayment options unless the loan is being used for a past due balance and the student is out of school. With the Full Deferment option, payments may be deferred while the student is enrolled at least half-time at an approved school and during the six month grace period after graduation or dropping below half-time status, but the total initial deferment period, including the grace period, may not exceed 66 months from the first disbursement date. The Partial Interest Repayment option (paying $25 per month during in-school deferment) is only available on loans of $5,000 or more. For payment examples, see footnote 7. With the Immediate Repayment option, the first payment of principal and interest will be due approximately 30-60 calendar days after the final disbursement date and the minimum monthly payment is $50.00. There are no prepayment penalties.

3. The 15-year term and Partial Interest Repayment option (paying $25 per month during in-school deferment) are only available for loan amounts of $5,000 or more. Making interest only or partial interest payments while in school deferment (including the grace period) will not reduce the principal balance of the loan. Payment examples within this footnote assume a 45-month deferment period, a six-month grace period before entering repayment and the Partial Interest Repayment option. 7 year term: $10,000 loan disbursed over two transactions with a 7 year repayment term (84 months) and a 8.468% APR would result in a monthly principal and interest payment of $199.90. 10 year term: $10,000 loan disbursed over two transactions with a 10-year repayment term (120 months) and an 8.938% APR would result in a monthly principal and interest payment of $162.92. 15 year term: $10,000 loan disbursed over two transactions with a 15-year repayment term (180 months) and a 9.423% APR would result in a monthly principal and interest payment of $136.90.

4. The 2% principal reduction is based on the total dollar amount of all disbursements made, excluding any amounts that are reduced, cancelled, or returned. To receive this principal reduction, it must be requested from the servicer, the student borrower must have earned a bachelor's degree or higher and proof of such graduation (e.g. copy of diploma, final transcript or letter on school letterhead) must be provided to the servicer. This reward is available once during the life of the loan, regardless of whether the student receives more than one degree.

5. Earn an interest rate reduction for making automatic payments of principal and interest from a bank account ("auto pay discount"). Earn a 0.25% interest rate reduction when you auto pay from any bank account and an extra 0.25% interest rate reduction when you auto pay from a SunTrust Bank checking, savings, or money market account. The auto pay discount will continue until (1) automatic deduction of payments is stopped (including during any deferment or forbearance) or (2) three automatic deductions are returned for insufficient funds during the life of the loan. The extra 0.25% interest rate reduction when you auto pay from a SunTrust Bank account will be applied after the first automatic payment is successfully deducted and will be removed for the reasons stated above. In the event the auto pay discount is removed, the loan will accrue interest at the rate stated in your Credit Agreement. The auto pay discount is not available when payments are deferred or when the loan is in forbearance, even if payments are being made.

6. A cosigner may be released from the loan upon request to the servicer provided that the student borrower is a U.S. citizen or permanent resident alien, has met credit criteria and met either one of the following payment conditions: (a) the first 36 consecutive monthly principal and interest payments have been made on-time (received by the servicer within 10 calendar days after their due date) or (b) the loan has not had any late payments and has been prepaid prior to the end of the first 36 months of scheduled principal and interest payments in an amount equal to the first 36 months of scheduled principal and interest payments (based on the monthly payment amount in effect when you make the most recent payment). As an example, if you have made 30 months of consecutive on-time payments, and then, based on the monthly payment amount in effect on the due date of your 31st consecutive monthly payment, you pay a lump sum equal to 6 months of payments, you will have satisfied the payment condition. Cosigner release may not be available if a loan is in forbearance.

7. If the student dies after any part of the loan has been disbursed, and the loan has not been charged off due to non-payment or bankruptcy, then the outstanding balance will be forgiven if the servicer is informed of the student's death and receives acceptable proof of death. If the student becomes totally and permanently disabled after any part of the loan has been disbursed and the loan has not been charged off due to non-payment or bankruptcy, the loan will be forgiven upon the servicer's receipt and approval of a completed discharge application. If the student borrower dies or becomes totally and permanently disabled prior to the full disbursement of the loan, and the loan is forgiven, all future disbursements will be cancelled. Loan forgiveness for student death or disability is available at any point throughout the life of the loan.

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Additional terms and conditions apply. For more details see LendKey

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A government loan is made according to rules set by the U.S. Department of Education. Government loans have fixed interest rates, meaning that the interest rate on a government loan will never go up or down.

Government loans also permit borrowers in financial trouble to use certain options, such as income-based repayment, which may help some borrowers. Depending on the type of loan that you have, the government may discharge your loan if you die or become permanently disabled.

Depending on what type of government loan that you have, you may be eligible for loan forgiveness in exchange for performing certain types of public service. If you are an active-duty service member and you obtained your government loan before you were called to active duty, you are entitled to interest rate and repayment benefits for your loan.
If you are unable to pay your government loan, the government can refer your loan to a collection agency or sue you for the unpaid amount. In addition, the government has special powers to collect the loan, such as taking your tax refund and applying it to your loan balance.

A private student loan is not a government loan and is not regulated by the Department of Education. A private student loan is instead regulated like other consumer loans under both state and federal law and by the terms of the promissory note with your lender.
If you refinance your government loan, your new lender will use the proceeds of your new loan to pay off your government loan. Private student loan lenders do not have to honor any of the benefits that apply to government loans. Because your government loan will be gone after refinancing, you will lose any benefits that apply to that loan. If you are an active-duty service member, your new loan will not be eligible for service member benefits. Most importantly, once you refinance your government loan, you will not able to reinstate your government loan if you become dissatisfied with the terms of your private student loan.

If your private student loan has a fixed interest rate, then that rate will never go up or down. If your private student loan has a variable interest rate, then that rate will vary depending on an index rate disclosed in your application. If the interest rate on the new private student loan is less than the interest rate on your government loans, your payments will be less if you refinance.
If you are a borrower with a secure job, emergency savings, strong credit and are unlikely to need any of the options available to distressed borrowers of government loans, a refinance of your government loans into a private student loan may be attractive to you. You should consider the costs and benefits of refinancing carefully before you refinance.

If you don't pay a private student loan as agreed, the lender can refer your loan to a collection agency or sue you for the unpaid amount.

Remember also that like government loans, most private loans cannot be discharged if you file bankruptcy unless you can demonstrate that repayment of the loan would cause you an undue hardship. In most bankruptcy courts, proving undue hardship is very difficult for most borrowers.

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1. Variable rate, based on the one-month London Interbank Offered Rate ("LIBOR") published in The Wall Street Journal on the twenty-fifth day, or the next business day, of the preceding calendar month. As of Student Loan Rate Disclosure : August 1, 2018, the one-month LIBOR rate is 2.07%. Variable interest rates range from 4.04%-12.01% (4.04%-11.91% APR) and will fluctuate over the term of the loan with changes in the LIBOR rate, and will vary based on applicable terms, level of degree earned and presence of a cosigner. Fixed interest rates range from 5.25%-12.19% (5.25% - 12.09% APR) based on applicable terms, level of degree earned and presence of a cosigner. Lowest rates shown requires application with a cosigner, are for eligible applicants, require a 5-year repayment term, borrower making scheduled payments while in school and include our Loyalty and Automatic Payment discounts of 0.25 percentage points each, as outlined in the Loyalty Discount and Automatic Payment Discount disclosures. Subject to additional terms and conditions, and rates are subject to change at any time without notice. Such changes will only apply to applications taken after the effective date of change. Please note: Due to federal regulations, Citizens Bank is required to provide every potential borrower with disclosure information before they apply for a private student loan. The borrower will be presented with an Application Disclosure and an Approval Disclosure within the application process before they accept the terms and conditions of the loan.

2. Multi-year approval funds available for future use are subject to a soft credit inquiry at time of your next request to verify continued eligibility. After we make the initial Loan to you, we may refuse to allow you to take out additional loans under the multi-year approval feature, terms and conditions will be outlined in your promissory note. Please Note: International students are not eligible to receive an offer for multi-year approval. Please Note: International Students are not eligible for the multi-year approval feature.

3. Loyalty Discount Disclosure : The borrower will be eligible for a 0.25 percentage point interest rate reduction on their loan if the borrower or their co-signer (if applicable) has a qualifying account in existence with us at the time the borrower and their co-signer (if applicable) have submitted a completed application authorizing us to review their credit request for the loan. The following are qualifying accounts: any checking account, savings account, money market account, certificate of deposit, automobile loan, home equity loan, home equity line of credit, mortgage, credit card account, or other student loans owned by Citizens Bank, N.A. Please note, our checking and savings account options are only available in the following states: CT, DE, MA, MI, NH, NJ, NY, OH, PA, RI, and VT and some products may have an associated cost. This discount will be reflected in the interest rate disclosed in the Loan Approval Disclosure that will be provided to the borrower once the loan is approved. Limit of one Loyalty Discount per loan and discount will not be applied to prior loans. The Loyalty Discount will remain in effect for the life of the loan.

4. Automatic Payment Discount Disclosure: Borrowers will be eligible to receive a 0.25 percentage point interest rate reduction on their student loans owned by Citizens Bank, N.A. during such time as payments are required to be made and our loan servicer is authorized to automatically deduct payments each month from any bank account the borrower designates. Discount is not available when payments are not due, such as during forbearance. If our loan servicer is unable to successfully withdraw the automatic deductions from the designated account three or more times within any 12-month period, the borrower will no longer be eligible for this discount.

5. Co-signer Release: Borrowers may apply for co-signer release after making 36 consecutive on-time payments of principal and interest. For the purpose of the application for co-signer release, on-time payments are defined as payments received within 15 days of the due date. Interest only payments do not qualify. The borrower must meet certain credit and eligibility guidelines when applying for the co-signer release. Borrowers must complete an application for release and provide income verification documents as part of the review. Borrowers who use deferment or forbearance will need to make 36 consecutive on-time payments after reentering repayment to qualify for release. The borrower applying for co-signer release must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident. If an application for co-signer release is denied, the borrower may not reapply for co-signer release until at least one year from the date the application for co-signer release was received. Terms and conditions apply.

Our team at Student Loan Hero works hard to find and recommend products and services that we believe are of high quality and will make a positive impact in your life. We sometimes earn a sales commission or advertising fee when recommending various products and services to you. Similar to when you are being sold any product or service, be sure to read the fine print understand what you are buying, and consult a licensed professional if you have any concerns. Student Loan Hero is not a lender or investment advisor. We are not involved in the loan approval or investment process, nor do we make credit or investment related decisions. The rates and terms listed on our website are estimates and are subject to change at any time. Please do your homework and let us know if you have any questions or concerns.

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Study: Here's the Real Cost Per Credit Hour Students Have to Pay | Student Loan Hero

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Advertiser Disclosure Student Loan Hero Advertiser Disclosure Our team at Student Loan Hero works hard to find and recommend products and services that we believe are of high quality and will make a positive impact in your life. We sometimes earn a sales commission or advertising fee when recommending various products and services to you.

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It's likely you're very familiar with the standard world map.

It's shown practically everywhere - you'll see it online, on the news, in books, and even as a part of company logos. In fact, the world map is so ubiquitous that we don't even really think about it much at all, really.

The economist Max Roser from Our World in Data argues that this familiarity with the world map may lead to complacency in understanding global matters. After all, the typical world map shows us the basic geography of countries and continents, but it doesn't give any indication of where people actually live!

Introducing: The Cartogram

To get around the challenges of relying on the standard world map, Roser instead has made a population cartogram based on 2018 population figures.
What's a population cartogram?
A cartogram is a visualization in which statistical information is shown in diagrammatic form. In this case, it's a population cartogram, where each square in the map represents 500,000 people in a country's population.

In total there are 15,266 squares, representing all 7.633 billion people on the planet.

Countries like Canada or Russia - which have giant land masses but small relative populations - appear much smaller on this kind of map. Meanwhile, a country like Bangladesh grows much bigger, because it has a large population living within a smaller area.

The Regional View

Let's zoom in on some continental regions to get a sense of what we can learn from a population cartogram done in this fashion.

Asia and Oceania
Where did Australia go? The continent is completely dwarfed by neighboring Indonesia and the Philippines.

Not surprisingly, India and China are the biggest countries on this cartogram, especially looking oversized in comparison to countries in the Middle East like Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, or the United Arab Emirates.

Europe
Geographically, Russia is a pretty massive country - but when resized based on population, the nation looks closer in size to many other European nations.

The Netherlands and Belgium, two countries with higher population densities than most European nations, also appear more prominent on this style of map.

The Americas
On the map below, Mexico has exploded to almost 4X the size of Canada. That's because although the Great White North is the world's second largest country in size, it only has a fraction of the population of Mexico.

Meanwhile, it's evident that Argentina's population is lower than the country's giant landmass leads on.

Africa
Finally, we'll look at Africa, which is in the middle of a massive population boom.

Countries like Namibia, Botswana, and Chad almost disappear.

Nigeria, which is expected to have the world's largest city by 2100 with over 88 million residents, is the largest country in Africa using this cartogram method.

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This Fascinating World Map was Drawn Based on Country Populations

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It's likely you're very familiar with the standard world map. It's shown practically everywhere - you'll see it online, on the news, in books, and even as a part of company logos. In fact, the world map is so ubiquitous that we don't even really think about it much at all, really.

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March 15, 2022 is Equal Pay Day, which reflects how many extra days women had to work to make as much as men did in 2021.

The gender wage gap persists, and women make 83 cents for every dollar a man makes.

These charts show the gap in pay varies widely based on location, race, and several other factors.

Equal Pay Day reflects how many extra days women have to work to earn what men did in the previous year. This year's Equal Pay Day falls on March 15.

Over half a century after the US passed the Equal Pay Act, American women still face a substantial gender wage gap across the spectrum.

Overall, women who were full-time, year-round employees made 83 cents for every dollar men made in 2020, based on median earning data from the Census Current Population Survey. That means women are paid about 17% less than men.

But as the National Women's Law Center pointed out in a new fact sheet about the pay gap, the pandemic's impact on employment especially affected people earning low pay. For instance, the leisure and hospitality sector, a low-paying industry made up of restaurants and hotels, faced a wave of pandemic-related business closures and drop in demand for these services.

"Because the women who remained in the labor force and worked full time for all of 2020 often had higher earnings than their counterparts who lost their jobs, 2020's data gives the appearance of closing wage gaps for some groups of women compared to 2019," the National Women's Law Center's Jasmine Tucker wrote in the fact sheet.

Rose Khattar, associate director of rapid response and analysis at the Center for American Progress, previously told Insider in an email that unpaid hours in caregiving and occupational segregation are reasons behind the pay gap between men and women.

There are other potential explanations.

"There are a multitude of factors that may contribute to earnings differences between women and men: age, number of hours worked, presence of children, and education," Megan Wisniewski of the Census Bureau wrote in a post. "The types of jobs women and men hold, and the earnings difference among these occupations also contribute to gaps in overall earnings."

The following charts highlight the pay gap between men and women in the US.

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These 8 charts show the glaring gap between men's and women's salaries in the US

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March 15 is Equal Pay Day, representing the extra days into a new year that a typical woman needs to work to make what a man made the previous year.

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Is there a new debt crisis on the horizon?

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With the US Federal Reserve confirming further rate hikes to come, emerging markets like China are the most vulnerable to the ripples this will send through the global economy.

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The U.S. economy added an estimated 313,000 jobs in February 2018, keeping the unemployment rate at 4.1 percent, where it’s held steady for the past five months

1.     What is the idea of full employment? What is the natural rate of unemployment?

2.     Why are economists wrong about full employment?

3.     What is a good unemployment rate for the US economy?

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The U.S. economy added an estimated 313,000 jobs in February, keeping the unemployment rate at 4.1 percent, where it's held steady for the past five months. And the good news is, experts agree, that it still has room to improve.

But there's even better news if you look closely: The lowest unemployment rate most economists think we can reach is still too high.

Within economics, there's a concept called full employment. There's a debate within the field over what that means in terms of the unemployment rate. In the New York Times, Neil Irwin suggests 3.5 percent may be the most realistic level for which we can hope; Alan Blinder, an economist Irwin quotes, gives a range with 2.5 percent as his low-end estimate. There's good reason to believe, however, that we should strive for the unemployment rate to be well under 2 percent and, potentially, even lower.

The idea behind full employment is that there is some "natural" level of unemployment caused by basic "frictions" in the job market, like temporary layoffs and job searches. Get any lower than this "natural" rate, the theory goes, and workers will have too much bargaining power relative to employers. They'll negotiate higher wages than their productivity warrants, employers will raise prices in response, workers will negotiate higher wages again, prices will rise again, and we'll be caught in a difficult-to-stop cycle of accelerating inflation. Terrible, right!?

If you're not scared, I don't blame you. Nothing remotely close to the dynamic outlined above has surfaced in almost four decades. One might cite the late 1990s as an exception, as unemployment in the 4 percent range did correspond with rising wages, but it didn't produce the kind of inflationary spiral about which economists often worry. More recently, unemployment has been below the Federal Reserve's "natural rate" estimate and inflation hasn't budged.

So why are economists so wrong about full employment?

One reason is that the labor market doesn't work the way the classic models suggest it does, especially since union membership and federal labor standards have been eroded by years of corporate attacks. Wages are not set, as in full employment theory, by some pristine equilibrium between supply and demand; workers are not paid their marginal contribution to their firms' output. In the real world, pay is determined by a negotiation between workers and employers, and employers typically have a lot more negotiating power than their employees do. While there's evidence that lower unemployment rates do give workers some power (by making employers less sure they can replace workers who ask for raises), it's not enough power for workers to secure raises that reflect their work effort. The evidence that higher wages necessarily lead to price hikes isn't exactly rock-solid, either.

The other big problem with theories of full employment is that they're based on historical data. Even in periods of very strong labor demand, there is logically some level of unemployment that is truly unavoidable because people are hired and fired, or change employers or quit, all of which involves transition time between one job and the next. But there's no reason to assume that we've ever been particularly close to that level of unemployment.
[Yes, the robots will steal our jobs. And that's fine.]
Consider, for example, that the black unemployment rate has been about twice as high as the white unemployment rate since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began publishing black unemployment data in 1972, and that even February's 6.9 percent black unemployment rate, which is close to December's record low, was higher than the white unemployment rate in 80 percent of the months since then. Economists seem to take the discrepancy between the black and white unemployment rates as a given, but it's a reflection of institutional racism. Very little of the long-standing 2-to-1 ratio can be attributed to differential rates of educational attainment among black and white populations (which are themselves the product of centuries of discrimination); we know that millions of Americans have historically been denied jobs on the basis of their racial identities alone. It is most certainly not the case that the "natural" rate of unemployment for white workers is in the 3.5 percent range while the "natural" rate of unemployment for black workers is twice as high.

What's needed is a benchmark full-employment rate that accounts for discrimination and is a reasonable proxy for the true level of frictional unemployment in the economy. The unemployment rate of white college graduates - workers unlikely to be discriminated against on the basis of race and possessing the credential many employers use to weed out the workers they want to consider hiring - i.e., a college degree - fits the bill. If you're a white college graduate and you end up unemployed, you're likely to find a new opportunity reasonably soon. (Though even for many white college graduates, of course, finding a good job is hardly easy). Our economy can and should work the same way for other workers, but it currently doesn't.
[The economy on the eve of the tax cut]
One might contend that college graduates are more productive than workers without college degrees and that their unemployment rates should be lower than the rates for their less-educated counterparts. But high levels of educational attainment aren't a prerequisite for many of the jobs in our economy. Employer claims that they can't find workers with the skills they need are much less often true than many people think, so there's not much basis behind the idea that employers can't afford to hire and train non-college-educated workers.

What's a good unemployment rate to aim for, then? The white college graduate unemployment rate was 1.7 percent during the late 1990s, the last time many economists think we were at full employment. So let's stop suggesting arbitrarily high target rates of unemployment and start focusing on making 1.7 percent unemployment or lower the new normal - for everyone.

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Perspective | The unemployment rate is low. It should be even lower.

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The U.S. economy added an estimated 313,000 jobs in February, keeping the unemployment rate at 4.1 percent, where it's held steady for the past five months. And the good news is, experts agree, that it still has room to improve.

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U.S economy graph

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This economic cycle is really setting records. We've had almost 10 years of U.S. economic growth, the unemployment rate is at a 30-year low (it is expected to go lower), and every few days I hear someone in the administration bragging about how well the economy is performing.

I've lived through five major economic cycles in my career and while all this is great news for many people, I just want to explain the dark side of all this, with a particular focus on what HR organizations and employers should do.
There Are A Lot of Jobs, Just Not Enough Skills
Yes, there are a lot of jobs being created: more jobs than there are people in fact. As I discussed in an earlier article, employers are opening up many new positions to compete for this economic growth, and most of these are positions in software, service, sales, engineering, design, and other digitally-enabled roles. LinkedIn's data shows that jobs like analytics, machine learning, cloud computing, and cyber security are 4-10X more scarce than the typical role, but data also shows that healthcare jobs and elder care are also in great demand.

Interestingly, most of these jobs demand softskills not just technical skills. A study just completed by Bloomberg and Workday finds that college graduates are not bringing enough technical or softskills to the job market (only 35% of employers feel grads are sufficiently ready) and four in ten are building remedial programs to try to fill this gap. So while there are a lot of jobs open, we are seeing an increasingly wide gap between the jobs being created and the skills and experiences in the workforce to fill them.

This creates stress among hiring managers, stress among HR teams, and stress among CEOs. The 2018 Conference Board CEO study found that "failure to attract and retain top talent" is now the No. 1 issue on the minds of CEOs, even more important than competition or the disruptive nature of technology. This is why the L&D market is exploding with growth and new L&D tools and solutions are being snatched up by employers.
Automation Is Creating Jobs But Also Stress
Contrary to many articles written a few years ago, AI and robotics are not doing away with jobs, they're creating them. We now have demand for people to build AI and robotics, sell them, train them, and repair them. My daughter works in digital marketing and her job has become one of operating, measuring, and refining data-driven systems to capture leads, segment buyers, and continuously improve sales production. Yes, she is also a gifted designer and writer, but that's only a part of the job now.

More than two-thirds of the companies we interviewed in the 2018 Deloitte Human Capital Trends believe the pace of automation is increasing, and this creates stress in selecting technology, implementing it, and wondering if the tools you're buying are good enough to compete with others. With an economy as hot as the one we have today, you don't have a lot of room for error in buying the wrong tools, delaying your implementation, or selecting the wrong vendor. Expectations are sky-high, which of course makes all our jobs harder than ever.

And despite all the wonderful positive things technology can do, it has gotten away from us. There are now more than 100 different corporate learning vendors, at least 20 different tools for corporate collaboration, hundreds of new tools for recruitment, performance management, and employee engagement, and at least five major ERP vendors competing for payroll and core HR. All these are great companies, but selecting the right one and making sure the vendor doesn't go out of business is a challenge.

Added to all this, we can't trust technology like we did before. These vendors are moving so fast (they see all this growth) they're becoming sloppy in their own ways. Facebook just revealed that it gave away more data than it hard reported to congress, and it "unblocked" confidential information for almost a million people in messenger "by accident." Google just revealed that hundreds of vendors have been reading your Gmail accounts (I use hosted Exchange), and despite their best efforts to "not be evil" I sometimes wonder what's happening to my enormous cache of photos.

A recent study by Edelman found that even Californians, where I live, don't trust tech the way we used to. More than three-fifths of Californians believe tech firms over-focus on profits and drain local resources for their own benefit (more on this below), 58% believe tech companies fail to protect them from security threats, and 67% believe the industry is "secretive." Worst of all, 60% believe tech jobs are good for the state, but only 38% believe tech companies benefit them as individuals. This is because many of these great jobs are unavailable to normal people.
Traffic, Housing Costs, Infrastructure
I have always measured the state of the U.S. economy by simply measuring how much traffic there is on the San Francisco Bay Bridge. Well it has reached an epic level of frustration. I have to leave my house at 5 a.m. to catch an 8 a.m. flight from SFO now, and there seems to be traffic all day everywhere. Uber drivers tell me the same.

The San Francisco BART system, which was an absolutely state of the art system in the 1970s (I actually worked with the IBM team that built the Bart computers in my early career), is heavily overloaded. I talked with a good friend last weekend who told me it takes her 90 minutes to travel from Berkeley to San Francisco because she has to walk to a Bart station far from her house that lets her get on the train. Many of the trains are so full you can barely get on.

Housing costs are clearly going up (the median house now costs $880,000 and it takes four minimum wage jobs to afford one average apartment rent), and in most neighborhoods here (and in many cities) they are far out of reach for new families. The Deloitte 2018 Millennial Study discovered that 51% of respondents believe their financial situation will be worse than their parents and they rate pay as their No. 1 criteria for a job. They see rising healthcare costs, high housing prices, and the high cost of food and transportation (and student debt) as expenses growing faster than their income. In fact 43% are willing to leave their jobs for better pay and 62% plan to work a "side-hustle" to make more cash. (Is that a full-time worker driving that Uber car?)

These are all nice problems to have of course, except for the fact that wages are barely increasing while the cost of living is now going up by 2-2.5% per year. Inflation is here (we just don't notice it) and the gap between wages and costs is not closing.

I also look at productivity data and again it shows a lag. As I've talked about with many companies, global productivity is slowing, which means we're creating jobs, hiring people, but getting a little less done per hour each year. I think this is caused by many factors (commute time, poor infrastructure, and also re-engineering of work practices), but ultimately it shows a "sloppiness" in the way we run our companies. Why? We are in such a rush to "grow" and hire people to meet demand, we don't always have time to really re-engineer what we're doing to become more efficient.

Surprising to me, in my research this year I've found that many of us are not very good financial planners in general. Research now shows that 50% of American households have no savings at all, the median retirement balance is only $3,000, and the average credit card debt is over $10,000. In fact 40% of adults rate themselves a C or worse in financial literacy and even Millennials feel stressed (15% of college graduate salaries now go to student loan debt and 32% of millennials say pay is causing them stress).

I'm not saying business leaders aren't trying hard: everywhere I go companies have a focus on the "employee experience" or some other terminology for making work easier and better. But programs like Wellbeing programs, employee engagement programs, and better benefits are kind of like putting bandaids on a wound, when the real problem is deeper and harder to fix. No amount of wellbeing subsidy makes up for a two-hour commute, a rent that takes a third of your income, or a lack of cash management to make ends meet.
Difficulty To Hire
Of course the biggest challenge employers find in this kind of economy is how hard it is to attract the right people. Recruiters are arming up with lots of new weapons to find people (I'll be talking much more about this at the HR tech conferences coming later this year), but they're also finding a 40% increase in time to hire. This is simply the result of candidates being more picky, and even trends like " job ghosting," where job candidates just "disappear."

I remember interviewing a large telecommunications company that told me they have "walk-aways" all the time - people who accept jobs and then just "walk away" when they don't understand what to do. Now candidates are just "disappearing" in the interview process because they see so many other opportunities available. One company told me they are now paying job candidates to take an interview, even though they may not get an offer!
What Does All This Mean?
Listen I'm not writing this article to be negative, but rather I think it's important for us to realize that in this economic cycle, we have a whole new set of winning strategies as employers. We can't fix what's going on in Washington, we can't necessarily fix the commute or the state of traffic - but we have to realize that our focus has to change.

Here are a few of the massive trends I see in my world of HR, business leadership, and the HR tech market.

Focus on employee productivity and wellbeing. In this kind of job market, everyone feels under stress. Your job as a business leader or HR manager has to focus on what you can do to make work easier.Reduce the clutter, help managers set clear goals, simplify your organizational structure, and make sure you have a rich set of wellbeing programs to offer. I'll be publishing a big report on wellbeing later this year: take my word for it, these programs are badly needed and you will see a huge ROI by investing in this area.

Get your recruitment house in order. The latest Bersin by Deloitte talent acquisition research found that 74% of companies are still doing what we call "transactional recruiting." In other words, they take a job requisition (typically opened by a manager), they post it on the internet, and they start the recruiting process. In today's job market this is insane. If you aren't honing your employment brand, seeking out passive candidates who fit your culture, actively engaging with senior leadership to improve your talent pipeline, and looking seriously at gig work and leveraging talent pools, you're fishing in a pond that is way overfished.

Take your employee engagement problems very seriously. I'm almost tired of writing about the topics of culture and engagement (you can read more about it in theSimply Irresistible Model) but the problem remains. Every day I read a story about some work-related practice (unfair pay, mistreatment of an employee, lack of diversity in leadership), and it hurts your own company. Yes, we all want to hire, grow, and gain market share - but if we don't do it in a meaningful way, we will lose our best people and ultimately when the next recession comes, people simply will not make the sacrifices you need to keep your business growing.

Simplify your technology. Despite all the wonderful newAI tools out there(most are very immature), a lot of these new tools are brand new. Don't buy a bunch of them, buy only a few. Focus on making your core HR systems (Workday, Oracle, SAP, ADP, Ultimate) easy to use and well implemented. Buy alearning experience platformso your employees can easily share information and learn from each other. And stop buying more and more communication tools, all they do is make your employees lives harder. (Theaverage company has more than four different waysto collaborate, including Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google G-Suite, Workplace by Facebook, Slack, Webex, Skype, Zoom, and the list goes on and on.) Do you really need them all? I doubt it.

Bring together HR, IT, and business leadership and talk about these issues. One of the most important things we found from the 2018 Deloitte Human Capital Trends was thatthe C-Suite is not working closely enough togetheron cross-organizational issues. (Seventy-three percent of CXOs "rarely if ever" work together on cross functional issues!) Dealing with low unemployment, a hyper-competitive job market, and increased need for productivity and career growth clearly falls into this category

Don't take me wrong, I'm a big fan of economic growth. But let's do it in a careful and measured way - we all have to live in this economy, so let's plan for the bad times while we enjoy all the growth.

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The Ugly Side To Today's Low Unemployment Rate

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This economic cycle is really setting records. We've had almost 10 years of U.S. economic growth, the unemployment rate is at a 30-year low (it is expected to go lower), and every few days I hear someone in the administration bragging about how well the economy is performing.

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The U.S Economy Prediction by Abigail M.

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The U.S Economy Prediction by Abigail M.

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The U.S Economy Prediction GDP Performance

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The U.S Economy Prediction GDP Performance

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by Tyenisha R.

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Caroline - Previous and Predicted GDP behavior

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Caroline - Previous and Predicted GDP behavior