The University of Massachusetts Amherst
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UMass Economics

Employees who file sexual harassment complaints often face harsh outcomes, with 65 percent losing their jobs within a year, and 68 percent reporting some form of retaliation by their employer, according to new research from the UMass Amherst Center for Employment Equity.

Employees who file sexual harassment complaints often face harsh outcomes, with 65 percent losing their jobs within a year, and 68 percent reporting some form of retaliation by their employer, according to new research from the UMass Amherst Center for Employment Equity. In their report, “Employer’s Responses to Sexual Harassment,” co-authors Carly McCann, Donald Tomaskovic-Devey and M.V. Lee Badgett analyzed over 46,000 harassment claims sent to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and state Fair Employment Practices Agencies from 2012-16. These cases represent only a small amount (0.2 percent) of the estimated 25.6 million experiences of sexual harassment in the workplace that occurred over this same five-year window. (Wall Street Journal, Business West, 12/13/18; News Office release)

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UMass Economics

A news story on recovery efforts in Puerto Rico after the destruction caused by Hurricane Maria includes comments from Robert N. Pollin, Distinguished Professor in economics and co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute.

A news story on recovery efforts in Puerto Rico after the destruction caused by Hurricane Maria includes comments from Robert N. Pollin, Distinguished Professor in economics and co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute. Pollin says rebuilding the island’s energy infrastructure using a green growth strategy will lower energy costs and modernize the system at the same time. It will also produce jobs and help reduce Puerto Rico’s dependency on the federal government. (Cleantechnica.com, 12/12/18)

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UMass Economics

There is continued national news coverage about a team of economists from the UMass Amherst Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) that has found that the Medicare for All Act of 2017, is not only economically viable, but could actually reduce health consumption expenditures by about 9.6 percent while also providing decent health care coverage for all Americans.

There is continued national news coverage about a team of economists from the UMass Amherst Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) that has found that the Medicare for All Act of 2017, introduced in the United States Senate by Senator Bernie Sanders, is not only economically viable, but could actually reduce health consumption expenditures by about 9.6 percent while also providing decent health care coverage for all Americans. Robert N. Pollin, Distinguished Professor in economics and lead author of the report, says, “The most fundamental goals of Medicare for All are to significantly improve health care outcomes for everyone living in the United States while also establishing effective cost controls throughout the health care system. These two purposes are both achievable.” (Financial Advisor, 12/6/18; News Office release)

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UMass Economics

A team of economists from the UMass Amherst Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) has found that the Medicare for All Act of 2017, introduced to the United States Senate by Senator Bernie Sanders, could actually reduce health consumption expenditures by about 9.6 percent while also providing decent health care coverage for all Americans.

There is national news coverage about a team of economists from the UMass Amherst Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) that has found that the Medicare for All Act of 2017, introduced to the United States Senate by Senator Bernie Sanders, is not only economically viable, but could actually reduce health consumption expenditures by about 9.6 percent while also providing decent health care coverage for all Americans. In a nearly 200-page report released at the Sanders Institute Gathering, the first major event hosted by the think tank founded by Jane O’Meara Sanders and David Driscoll, the senator’s wife and son, the economists outline seven major aspects of transforming the U.S. health care system, detailing step-by-step the actions needed to be taken to achieve truly universal health care and its potential impacts on individuals, families, businesses and government. The analysis, which was in development for 18 months, has received praise from 11 distinguished experts in the fields of economics and health care studies who have rigorously reviewed the researchers’ findings. (Seattle Post-Intelligencer [from AP], Commondreams.org, WCAX-TV 3 [Vt.], Republican, 11/30/18; News Office release)

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UMass Economics

Gerald C. Friedman, economics, comments in a column about how the layoffs announced by General Motors highlight the ever-larger holes in the retirement system for most American workers.

Gerald C. Friedman, economics, comments in a column about how the layoffs announced by General Motors highlight the ever-larger holes in the retirement system for most American workers. He says, “Companies don’t offer pensions anymore. Social Security, when it was established, was meant to be one leg of a stool. One leg would be the private pension through employment, a second leg personal savings, and a third leg Social Security. Social Security is now the only source of income a lot of elderly have.” (NBC News, 11/27/18)

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UMass Economics

Ina Ganguli, economics, is quoted in a story about how immigrant businesses play a key role in the economy of the Worcester area.

Ina Ganguli, economics, is quoted in a story about how immigrant businesses play a key role in the economy of the Worcester area. She says immigrants have a higher rate of obtaining patents or more upstart capital, but the reason for this isn’t known. (Telegram & Gazette, 11/19/18)

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UMass Economics

A columnist writing about issues that should be addressed by the new Congress says raising the minimum wage is high on his list, cites recent research done by Arindrajit Dube.

A columnist writing about issues that should be addressed by the new Congress says raising the minimum wage is high on his list. He cites recent research done by Arindrajit Dube, economics, that finds that a 10-percent increase in the minimum wage will tend to increase the incomes for the poorest 15 percent of families by about 3.3 percent after three years, while cutting the poverty rate substantially. The writer notes that Dube uses publicly available survey data and is able to analyze a large number of wage increases at both the federal and state levels. (Bloomberg, 11/13/18)

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UMass Economics

Research done by James K. Boyce, emeritus professor of economics, and Michael A. Ash, economics, on how minority communities are often the site of polluting industries.

Research done by James K. Boyce, emeritus professor of economics, and Michael A. Ash, economics, on how minority communities are often the site of polluting industries, but see very little of the economic benefit from those facilities, especially in the form of jobs, is cited in a news story. (Pacific Standard, 11/9/18)

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UMass Economics

Leonce Ndikumana, economics and Political Economy Research Institute, is interviewed about how the global tax system allows capital to flow from developing countries into global tax havens

Leonce Ndikumana, economics and Political Economy Research Institute, is interviewed about how the global tax system allows capital to flow from developing countries into global tax havens. He says globalized corporations take advantage of the patchwork of taxation policies that leads to loss of revenue for poorer countries where natural resources are mined or collected. (The Real News Network, 11/5/18)

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UMass Economics

M.V. Lee Badgett, economics, has calculated that India was losing $26 billion per year in economic activity by discriminating against LGBT people

A news story about how Malaysia’s Prime Minister Maharthir Mohamad says he doesn’t think Asia needs to copy the West in accepting its lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender citizens, notes that M.V. Lee Badgett, economics, has calculated that India was losing $26 billion per year in economic activity by discriminating against LGBT people. (Bloomberg, 10/25/18)