A persistent question for those who pondered West Virginia’s fate is a simple: why, in a state rich in natural resources, are West Virginians so poor? For more than a century several explanations have been developed by natives and interested “outsiders.” Read the report. This report, the ninth annual investigation of The State of Working…
Income and Work
This report is the eighth in an annual series that examines the state of West Virginia’s economy. While previous editions examined data on employment, income, productivity, job quality and other aspects of the economy as they impact working people, this issue is an in-depth look at one specific economic measure - West Virginia’s labor force…
In honor of Women's Equality Day, recognizing the certification of the 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote, the Institute for Women's Policy Research (IWPR) released a new report on women in unions. The report found that women in unions earn more than women who are not in a union in every state including West…
On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its employment and unemployment survey for July 2015 and the news for West Virginia's economy continues to be bad. West Virginia not only has the highest unemployment rate in the nation at 7.5 percent, it is also the only state to have lost a statistically significant number of…
“Right-to-Work” laws do not guarantee jobs for workers. Instead they prohibit unions and employers from including a provision in contracts that requires employees who benefit from union representation to pay for their fair share toward those costs. PDF of Fast Facts. Some state lawmakers argue that if West Virginia adopted a so-called “right-to-work” (RTW) law…
Some lawmakers are claiming West Virginia’s prevailing wage overpays construction workers and inflates the costs of public construction projects, but the evidence does not support these claims. Ending the state’s prevailing wage is likely to have no impact on public construction costs but could hurt the living standards of construction workers and the competitiveness of…
It has been over seven years since the beginning of the Great Recession. While the country is finally beginning to recover from the biggest recession since the Great Depression, West Virginia's rocky recovery has yet to fully materialize. In fact, over the last couple of years the state's job growth has been non-existent. At the…
Last week, the State Senate passed a bill (SB 559) that would except DHHR social workers from the requirement to be licensed by the West Virginia Board of Social Work. According to the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Services, this bill aims to get more people to apply for positions within Child Protective…
Construction workers hired for public projects in West Virginia must be paid a minimum “prevailing” wage and benefits level. This prevailing wage level must equal the market wage rates as determined by the West Virginia Division of Labor, and varies by geographical area within the state and by occupation. West Virginia’s prevailing wage law was…
Earlier, I showed how it's nearly impossible for the prevailing wage to add 25% to the cost of public construction projects, like opponents to the law claim, even if you assume that the prevailing wage is nearly 50% higher than average wages in the construction sector. But let's take a closer look at that 50% claim.…