Heidi Shierholz

1 month ago | epi.org | Heidi Shierholz

Today, the Trump administration and nearly all Republicans in the House of Representatives took another step toward advancing their top economic priority: keeping taxes for the wealthy and corporations at rock-bottom rates, by any means necessary. The budget reconciliation bill that the House passed today, H.R. 1, represents a massive redistribution of income to the richest households in the country at the expense of some of the poorest.

Mar 28, 2025 | epi.org | Heidi Shierholz

President Trump dismantling collective bargaining rights from more than a million federal workers is pure political retribution. The administration has selectively revoked collective bargaining rights from federal workers represented by unions that are fighting against the administration’s efforts to tear down the federal government and the core services it provides. This is the behavior of an autocrat who grants rights to those who bow down to him and strips the rights of those who challenge him.

Mar 27, 2025 | epi.org | Heidi Shierholz

In a move that starkly exposes just how disingenuous the Trump administration’s pro-worker rhetoric really is, President Trump rescinded the Biden administration’s executive order that increased the minimum wage for workers on federal contracts. The Biden-era rule implementing that executive order raised the minimum wage for workers on federal contractors to $15 an hour in 2022 and indexed it to inflation going forward. As of January 1, it was $17.75 an hour.

Feb 26, 2025 | epi.org | Heidi Shierholz

Chair Walberg, Ranking Member Scott, and members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today. My name is Heidi Shierholz, and I am an economist and the president of the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) in Washington, D.C. EPI is a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank created in 1986 to include the needs of low- and middle-wage workers in economic policy discussions.

Feb 5, 2025 | epi.org | Heidi Shierholz

The hacking of U.S. Treasury payment systems and Office of Personnel Management (OPM) databases by Elon Musk’s team with the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is reckless, illegal, and unconstitutional. While we have very different fiscal priorities than the Trump administration, the method for enacting these policy priorities should be the same for everyone: pass a law.