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1 week ago | 
tcf.org | Gayle Goldin |Steven Greenhouse |Emily McGrath |Michelle Burris
In a reversal that underscores both the political sensitivity and economic importance of U.S. manufacturing, the Trump administration is walking back its April 1 decision to zero out millions in funding for Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) centers whose contracts were up for renewal in ten states.
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2 weeks ago | 
tcf.org | Emily McGrath |Michelle Burris
The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) serves as the nation’s primary federal workforce development framework, providing job seekers with access to training, employment services, and supportive resources while also facilitating career navigation and regional workforce planning. Though funding for the WIOA is limited relative to the nation’s workforce challenges, it plays an important role in meeting the talent needs of local industries.
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3 weeks ago | 
tcf.org | Emily McGrath |Michelle Burris |Laura Gutierrez |Laura Gutiérrez |Alejandra Vazquez Baur
Imagine this:Thirteen-year-old children working the night shift cleaning the kill floors of meatpacking plants, their small hands barely able to hold the tools they are required to use. Working people putting in fifty-hour workweeks and getting paid for just a fraction of the hours they worked. Hardworking coal miners working underground, forced to travel miles in mines that haven’t had safety inspections.
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2 months ago | 
tcf.org | Steven Greenhouse |Emily McGrath |Michelle Burris |Andrew Stettner
On February 18, President Trump issued an executive order purporting to assume control over independent administrative agencies, including those that hear and decide individual cases involving workers’ rights and protections, such as the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Independent agencies were carefully designed by Congress—decades ago—to ensure that they can act in accordance with the law, unaffected by political influence or presidential favoritism.
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2 months ago | 
tcf.org | Emily McGrath |Michelle Burris |Andrew Stettner |Michele Evermore
As a presidential candidate last fall, Donald Trump repeatedly promised to battle for U.S. workers, but ever since he returned to the White House, he has taken a surprisingly large number of anti-worker actions, labor experts say. Some of those actions, among them hobbling the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), will help Trump’s billionaire business friends, most notably Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos.
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Oct 15, 2024 | 
tcf.org | Julie Kashen |Laura Valle-Gutierrez |Michelle Burris |Tanu Kumar
We have probably had too good an opinion of human nature in forming our confederation. Experience has taught us, that men will not adopt & carry into execution, measures the best calculated for their own good without the intervention of a coercive power. —George Washington to John Jay, August 15, 1786Executive SummaryExperience teaches us that the resolution of contested public policies is often delayed by public officials until events force them to act.
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Nov 13, 2023 | 
tcf.org | Tanu Kumar |Laura Gutierrez |Laura Gutiérrez |Emily McGrath |Michelle Burris
For the first time in decades, U.S. manufacturing is experiencing a resurgence. Billions of dollars are flowing into the sector as historic investments through the American Rescue Plan and CHIPS and Science Act of 2022. Automation, customization, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of Things are transforming work in the sector as part of what some are calling the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
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Oct 3, 2023 | 
tcf.org | Michelle Burris |Laura Gutierrez |Laura Gutiérrez |Julie Kashen |Andrew Stettner
Achieving diversity of enrollment in U.S. colleges and graduate schools—and by extension, employment in professional fields—has always been an uphill battle. With the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down race-based affirmative action programs in higher education, that battle will be even tougher.
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Oct 3, 2023 | 
tcf.org | Emily McGrath |Michelle Burris |Denise Smith |Halley Potter
Manufacturing in the United States is at a major inflection point. Automation, customization, artificial intelligence, and the internet of things are transforming work in the sector as part of the “fourth industrial revolution.” Alongside the aging of the manufacturing workforce, it’s estimated that between 2015 and 2025, approximately two million manufacturing jobs will go unfulfilled because of recruitment and skill-building challenges.
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Jun 23, 2023 | 
tcf.org | Julie Kashen |Michelle Burris |Laura Gutierrez |Laura Gutiérrez |Lea Woods
TCF fellow Laura Valle Gutierrez testified at a Women’s Democratic Caucus “shadow hearing” on June 22, 2023, “The State of Child Care in America.” Her testimony, which you can read below, explains the dire consequences that the rapidly approaching child care funding cliff will have for women, children, families, early educators, and state economies as federal child care stabilization grant funding expires at the end of September.
