Affiliate · Center on Poverty and Social Policy, Columbia University
Evidence on how policy reshapes work, place, and mobility.
I study how policy changes work, pay, and opportunity across U.S. places — from minimum wages and the gig economy to Opportunity Zones, the Child Tax Credit, and retirement coverage. The through-line is how national policy choices play out in local economies, and what that means for worker well-being and economic mobility.
- Appeared on · C-SPAN Washington Journal · CBS News
- Research covered in · The Wall Street Journal · The Washington Post · Reuters · Axios
- Published in · Journal of Labor Economics · Journal of Public Economics · Health Affairs
Recent findings
The top pulled away from everyone else
Since December 1982, real hourly wages at the 90th percentile are up 77.5 percent, against 39.7 percent at the median and 53.6 percent at the 10th percentile.
The bottom closed on the middle while the top pulled away
Measured against December 1982, the 90th-percentile wage has gained 27 percent on the median, while the median has lost 9 percent against the 10th percentile.
Half the workers, a tenth of the tax benefit
The bottom half of U.S. workers receives about 10 percent of the federal tax benefit that goes to workers for retirement saving — a modeled $92 a year on average in the lowest-paid tenth, against $5,084 in the highest-paid tenth.
Pay has trailed prices for five months
Average hourly earnings after inflation were below their year-earlier level for five straight months, April through August 2026 — in August, pay was up 3.1 percent and prices 3.4 percent.
$7.25 no longer tells the whole story
In 2025, one percent of hourly workers earned at or below the $7.25 federal minimum, but seven percent earned at or below the higher federal-or-state floor — in 1982, both measures were about 14 percent.
One inflation rate, very different prices
From 2000 to 2024, consumer prices rose 82.2 percent overall, but medical care prices rose 116.2 percent and apparel prices just 1.5 percent — all inside the same official index.
The generation wage ladder
At the same age, each generation of U.S. wage earners has out-earned the last — at 35, the typical Millennial earned about 32 percent more than the typical Boomer did, in 2025 dollars.
Figures adapted from my short-form video series — full reels on Instagram and TikTok.
Currently: Research on the U.S. retirement coverage gap and the Retirement Savings for Americans Act, plus a short-form video series on what the latest labor-market data show.
Collaborations, press interviews, podcasts, and panels are a regular part of the work — requests welcome. Email me or see past appearances.
Selected work
The Minimum Wage, Self-Employment, and the Online Gig Economy
Minimum-wage increases pushed some workers into gig and nonemployer self-employment, concentrated in transportation and warehousing after ride-hailing platforms emerged.
How to end low-wage work forever: An 80-80 wage subsidy proposal
The 80-80 proposal would subsidize low-wage paychecks directly, raising take-home pay without adding to employers' cost of hiring.
Benjamin Glasner on President Trump's Proposal to Create Private-Sector Retirement Accounts
Washington Journal interview on retirement-plan access, the gaps in the current system, and the policy logic behind expanding portable retirement accounts for workers without employer coverage.