Peter Norlander

SEIU California | SEIU California Demands Release of CSU Faculty Member Brutalized By ICE SEIU California members call for the immediate release of our brother Jonathan Caravello, PhD, a U.S. citizen and union member, who was brutally assaulted and detained by federal agents as he…

A worker was killed. Dozens detained.

Dr. Jonathan Caravello, A CSU faculty member and US citizen, was brutalized & disappeared by ICE for observing.

Trump’s ICE thugs are escalating terror in our communities. Release them ALL.

seiuca.org/press-releas...

a line of heavily armed federal agents in riot gear standing in a field surrounded by tomato plants

The UFW can confirm farm workers were critically injured yesterday during chaotic raids in Ventura County, CA. Other workers, including US citizens, remain unaccounted for.

UFW staff is on the ground supporting impacted families.

Our full statement below. ⬇️
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H-1B Middlemen Bring Cheap Labor to Citi, Capital One Major US banks like Citi and Capital One are outsourcing to H-1B middleman firms which game the visa lottery system to hire thousands of lower paid workers.

“If the whole purpose of this program is to hire the best of the best, then why aren’t we seeing higher wages?” our Susan Houseman asks in @bloomberg.com

Work Schedules Fail Millions of U.S. Employees A new study finds that low-quality work schedules are widespread across the U.S., undermining employee wellbeing and creating challenges for employers.

The Upjohn Institute is leading the American Job Quality Survey, the most comprehensive look at what makes a job good – pay, benefits schedules and more – with @gallup.com, Jobs for the Future, and the Families & Workers Fund.

First findings spotlight the prevalence of low-quality work schedules.

Universities are the best at attraction and selection of foreign talent - recruitment is aligned with R&D and patenting, as my work (and work by Jennifer Hunt) has shown. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

Universities are the best at attraction and selection of foreign talent - recruitment is aligned with R&D and patenting, as my work (and work by Jennifer Hunt) has shown. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

We're hiring a postdoc in labor economics at IAB Nuremberg! Join @ineshelmecon.bsky.social, @jnimczik.bsky.social & me on a project about gig work.

🗓️ Start: 1 Oct 25
💶 Salary ≥ €5200/month

🌱 Possibility to apply for tenure track program

Apply here until 17 June: econjobmarket.org/positions/11...

Minimum Wages and Monopsony Power: MichalReichFest. June 6, 2025. Learn more: irle.berkeley.edu/events

Virtual registration is still open for the "Minimum Wages & Monopsony Power" conference! Featuring an all-star lineup of labor economists, this one-day event also honors career of Dr. Michael Reich.

📅 June 6, 2025 | 8am - 5pm
🔗 Register today: irle.berkeley.edu/events/minim...

Data on firm relocations reveal that nearly all wage differences between cities stem from the spatial sorting of workers and firms; Location-specific factors explain only 2–5 percent, from Pauline Carry, Benny Kleinman, and Elio Nimier-David https://www.nber.org/papers/w33779

Virtual LERA panel on "Free Speech at Work" a critical topic with speakers:

- Wilma Liebman, former NLRB chair & Dep Dir FMCS

- Craig Becker, @aflcio.org Senior Counsel & former NLRB member,

- Cynthia Estlund, NYU Law Prof.
lerachapter.org/vlera/events...

www.leraweb.org/fmcs-support

Do you work on topics related to employment and labor relations? Submit an individual paper or panel to LERA@ASSA 2026! LERA will be sponsoring a number of sessions, and they usually are well-attended. Submission deadline 3/15. #EconSky #EconConf

Also ... probably going to be challenged in court .... the Telework Enhancement Act says agencies "shall" establish telework policies, sets eligibility and participation criteria, requires OPM to report annually on agency-specific goals for increasing telework participation!

Telework is shaped by worker power, incentives, and institutions that coordinate behavior. Efficiency and task environment matter, of course, but the influence of the former dominates, imo. Events of recent years have lent greater credibility to our hypotheses in that paper.

Telework Enhancement Act - "require(s) the head of each executive agency to establish and implement a policy under which employees shall be authorized to telework, and for other purposes" I'm not sure how the President or OPM can rescind approved telework --> Congress requires it! Courts will say.

Can 'back to office' demands end telework in the federal gov't? OPM rule says n/a for workers covered by a CBA. Chris Erickson and I found that federal and unionized workers were more likely to work remote pre-pandemic. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

youtu.be/S46iJIk3t70?...

Put on ICE? Effects of Immigration Raids in the Animal Slaughtering and Processing Industry (May 2022) - The animal slaughtering and processing industry was the epicenter of work site immigration raids from 2006 to 2008 that were aimed at rooting out unauthorized immigrant workers in the Uni...

This article by Pia Orrenius and me seems relevant again. We examine the fallout from meatpacking & poultry processing raids during the Bush admin, a precursor to the Trump raids in 2019 and the future (maybe)
doi.org/10.1257/pand...

Looking forward to new research on #immigration, the #H1B visa, and more at #ASSA2025. #EconConf www.aeaweb.org/conference/2.... bsky.app/profile/pnor...

6. Despite regulatory barriers to H-1B worker's freedom to quit, there is still a significant amount of inter-firm mobility - when labor markets are tight. During recessions, many H-1B workers return to their home country. link.springer.com/article/10.1...

5. Organizations that sponsor H-1B workers have different reasons for doing so. The link between guest workers and innovation or productivity depends on the firms under consideration. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

4. However, employers do not use the full extent of their market power, likely due to regulations that require employers to pay prevailing wages. journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1...

Do guest worker programs give firms too much power? Guest worker programs requiring employer sponsorship can expand global opportunity—and grant employers market power

3. Guest worker programs such as the H-1B restrict worker's freedom to quit. This can give firms power to set wages below market. wol.iza.org/articles/do-...

2. Wage theft in the H-1B program more frequent among subcontractors. Higher employer concentration / employer power is associated with fewer wage and hour violations. We model why we this surprising finding might occur. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Good time to share some research on the #h1b program? #econsky 1. Firms with ex-politicians on the board increased barriers to hiring foreign workers after Trump's 2017 inauguration. Could it be because politically-connected execs pay more attention to tweets? onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

Interested in the effect of President Trump's 2016 election on foreign worker recruitment? How political connections on the board heighten firm responsiveness to change in the political environment? New paper co-authored with Professor Steve Sauerwald. #econsky journals.sagepub.com/share/RJIMCA...

Really interesting new paper on franchises, which finds (among other fascinating results!) that:
1) power has shifted over the past 15 years from franchisees to the franchisor (corporation)
2) lower franchisee power is associated with lower front-line worker wages

New working paper:

"The Balance of Power in Franchising,"
joint with @ulrich.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy, Pete Norlander, @stpinto.bsky.social, and newly-minted econ RA Blake Eliason.

marshallsteinbaum.org/wp-content/u...

#econsky /1

Few politicians I can think of name a corporate practice that affects workers and the companies that do it in stump speeches, and bring affected workers onto the stage during campaign rallies. …