The COVID-19 pandemic has raised critical questions about the quality of low-wage work in the United States. Many low-wage workers in the US have experienced employment precarity during the pandemic, creating new urgency around improving job quality so that work can once again become a pathway for economic security and mobility. Join the Urban Institute and WorkRise for a virtual convening that aims to advance understanding of good jobs, key questions for research and policy, and the levers for improving job quality now and in the future. We will hear from researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and advocates on wages and other elements of job quality as well as the roles different stakeholders play in creating higher-quality jobs for all workers. We will also learn about how workers think about and experience job quality through participants in STRIVE, an organization providing workforce training and career development and wraparound services in New York and Atlanta.
Introduction
- Kimberly Brown, Senior Program Officer, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
- Demetra Smith Nightingale, Institute Fellow, Urban Institute
Panel 1: Wages and Beyond: Exploring Job Quality
- Pronita Gupta, Special Assistant to the President on Labor and Workers, Domestic Policy Council
- Arne L. Kalleberg, Kenan Distinguished Professor of Sociology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- Sarah Kalloch, Executive Director, Good Jobs Institute
- Deborah King, Senior Advisor, National Domestic Workers Alliance
- Molly Scott, Principal Research Associate, Urban Institute (moderator)
Panel 2: Workers’ Perspectives on Job Quality
- Lakythia Ferby, Executive Director, STRIVE New York
- STRIVE participants
Panel 3: Charting a New Path for Job Quality
- Anmol Chaddha, Principal, Reimagining Capitalism, Omidyar Network
- Alexander Hertel-Fernandez, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy and Evaluation, US Department of Labor
- Michelle Wilson, Director of Evaluation and Learning, National Fund for Workforce Solutions
- Elisabeth Jacobs, Senior Fellow, Urban Institute (moderator)
Materials:
- Speaker biographies
- A Research Agenda on Good Jobs and Economic Mobility (WorkRise blog series)
- Understanding Good Jobs: A Review of Definitions and Evidence (Urban report)
- “Good Jobs: An Agenda for Future Study” (Urban brief)
- "What Would It Take to Achieve Job Quality for All Workers?” (Urban brief)
This event was supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and additional funders of WorkRise.
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