Overview
Employer practices such as hiring, scheduling, promotion, supervision, and on-the-job training determine workers’ day-to-day reality and long-term prospects in the labor market. The growing prevalence of independent contractors and contingent workers underscores the continued fissuring of employer-employee relationships.
Working Knowledge
Skills and training
December 30, 2020
Article
Evidence from Sector-Focused Training Programs Shows Significant and Persistent Earnings Gains
A new NBER working paper finds sector-focused training programs enabled participants to increase longer-term earnings through jobs with higher hourly wages.
Employer practices
December 11, 2020
Article
New Colorado Paid Family Leave Policy—and a Surging Pandemic—Creates Urgency for a Federal Paid Leave Program
Colorado joins eight states and Washington, DC as jurisdictions with paid family leave. Yet without a federal program, gaps in access to paid leave will persist.
Worker voice, representation, and power
October 29, 2020
Article
How Can COVID-19 Recovery Policies Narrow the Power Gap between Workers and Employers?
Even before Covid-19, workers in low-wage jobs were in crisis as worker protections have eroded and ladders of upward mobility have all but disappeared.
Research
Employer practices
Report
Last updated on January 22, 2025
Job Quality and Employer Practices: Evidence from B Corporations
A new WorkRise report, Job Quality and Employer Practices: Evidence from B Corporations, examines differences across firms in employer practices related to job quality, and how those differences relate to outcomes for both workers and businesses.
WorkRise Research
Employer practices
Last updated on December 04, 2024
Advancing Economic Mobility in Manufacturing
In today’s labor market, manufacturers, like many employers, recognize that recruiting and retaining workers often means rethinking diversity considerations and identifying new talent pools.
Last updated on December 04, 2024
Employer practices
Report
Last updated on October 25, 2024
The Minneapolis Small Business High-Road Labor Standards Intervention Pilot Project
The Minneapolis Small Business High-Road Labor Standards Intervention Pilot Project seeks to provide services that support immigrant, black, indigenous, and people of color owned small businesses so that they can create healthy, just, and equitable jobs through meeting and or exceeding minimum city labor standards.
Grantee Research
Employer practices
Brief
Last updated on September 19, 2024
Extreme Heat at Work
This research brief offers the first nationally representative estimates of how outdoor and indoor workers are affected by extreme heat, highlighting that low-wage workers, defined as adults earning less than $15 an hour, face greater risks than higher-wage earners.
WorkRise Research