Center for Economic and Policy Research

Not to be confused with Centre for Economic Policy Research.

The Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) is an American think tank that specializes in economic policy. Based in Washington, D.C. CEPR was co-founded by economists Dean Baker and Mark Weisbrot in 1999.^[2]

Center for Economic and Policy Research

Abbreviation	CEPR
Formation	1999; 25 years ago (1999)
Type	Economic policy think tank
Headquarters	1611 Connecticut Avenue NW Washington, D.C., United States
Co-directors	Dean Baker Mark Weisbrot
Revenue (2019)	$4,333,658
Expenses (2019)	$2,392,792^[1]
Website	www.cepr.net

Considered a left-leaning organization,^[3][4][5] notable CEPR contributors include Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences recipients Joseph Stiglitz and Robert Solow.

History

Politically, CEPR has been described as both progressive^[6] and left-leaning.^[3][4][5] CEPR contributors include Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences recipients Joseph Stiglitz and Robert Solow.

Issues

United States

Healthcare

CEPR supports the Affordable Care Act (ACA) stating that it is "a family-friendly policy" and that the policy "has allowed thousands of workers to voluntarily reduce their work hours to care for children or elderly parents, or to explore new opportunities." Despite the increase in the percentage of workers employed on a part-time basis, CEPR concluded that such statistics were not sufficient to make any overall judgments on the health of the labor market.^[7][8]

Employment

CEPR backs alongside the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) the Full Employment Caucus, a group on United States House officials that advocate for full employment in the United States.^[9]

Minimum wage

A 2014 study by CEPR shows that 13 states that increased their minimum wage had an average payroll of 0.99% compared to 0.68% in other states, though the CEPR stated the analysis was "far from scientific".^[10] In response to criticism of President Joe Biden's support for a $15 minimum wage, Baker calculated that, had wages risen alongside increases in productivity since 1968, the minimum wage would be around $24 an hour.^[11] This was later revised to $21.50 per hour on March 16, 2022, after a spreadsheet error was found and corrected.^[12]

Taxes

In a 2014 report in Fortune, CEPR co-founder Dean Baker suggested that according to poll findings, many citizens of the United States did not notice a 2% increase in their Social Security tax.^[13]

Latin America

CEPR has been supportive of left-leaning governments in South America.^[14]

Brazil

In 2008, Brazilian Foreign Secretary Celso Amorim cited CEPR's work to explain why Brazil had no interest in signing a free trade agreement with the United States. He said that the CEPR report concluded that the most severe impacts from the financial crisis of 2007–08 would be suffered by those economies most integrated to United States, those that have free trade agreements with the US.^[15]

Venezuela

CEPR and its founder Mark Weisbrot have analysed and often written about the crisis in Venezuela. In an October 2012 op-ed for The New York Times, Weisbrot wrote "[a]lthough some media have talked of Venezuela’s impending economic collapse for more than a decade, it hasn’t happened and is not likely to happen."^[16] In a July 2014 article, for Fortune, Weisbrot said the Venezuelan economy had performed well for the period from 2004, when the government gained control of the oil industry from the opposition, to 2012. He stated that, during the past two years, however a number of problems like the inflation and a shortage of essential consumer goods worsened. He said many problems are connected to the exchange rate system and for the things to get better, the government would have to bring inflation down and manage the transition to a new exchange rate regime.^[17] In a June 2016 article in The New York Times, Weisbrot wrote that "Washington has caused enormous damage to Venezuela in its relentless pursuit of 'regime change' for the last 15 years." He suggested the US end its intervention, which he said included economic sanctions, funding of opposition groups and refusal to accept presidential election results.^[18]

Bolivia

in 2019, CEPR criticized the Organization of American States (OAS)'s audit of the 2019 Bolivian general election, which concluded that the results of the elections should be voided because there were "drastic and hard-to-explain change in the trend of the preliminary results after the closing of the polls". Weisbrot wrote that the report "provides absolutely no evidence — no statistics, numbers, or facts of any kind — to support this idea", and called on the OAS to retract its press release.^[19]

CEPR commissioned researchers at the MIT Election Data and Science Lab, John Curiel and Jack R. Williams, to independently verify their work on the 2019 Bolivian election.^[20][14] The MIT researchers published a statistical analysis on 27 February 2020, confirming the results of the CEPR study and finding that there was no "statistical evidence of fraud that we can find — the trends in the preliminary count, the lack of any big jump in support for Morales after the halt, and the size of Morales’s margin all appear legitimate. All in all, the OAS's statistical analysis and conclusions would appear deeply flawed" and that "it is highly likely that Morales surpassed the 10-percentage-point margin in the first round" as originally presented.^[21][22] Several left-leaning governments like Argentina under Alberto Fernandez cited the CEPR report as a reason to support the old Bolivian president Morales, while right-leaning governments like Brazil under Jair Bolsonaro backed the OAS.^[23] The OAS dismissed the report as "neither honest, nor fact-based nor comprehensive"^[24] and called it "unscientific".^[23] Three researchers from the University of Pennsylvania further criticised the OAS report in a study and according to the New York Times the OAS consultant refused to share the data or methods of the OAS analysis, while an expert from the University of Miami like the OAS stated there was fraud in the election.^[25] Two economists from the Mercatus Center and the College of Business and Entrepreneurship, writing for Project Syndicate, argued that the assumptions of the study of the MIT scientists commissioned by CEPR, were questionable for methodological reasons.^[26]

Personnel

CEPR's staff includes Ha-Joon Chang,^[27] Eileen Appelbaum,^[28][29] John Schmitt and Deborah James.^[30][31]

CEPR contributors include Advisory Board Members Joseph Stiglitz and Robert Solow.^[32]

As of 2017, CEPR's Board of Directors includes:^[33]

Dean Baker Walden Bello Chuck Collins Teresa Ghilarducci

Danny Glover

Robert Pollin

Julian Bond served as CEPR's Board Chair in the past.^[34]

References

1. "Center For Economic And Policy Research - Nonprofit Explorer". ProPublica. 9 May 2013. from the original on 2021-07-16. Retrieved 2021-07-16.
2. "About CEPR". Center for Economic and Policy Research. Retrieved 17 April 2018.
3. Rosenberg, Tina (4 November 2007). "The Perils Of Petrocracy". The New York Times. from the original on 24 November 2020. Retrieved 5 October 2014. … Mark Weisbrot, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, a left-leaning Washington policy group.
4. Sussman, Anna Louie (7 September 2015). "Are Women the New Face of Organized Labor?". The Wall Street Journal. from the original on 21 September 2015. Retrieved 20 September 2015.
5. Fox, Maggie (24 July 2013). "Obamacare won't slash workers' hours, report finds". NBC News. from the original on 3 November 2020. Retrieved 31 October 2014.
6. Dolny, Michael (March 2008). "The Incredible Shrinking Think Tank". Fair. from the original on 18 April 2018. Retrieved 17 April 2018.
7. Hiltzik, Michael (2 October 2014). "Obamacare at one year: a birthday assessment". Los Angeles Times. from the original on 2 October 2014. Retrieved 3 October 2014.
8. Verhage, Julie (August 7, 2015). "Dean Baker: There's a Big Economic Benefit to Obamacare That Isn't Getting Much Attention". Bloomberg. from the original on 2015-09-14. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
9. Marans, Daniel (18 September 2015). "Senior Democrat Has A New Plan To Trim Unemployment". The Huffington Post. from the original on 22 September 2015. Retrieved 20 September 2015.
10. Davisdson, Paul (7 July 2014). "Study: States that raised minimum wage had stronger job growth". USA Today. from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 3 October 2014.
11. Schwarz, Jon (2021-03-05). "Forget $15 an Hour — the Minimum Wage Should Be $24". The Intercept. from the original on 2021-10-08. Retrieved 2021-10-08.
12. Baker, Dean (16 March 2022). "CORRECTION: This is What Minimum Wage Would Be If It Kept Pace with Productivity". CEPR. from the original on 1 November 2022. Retrieved 1 November 2022.
13. Baker, Dean (30 September 2014). "The tax hike that almost nobody noticed". Fortune. from the original on 3 October 2014. Retrieved 3 October 2014.
14. "M.I.T. Researchers Cast Doubt on Bolivian Election Fraud". The New York Times. 2020-02-29. from the original on 2020-02-29. Retrieved 2021-09-08.
15. "Diversified markets have cut Brazil's exposure to US crisis". MercoPress. 4 April 2008. from the original on 15 March 2018. Retrieved 17 March 2018.
16. Weisbrot, Mark (2012-10-09). "Opinion | Why Chávez Was Re-elected". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. from the original on 2018-10-19. Retrieved 2018-12-09.
17. "How to fix Venezuela's troubled exchange rate". Fortune. from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 29 September 2014.
18. "How to save Venezuela". The New York Times. from the original on 29 June 2016. Retrieved 30 June 2016.
19. Beeton, Dan. "OAS Should Retract Its Press Release on Bolivian Election, CEPR Co-Director Says Press Releases CEPR". cepr.net. from the original on 2019-11-19. Retrieved 2019-11-11.
20. Williams, Jack. "Analysis of the 2019 Bolivia Election". Center for Economic and Policy Research. CEPR. from the original on 1 March 2020. Retrieved 1 March 2020.
21. Curiel, John; Williams, Jack R. (27 February 2020). "Bolivia dismissed its October elections as fraudulent. Our research found no reason to suspect fraud". The Washington Post. from the original on 12 November 2021. Retrieved 28 February 2020.
22. "US centre: No evidence of fraud in Bolivia's October polls - Evo Morales News". Al Jazeera. 2020-02-28. from the original on 2021-09-08. Retrieved 2021-09-08.
23. Laing, Aislinn (2020-03-02). "Study casting doubt on Bolivian election fraud triggers controversy". U.S. from the original on 2021-09-08. Retrieved 2021-09-08.
24. "Bolivia after the ouster of Evo Morales, a leftist strongman". The Economist. ISSN 0013-0613. from the original on 16 July 2020. Retrieved 10 March 2020.
25. "A Bitter Election. Accusations of Fraud. And Now Second Thoughts". The New York Times. 7 June 2020. Retrieved 15 October 2023.
26. Escobari, Diego (2020-03-17). "Bolivia's Electoral Fraud Reckoning | by Walter D. Valdivia & Diego Escobari". Project Syndicate. from the original on 2021-09-08. Retrieved 2021-09-08.
27. . CEPR. 30 January 2007. Archived from the original on 17 April 2015. Retrieved 30 September 2014.
28. . CEPR. Archived from the original on 18 April 2015. Retrieved 30 September 2014.
29. . Russell Sage. Archived from the original on 2014-10-06. Retrieved 30 September 2014.
30. . Global Exchange. Archived from the original on 2015-04-02. Retrieved 15 September 2014.
31. . CEPR. Archived from the original on 19 March 2015. Retrieved 21 March 2015.
32. "Joseph Stiglitz and Robert Solow". CEPR. from the original on 25 September 2014. Retrieved 30 September 2014.
33. . Center for Economic and Policy Research. March 2017. Archived from the original on 2008-03-10. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
34. "Center for Economic and Policy Research - GuideStar Profile". www.guidestar.org. from the original on 2017-04-01. Retrieved 2017-03-31.

External links

• CEPR website