Institute for Work and the Economy

12/15/2025

I am excited to announce the launch of the new website for the Institute for Work and the Economy at workandeconomy.org. The site outlines the principles that drive our mission, highlights our current initiatives, and showcases our accomplishments over the past 25 years.

We are also introducing three initiatives that utilize our resources:
- One focused on fair access in employment
- Another that chronicles AI in the workplace
- A third serves as an incubator for independent ideas in workforce and economic development

Additionally, we are launching two innovative features on the website:
- Open invitations for individuals to share their stories about fair access
- A platform for sharing ideas on how to create positive outcomes in today's challenging environment.

www.workandeconomy.org

Our vision is for a thriving and inclusive economy that prioritizes workers and fosters shared prosperity. This is backed by our mission to serve as a conduit for innovative workforce strategies and policies that foster economic security, equity, and opportunity for all workers.

01/10/2025

Diversity, equity, and inclusion policies aim to level the playing field and give everyone equal opportunities. Experience shows that they erase disadvantages, the opposite of the misleading claim that DEI conveys advantages to special groups. Businesses benefit from enhanced performance from a larger pool of qualified workers, resilience, and the ability to function better in diverse markets. Workers benefit from more opportunities to pursue the careers they wish....

Diversity, equity, and inclusion policies aim to level the playing field and give everyone equal opportunities. Experience shows that they erase disadvantages, the opposite of the misleading claim …

06/20/2024

Veteran elections official Cathy Darling Allen will join us on June 20th for a discussion about election year reporting and how journalists can tell more accurate stories about rural voters. Register now: https://ruralassembly.org/rural-journalism-collective-election-reporting/

Allen served as the Shasta County Clerk and Registrar of Voters 2004-2024. Appointed to fill the remaining term of retiring County Clerk Ann Reed, Cathy was elected to her fifth term of office in 2022. She oversaw the administration of 41 elections and counted more than 1.8 million votes. Cathy administered elections using electronic voting, paper ballot voting, and steered Shasta County elections through major changes in California election law and regulation.

Allen has always been an active member of the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials (CACEO), served on the Elections Legislative Committee, the Board of Directors, and as President (2012-2014). She received certification from CACEO as a California Professional Election Administrator in 2005 and from the Election Center (a national professional association) as a Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) in 2016. Allen is also an originating member and Advisory Board member of the Future of California Elections (FOCE) collaborative, a member of the Elections Verification Network (EVN) and Board Chair for the California Voter Foundation (CVF). She lives in Redding with her husband and granddaughter.

She will join panelists Dee Davis, president of the Center for Rural Strategies, and ICT political correspondent Pauly Denentclaw on the panel. We’ll touch on voter polling conducted by the Center for Rural Strategies, Native and Indigenous voters, and how journalists can support rural poll workers with their reporting, and more.

06/20/2024

What makes your community thrive? Submit a video to share that story with rural leaders, organizers, and allies at Rural Assembly Everywhere. Deadline: July 1st. Learn more at ruralassembly.org/submissions

06/20/2024

Journalist Pauly Denetclaw, a political correspondent for ICT (Indian Country Today) will join us on June 20th for a discussion about election year reporting and how journalists can tell more accurate stories about rural voters. Register now: https://ruralassembly.org/rural-journalism-collective-election-reporting/

Denetclaw, a citizen of the Navajo Nation, is Haltsooí (Meadow People) born for Kinyaa’áanii (Towering House People). Based in Washington, D.C. She has a weekly political segment on the ICT Newscast called IndigiPolitics.

An award-winning reporter from Gallup, New Mexico, she has worked for the Navajo Times and Texas Observer covering Indigenous communities, and her radio pieces have aired on KYAT, National Native News, NPR’s Latino USA and Texas Public Radio. She is a former board member of the Indigenous Journalist Association where she served as secretary.

She will join panelists Dee Davis; president of the Center for Rural Strategies and Cathy Darling Allen, registrar of voters and Shasta County clerk in rural California on the panel. We’ll touch on voter polling conducted by the Center for Rural Strategies, Native and Indigenous voters, and how journalists can support rural poll workers with their reporting, and more.

06/20/2024

01/22/2024

On December 11, 2023, Chicago-based actor Courtney Rioux, a member of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) negotiating team, and Illinois Congressman Jesús “Chuy” García, led a conversation on Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the workplace at an event organized by the Institute for Work & the Economy and hosted by the Chicago Federation of Labor. SAG-AFTRA and the Screenwriters Guild of America (SGA) were in the vanguard in 2023 in addressing fair use and compensation of AI in their industry....

On December 11, 2023, Chicago-based actor Courtney Rioux, a member of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) negotiating team, and Illinois Congress…

11/02/2023

AI: Worker Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (Worker AI/DEIA – pronounced “idea”) is an 18-month initiative planned for 2024 to: From the workers’ perspective, understand different workplace implications stemming from choices to use emerging forms of AI. Recommend and share frameworks, principles, guidelines, and tools advancing workplace diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility through AI's ethical development and uses in workplaces....

AI: Worker Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (Worker AI/DEIA – pronounced “idea”) is an 18-month initiative planned for 2024 to: From the workers’ perspective, understand different wo…

05/08/2023

Environmental justice and diversity, equity, and inclusion are core elements of federal infrastructure, energy, and domestic manufacturing legislation. The Brookings Institution estimates that as much as $490 billion authorized by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act can be put towards or emphasize workforce investment. When other federal programs operating under White House guidance on DEIA are added, the potential scale is mindboggling and well exceeds Brookings’ estimate....

Environmental justice and diversity, equity, and inclusion are core elements of federal infrastructure, energy, and domestic manufacturing legislation.  The Brookings Institution estimate…

01/08/2023

Peter A. Creticos and Evan M. Breedlove On December 7, 2022, the Urban Institute published "Exploring Capital Flows in Chicago" (see: Noting that Chicago is a "starkly segregated" city, "the larger the share of Black residents in a neighborhood, the less investment that place receives." Conversely, "the larger the share of white residents in a Chicago neighborhood, the more investment per household that neighborhood generally receives."...

Peter A. Creticos and Evan M. Breedlove On December 7, 2022, the Urban Institute published “Exploring Capital Flows in Chicago” (see: Noting that Chicago is a “starkly segregated&…

09/29/2022

Peter A. Creticos, President, Institute for Work & the Economy and Evan M. Breedlove, IWE Non-Resident Fellow and Post-graduate student at University College Dublin At the outset of the pandemic as businesses moved to remote work, disabilities rights organizations regarded this shift as a potential sea-change supporting workers who are blocked from fully participating in the workforce because of their disabilities....

Peter A. Creticos, President, Institute for Work & the Economy and Evan M. Breedlove, IWE Non-Resident Fellow and Post-graduate student at University College Dublin At the outset of the pandem…

08/25/2022

Peter A. Creticos, President; Evan Breedlove, Non-Resident Research Fellow. Institute for Work & the Economy A few weeks ago, we published a blog showing the areas in Chicago where women are the Majority as Heads of Family Households, and their relationship to where essential services are located. Recently we received data from Purdue University using their Digital Divide Index[1]...

Peter A. Creticos, President; Evan Breedlove, Non-Resident Research Fellow. Institute for Work & the Economy A few weeks ago, we published a blog showing the areas in Chicago where women are th…