Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), Vice Chair of the U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee (JEC), and Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-TX), Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC), jointly released a new report today examining the economic state of the Latino community in the United States. The study was prepared in honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, which runs from September 15^th through October 15^th.

Click here for the report.

The study finds that the almost 60 million Latinos in the United States already account for $2.3 trillion in economic activity, which on its own would rank as the eighth largest economy in the world. The economic clout of Latinos is expected to rise as about one in four Americans will be of Latino or Hispanic heritage by 2060. This increase – combined with high rates of labor force participation among Latinos, their relative youth and increased level of educational attainment – will be a key driver of overall U.S. economic growth. That will help offset downward pressures on the U.S. economy stemming from the rising number of retirements and plateauing labor force.

“For too long, too little attention has been paid to the economic contributions of Latinos. This report helps dispel the fog of ignorance surrounding the fact that not only our future, but our present as well, depends upon Latino economic contributions to make America thrive,” Congresswoman Maloney said. “Latinos are more likely to be in the workforce than the population as a whole. They are more likely to be entrepreneurs, as nearly one in four new businesses in this country are Latino-owned. These are but two examples demonstrating how our future economic success is created by Latinos in every part of the nation.”

“I am proud to highlight all the accomplishments and contributions Latinos have made to our country during Hispanic Heritage Month, and I am deeply grateful to Chairwoman Maloney and the staff of the Joint Economic Committee for compiling this report on the economic state of our Hispanic community. This report confirms what numerous reports have previously found – Hispanics drive our economy and make enormous contributions to our communities,” said Chairman Castro. “With this data, we can also work to confront the economic challenges that have held our community back – from the gender wage gap that pays Latinas just 54 cents to every dollar earned by her white male counterparts, to the disparities in household wealth across generations. Together, we can use this data to reach out to those in need and build an infrastructure of opportunity to ensure Latinos can continue to succeed and prosper.”

The report takes a comprehensive look at the following: demographics, marriage and migration patterns, education, employment, income and earnings, entrepreneurship, wealth, poverty and economic mobility, home ownership and access to credit, as well as economic and political power.

The report highlights the changing demographics of Latinos in the United States.

• By 2060, about one in four people living in the United States will be Latino, up from 18 percent today.
• Eleven states currently have more than a million Latino residents.
• Rural areas experienced the fastest Latino population growth over the last decade.
• Two-thirds of Latinos in the United States are native-born.

The report points to significant progress and indications of gains to come.

• The percentage of Latinos with a bachelor’s degree has doubled since 1990.
• Hispanics are more likely than non-Hispanics to be new entrepreneurs and are more likely than other groups to participate in the labor force.
• By 2030, Hispanics will comprise more than half of all new homeowners.

The study also finds that Hispanics face a number of economic challenges.

• The median income of Hispanic households is nearly $20,000 less than that of non-Hispanic white households. 
• Median net worth of Hispanic households in 2016 was just one-eighth of the net worth of non-Hispanic white households.
• The median Latina earns just 54 cents for every dollar earned by the median non-Hispanic white man.
• Hispanics have less access to credit and banking services than non-Hispanic white households and are 1.7 times more likely to live in poverty.

Press Contact:
Randy Woods
Randy_Woods@jec.senate.gov
202-503-5943

WASHINGTON—Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney (NY-12), Vice Chair of the U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee, issued the following statement after the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) released its third and final estimate of second-quarter gross domestic product (GDP). The report showed that GDP expanded at an annual rate of 2.0 percent in the second three months of 2019, unchanged from the second estimate of 2.0 percent growth for Q2, which in turn was a downward revision of the advance estimate of 2.1 percent.

“This number falls far short of the more than 3 percent rate that the President has promised and it’s nowhere near the 6 percent growth that he had predicted two years ago.”

“This disappointing number is partly the result of chaos caused by the President’s haphazard trade policies. This hurts manufacturers, farmers and in the end American consumers.”

“The BEA report includes a downward revision of consumer spending and private investment, which was supposed to receive a permanent boost from the Republican tax cuts. Meanwhile manufacturing is demonstrating weakness and we have seen signs of waning consumer confidence.”

“Clearly the President’s tax cuts gave the economy a sugar high that has already faded and resulted in growing budget deficits. I am also deeply concerned that these tax giveaways to the fortunate few are inflating the gender and racial income gaps. That’s why I have introduced legislation that would require BEA to report growth by income decile. The bill would help us craft policies to help Americans who are being left behind in this economy.”

Congresswoman Maloney introduced the Measuring Real Income Growth Act (H.R. 707) this Congress and also in the 115^th Congress. The legislation would require BEA to publish distributional analyses of GDP.

Congresswoman Maloney is Vice Chair of the Joint Economic Committee and a senior member of both the House Financial Services Committee (where she is Chair of the Subcommittee on Investor Protection, Entrepreneurship, and Capital Markets) and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Press Contact
Randy Woods
Randy_Woods@jec.senate.gov
(202) 224-2599

WASHINGTON—Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney (NY-12), Vice Chair of the U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee, called on members of the Senate to find “the courage to act” to address the nation’s gun violence epidemic. She spoke at a JEC hearing today, which came shortly after the Committee published a state-by-state analysis of gun violence that found the crisis imposes more than $200 billion in total annual costs on the country, which is about 1.4 percent of GDP.

Click here to access the Vice Chair’s prepared statement and witness testimony. Here are key excerpts from the hearing:

“There is no way to estimate ‘cost of a human’ life. The loss is incalculable,” Congresswoman Maloney said in her opening statement. “But there is also economic cost – a lost breadwinner’s income, astronomical medical costs, costs to employers, schools, police, hospitals and the criminal justice system.”

“In the United States, there are more guns in civilian hands than any other country in the world,” she said. “An American is nearly seven times more likely than someone in Canada to die by a gun, eight times more likely than someone in France, almost twenty times more likely than a person in Germany and almost forty times more likely than someone in the UK, Australia or New Zealand.”

The Congresswoman noted the JEC report finds rural states have the highest costs of gun violence as a percent of GDP, and states with high rates of gun ownership have the highest rates of gun suicide. “In contrast, my state of New York, which has stricter gun laws including an assault weapons ban, has one of the three lowest costs of gun violence as a share of its economy, along with Hawaii and Massachusetts.”

“Let us honor the victims of gun violence and their families by working to prevent more victims,” Rep. Maloney said. “Let us – like other countries in the developed world – turn tragedy into bold action. And may all Members of Congress, especially those in the Senate, find the courage to act.”

Here are excerpts from Democratic witnesses at the hearing:

“The potential return on a nationwide investment in stopping gun violence would be huge in both lives and taxpayer dollars,” according to Democratic witness Adam Skaggs, chief counsel and policy director of the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. 

“Data compiled by Giffords Law Center has made clear for years that states with stronger gun laws have lower rates of gun deaths and spend less on gun violence than states with weaker laws,” Mr. Skaggs said in his opening remarks. “But our federal laws remain porous and ineffective and gun violence continues to be a tremendous public health and safety crisis that costs hundreds of billions of dollars each year.”

“We should all be free to live without the fear of being shot,” according to Tina Meins, whose father was killed in the San Bernardino, California shooting in 2015. “No one law can stop all gun violence, but there’s so much more we must do to keep our families safe. The House of Representatives has already passed bipartisan legislation to require background checks on all gun sales and is considering a strong Red Flag law. Now, the Senate must act on background checks and pass a strong Red Flag bill.”

“Across the country, survivors of gunshot wounds experience difficulties ranging from psychological trauma, loss of work, and steep medical costs,” she said in her opening remarks. “Even after the immediate hospital costs, survivors of gunshot wounds face a lifetime of medical care costs including readmission to the hospital and nursing care…One study put the cumulative lifetime costs of treating gunshot wounds incurred in a single year in this country at $2.3 billion.”

Press contact
Randy Woods
Randy_Woods@jec.senate.gov
(202) 224-2599

Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney, Vice Chair of the Joint Economic Committee, participated in a JEC hearing today that explored policies to help families who find themselves squeezed by rising costs and relatively stagnant wages.

Here are key excerpts from the hearing, which included two witnesses invited by Congresswoman Maloney: Dr. Jane Waldfogel, Compton Foundation Centennial Professor for the Prevention of Children’s and Youth Problems at the Columbia University School of Social Work, and Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, CEO and Co-Founder of MomsRising:

“Everyone in this room agrees that it’s more expensive than ever to raise a family. But we may disagree about the causes, and we may disagree about the solutions. I welcome the robust discussion that this committee provides,” Congresswoman Maloney said in her opening statement. “The entrance of women in the workforce is not a problem. We may hear that Americans got married less frequently or later in life as women took on careers, and that this hurt fertility rates. But women have become key drivers of our economic success.”

“Some would say that the solution is for the federal government to do nothing. I disagree. It has a key role to play,” she said later in her statement. “Let’s start by lifting the minimum wage. The House has passed legislation to lift the minimum wage to $15 by 2025 and give 33 million Americans a raise.  It’s time for the Senate to follow suit. We should expand programs and initiatives that we know work—like the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit.”

“So what can we do to better support American families? We need to start by recognizing that in the majority of American families, it is no longer commonplace for there to be a stay-at-home caregiver,” Dr. Waldfogel said in opening remarks. “Our public policies have not kept pace with this new demographic reality.”

“Experts in this room, and around the nation, agree: It’s getting more and more expensive to raise a family and that fact has dire consequences,” Ms. Rowe-Finkbeiner said in her opening statement. “It doesn’t have to be this way. This crisis is born of policies that are outdated and that fail to address the realities of today’s economy and the struggles working families face. In good news, this crisis is solvable.”

Congresswoman Maloney is Vice Chair of the Joint Economic Committee and a senior member of both the House Financial Services Committee (where she is Chair of the Subcommittee on Investor Protection, Entrepreneurship and Capital Markets) and the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Press Contact (Democrats): Randy Woods; Randy_Woods@jec.senate.gov; 202-503-5943