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Our Economic Recovery

Outlook for the U.S. labor market and when we get “back to normal.”

MADISON, WI (January 25, 2021) — Between the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine, concerns about virus mutation, and the beginning of a new administration with new policies, many people are wondering how recent changes will impact the U.S. labor market. Are we on track with previous market predictions, or have recent events changed the forecast? How quickly might the job market return to its pre-pandemic strength? When will the most vulnerable populations start to see the benefits of recovery?

On the next UW Now Livestream: a Q & A with two leading UW economists about their predictions for economic recovery. The talk will be moderated by Mike Knetter, president and CEO of the Wisconsin Foundation and Alumni Association.

Featured guests:

Erica Groshen, PhD, is a UW–Madison alumna and senior extension faculty member at the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations, as well as a research fellow at the W. E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research. She also served as the 14th commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics from 2013 to 2017. Prior to that, she was vice-president in the research and statistics group of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Her research has focused primarily on jobless recoveries, wage rigidity and dispersion, and the role of employers in the labor market.

Noah Williams, PhD, is the Juli Plant Grainger Professor of Economics at UW–Madison and the founding director of the Center for Research on the Wisconsin Economy (CROWE). His research focuses on macroeconomics — particularly monetary policy, social insurance programs, and financial markets. He has coauthored several papers with Nobel Prize recipients Lars Peter Hansen and Thomas Sargent. A consultant to the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, he is also a member of the Economic Advisors Roundtable. His research on state economies, which underlies the work of CROWE, has been supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation.

When: Tuesday, Jan. 26, at 7 p.m. CST

Media Information

Contact: Tod Pritchard, tod.pritchard@supportuw.org, 608-609-5217, @WisAlumni

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