Reimagining Job Quality Measurement: Learning from the American Job Quality Survey

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Abstract

For decades, federal labor statistics have anchored our understanding of American jobs in two headline numbers: how many people are working and how much they earn. Yet these traditional metrics increasingly fail to capture whether jobs are actually working for the people who hold them, or for the businesses and communities that depend on them. Critical dimensions of work life, including schedule stability and predictability, voice in workplace decisions, exposure to electronic monitoring, advancement opportunities, and protections against discrimination and harassment, remain largely invisible in our federal data infrastructure. The result is a measurement gap with serious consequences for research, policy design, and public understanding of contemporary work.

This roundtable will convene leading academic researchers, policy experts, and practitioners to examine these gaps and chart a path forward. The conversation is anchored by the American Job Quality Study (AJQS), a major new effort led by Jobs for the Future, the Families and Workers Fund, the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, and Gallup. Built on a panel survey of more than 18,000 U.S. workers spanning industries, demographics, and employment arrangements—including part-time and non-W-2 workers—the AJQS establishes a national benchmark across five core dimensions of job quality: financial wellbeing; workplace culture and safety; growth and development opportunities; agency and voice; and work structure and autonomy. 

Roundtable participants will address four interrelated questions. First, what are the most consequential blind spots in current federal job quality measurement, and how do those blind spots distort our understanding of workers' lives and the labor market? Second, what substantive insights does the AJQS offer about the state of work in America that existing federal sources cannot provide? Third, how can multidimensional job quality data inform policy design at the federal, state, and local levels, as well as employer practice? And fourth, what would it take to rebuild federal data infrastructure—through new survey vehicles, supplements to existing instruments, or partnerships with non-governmental data producers—to better measure job quality going forward? The session aims to generate concrete recommendations for researchers, statistical agencies, and policymakers committed to a fuller accounting of the quality of American work.

To discuss these issues, we will bring a diverse set of perspectives in conversation with another, bridging academics and policy practitioners, including: Heidi Sheirholz (Economic Policy Instiutte), Darrick Hamilton (New School / AFL-CIO), Mike Strain (American Enterprise Institute), Elisabeth Jacobs (Urban / Workrise). Alexander Hertel-Fernandez (Columbia), a member of the AJQS research team, will moderate the roundtable.

Policy Area

• Employment and Training Programs

Moderator

• Alexander Hertel-Fernandez, Columbia University

Organizer

• Alexander Hertel-Fernandez, Columbia University

Speakers

• Heidi Shierholz, Economic Policy Institute

• Darrick Hamilton, The New School

• Elisabeth S Jacobs, Urban Institute

• Michael R Strain, American Enterprise Institute