Remembering Labor Economist William Spriggs

The entire Labor Movement was deeply saddened this week to learn of the passing of beloved AFL-CIO Chief Economist William Spriggs. Bill Spriggs was above all a man of intellectual rigor and courage, the conscience of the labor movement. He mentored generations of economics graduate students, sharing with them his conviction that good economics and social justice were inseparable. No one knew better the intimate details of how the numbers that define our labor markets are constructed—their intricacies and limitations. Bill cared about economics as a profession—and demanded the economics profession address issues of racial and economic justice.

He went into rooms of power and privilege no one else could go—to the Federal Reserve’s meeting at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to the OECD in Paris—and he spoke truth to power. He knew about fairness, economic security and safety on the job—what these things meant to working people—and he fought for them the first moment he set foot at the AFL-CIO. He never failed to remind whomever he was talking to that the majority of America’s working people were people of color and women, and that economic, racial and gender justice are deeply intertwined. Read more about Bill and his legacy, including remembrances by AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler and Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond here, as well as tributes from President Biden and Vice President Harris.

Last summer, the NYC CLC was honored to have Bill's participation in our panel discussion, "Building Prosperity: Addressing the Inequality Gap." Watch video of that event here.