Hazard pay for most grocery workers expired months ago, despite record profits for many of America's biggest grocery and retail employers. Fortunately, change could be on the horizon at the local level.

Below, Molly Kinder and Laura Stateler discuss the growing momentum for COVID-19 hazard pay mandates in California and Seattle. While these ordinances do not address the needs of all essential workers, they do offer a promising new approach for cities and counties to follow and build on.

Also in this edition, we highlight strategies to strengthen the U.S. labor market, assess the current status of America's vaccine rollout, and explore how Africa can respond to the pandemic and emerge stronger from it.

Restoring America's labor market

Local hazard pay mandates could take off. These new ordinances can help fill the void left by nonexistent government-funded hazard pay and inadequate or lapsed employer-provided hazard pay, Molly Kinder and Laura Stateler argue.

The critical need for workforce training. The leisure and hospitality industry had nearly 4 million fewer jobs in December 2020 compared to February 2020. With more workers changing fields due to the pandemic, Wendy Edelberg and Paige Shevlin call for broad-based workforce training to help facilitate transitions.

COVID-19's impact on core industries and workers. In a new report, Aaron Klein and Ember Smith examine the effects of the pandemic on various industries and discuss the troubling disparity between Hispanic and white unemployment rates.

Apprenticeships are an overlooked solution. As the COVID-19 recession lingers, Annelies Goger and Chenoah Sinclair say it would be a missed opportunity to not pursue transformative updates to the apprenticeship system.

The vaccine rollout and testing 

Why haven't more vaccines been administered? Until help from the federal government materializes, states have been and will be muddling through the vaccination effort. Elaine Kamarck looks at where things stand.

Leveraging a powerful but neglected tool. Health Information Exchange platforms electronically retrieve, organize, and share medical data between clinical points of service. Niam Yaraghi and Peter Levin share five ways they can assist in vaccination efforts. 

Testing remains a vital tool. Increased testing is a key component to controlling the pandemic, but too many Americans are facing unexpected and often hefty fees for COVID-19 tests. Loren Adler and Sabrina Corlette discuss how to address the problem.

Spotlight on Africa

Putting women and girls at the center of reconstruction. Africa's ability to bounce back from the pandemic could largely depend on safeguarding gender equality. Damaris Seleina Parsitau explains why.

A CEO's perspective on the recovery effort. The continent has an opportunity to build sustainable value chains by adopting strategies that demonstrate certainty, stability, and ease of doing business, Ashish J. Thakkar argues.

How the continent can emerge stronger from the crisis. On a new episode of the Brookings Cafeteria podcast,  Africa Growth Initiative Director Aloysius Uche Ordu discusses the regional challenges and opportunities presented by the COVID-19 pandemic.

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