Bilal Baydoun
Director of Policy and Research, Groundwork Collaborative
Washington, D.C.
Experience
- Michigan and Illinois state government
- City of Dearborn, MI
- Clinton Foundation
Expertise
- Poverty, income and wealth inequality
- Economic security and affordability
- Corporate power
- Michigan and Midwest political and economic climate
Education
- University of Michigan, M.P.P., B.A.
Recent Coverage
Feb 2, 2024
Newsweek | Hundreds of Thousands of Workers Hired in January, Smashing Expectations
“Today’s stellar jobs report marks two straight years of unemployment below 4 [percent] and 18 months of cooling inflation, an achievement many economists did not think was possible,” Bilal Baydoun, director of policy and research at think tank Groundwork Collaborative, said. “The data is very clear that we never had to sacrifice jobs for lower prices.”
Feb 2, 2024
Yahoo Finance | A strong jobs report complicates Jerome Powell’s political dilemma as 2024 election nears
In one sign the leftward pressure is unlikely to abate, Bilal Baydoun of the Groundwork Collaborative reacted to Friday’s jobs number by reiterating his call for immediate cuts.
“The data is very clear that we never had to sacrifice jobs for lower prices,” he wrote in a statement. His group is closely aligned with liberal figures like Warren.
OCT 27, 2023
States Newsroom: Borrowers weigh personal, professional options as student loan payments resume
Bilal Baydoun, director of policy and research at the Groundwork Collaborative, said that debt cancellation, once a fringe policy idea years ago, is “considered one of the most important interventions when it comes to our affordability crisis.”
“I think continuing to find ways to [cancel student debt] is not only great economic policy, it’s also great politics. All of these borrowers through the course of the pandemic, when payments were on hold for three years, they saw very clearly that nothing bad happened as a result of that … In fact, if anything, it was one of the factors that helped supercharge our economic recovery,” he said.
SEP 3, 2023
Michigan Advance: Job growth exceeds economists’ expectations as unemployment inches up
Bilal Baydoun, director of policy and research at Groundwork Collaborative, said the strong labor market has provided more opportunities for labor organizing this year. “This is a historic opening for workers not just to make progress against the pandemic economy and the pandemic recovery, but also against the pre-pandemic economy. The rise in labor activity spurred by a tight labor market is very promising,” he said. “And the Fed is threatening to stifle a lot of that progress, which is curious because merely years ago, the very workers that we almost exclusively refer to as essential are proving to be ever expendable in Fed policymaking.”
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About Bilal
Bilal Baydoun is the Director of Policy and Research at Groundwork Collaborative. Bilal is a policy and communications strategist committed to advancing economic justice in the policy arena and the public square. He served as a senior advisor in several government organizations, including the City of Dearborn, the Michigan Attorney General’s Office, and the Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice under a Harvard Government Innovation fellowship. As a journalist at The Appeal, Bilal edited long-form analyses by leading scholars that clarified the stakes around inequality and authored policy polling memos. Bilal also served on former President Clinton’s policy briefing team at the Clinton Foundation, where he led an executive briefing protocol on a wide range of international policy issues.
A lifelong Michigander, Bilal holds a Master of Public Policy from the University of Michigan, where he served as the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Fellow, and a bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Michigan.
