During her time as commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Abraham laid the groundwork for the American Time Use Survey, the first U.S. government survey of time use; obtained funding to launch the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey; and established the Federal Economic Statistics Advisory Committee. During extensive public debate on the Consumer Price Index in the 1990s, Abraham testified repeatedly before Congress on the shortcomings of existing methodology and the necessity of making revisions based on objective research.[8][9][10] She expanded coverage of the prices of services in the Producer Price Index; instituted improvements in the Current Employment Statistics program, including the substitution of a probability sample for the quota sample; accelerated delivery of employment and wage statistics; and took steps toward expanding coverage of wages and salaries in the Occupational Employment Statistics program.[1]
In 2016-2017, Abraham served as Chair of the Commission on Evidence Based Policymaking. Many of the Commission's recommendations were enacted into law as part of the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act of 2018 (the Evidence Act).
Abraham's research has included studies on unemployment, job vacancies, wages and the business cycle; comparisons among the U.S., European, and Japanese labor markets; work-sharing policies; the operation of internal labor markets; the gig economy; and the measurement of market and nonmarket economic activity.[11][12]
Awards
Abraham is a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research[13] and the recipient of an honorary doctorate from Iowa State University. She has been awarded the Julius Shiskin Award for Economic Statistics (2002),[1] the Roger Herriot Award for Innovation in Federal Statistics (2010), the Susan C. Eaton Scholar-Practitioner Award of the Labor and Employment Relations Association (2013), and was named a Distinguished Fellow of the American Economic Association in 2020.[14] She is a fellow of the American Statistical Association and the Society of Labor Economists.[15] She was elected to fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2020.[16]
Abraham, Katharine G.; Spletzer, James R.; Harper, Michael J. (2010). Labor in the new economy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN9780226001432.
Abraham, Katharine G.; Maitland, Aaron; Bianchi, Suzanne M. (2006). "Nonresponse in the American time use survey: who is missing from the data and how much does it matter?". Public Opinion Quarterly. 70 (5): 676–703. doi:10.1093/poq/nfl037. S2CID145566407.
Abraham, Katharine G.; Spletzer, James R. (May 2009). "New evidence on the returns to job skills". The American Economic Review. 99 (2): 52–57. doi:10.1257/aer.99.2.52. JSTOR25592374.
Abraham, Katharine G.; Houseman, Susan N. (October 2014). "Short-time compensation as a tool to mitigate job loss? Evidence on the U.S. experience during the recent recession". Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society. 53 (4): 543–567. doi:10.1111/irel.12069. hdl:10419/64398. SSRN2048540. Pdf.
