Ron Blackwell

Ron Blackwell is chief economist of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) where he coordinates the economic agenda of the AFL-CIO and advises leadership on corporate and economic issues affecting American workers and union strategies. 

Ron chairs the Economic Policy Working Group of the Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD where the labor movement formulates its positions on economic policy at the global level.  He is a director of the Baltimore branch of the Richmond Federal Reserve Bank and serves on the Board on Manufacturing and Engineering Design of The National Academies and New Rules for Global Finance.  He also serves on the editorial board of New Labor Forum and is the American correspondent of the Italian journal Sindicalismo. 

Formerly, he was assistant to the president of the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union and chief economist of UNITE.  Before joining the labor movement, he was an academic dean in the Seminar College of the New School for Social Research in New York where he taught economics, politics and philosophy.  Ron recently received the Nat Weinberg Award for service to the labor movement and social justice.