Some lawmakers represent areas where poverty is a central part of constituents’ daily lives. In some legislative districts, poverty rates are more than double the state average of 16.6 percent, according to the U.S. Census’ most recent American Community Survey. In others, the poverty rates are barely a quarter of the California average.
Employment growth in 2014 was higher in counties that saw bigger declines in the duration of benefits. Overall, the authors estimate that the benefit cut led to the creation of 1.8m extra jobs in 2014—about two-thirds of the total.
Real gross domestic product — the value of the production of goods and services in the United States, adjusted for price changes — increased at an annual rate of 2.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2014, according to the “advance” estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the third quarter, real GDP increased 5.0 percent.
U.S. economic growth retreated to a modest pace in the final months of 2014, underscoring obstacles facing the recovery as troubles mount abroad.
In some recent merger cases, shareholder plaintiffs have based their suits on the claim, among others, that the venture capitalists on the board who constituted a majority had conspired to sell the company at a discount to the detriment of minority shareholders. Venture capitalists aren’t often accused of undue generosity, but especially not to buyers. San Diego-based Trius Therapeutics, which was sold to Cubist Pharmaceuticals well over a year ago, was sued in both Delaware and California. Though the suit was dismissed in Delaware, the case grinds on in California.
Given the diminished possibilities of buying a home or finding a decent job in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, Latinos have been flocking to the suburban periphery that encompasses much of adjacent Riverside and San Bernardino counties, also known as the Inland Empire, which ranks second in our survey. From 2000 through 2013, the Latino population in the area soared 74%, compared to a 15% population gain for Los Angeles.
While the prospects for tax reform in Washington are dim, as many as 20 Republican governors are moving forward with their own pro-growth tax-relief initiatives. This is on top of the 14 states, including Florida, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin, whose 2014 tax cuts will take effect this year.
Simply stating that legislation is pro-job in a legislative floor speech or opening a Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development isn’t sufficient to creating a pro-growth business environment. If Sacramento seriously wants to foster a robust job market, the state needs strong economic growth, which requires nurturing, consistently and vigorously, a healthy business climate.
The Obama administration’s plan for the federal budget will contain a new line-item that is numerically trivial but philosophically important: $15 million for states to analyze the costs and benefits of their job-licensing requirements. . . State governments, with little public attention or debate, have spun a vast web of red tape that bars entry into working-class professions. Jobs like florists, manicurists, barbers, and on and on, impose unnecessarily burdensome restrictions on those who can practice the trade, closing off potential avenues for upward mobility. These restrictions have no policy rationale; they exist because incumbents in those fields have an interest in keeping out competition.
“California’s finances are roaring back,” the report said. “History would suggest, however, that any fiscal renaissance will be temporary.”
The goal is part of a newly announced initiative targeting an estimated 1 million degree gap in the state economy by 2025. While more than 900,000 CSU students earned degrees in the past decade, the six-year graduation rate for freshmen hovers around 51 percent.
We measure the effect of unemployment benefit duration on employment. We exploit the variation induced by the decision of Congress in December 2013 not to reauthorize the unprecedented benefit extensions introduced during the Great Recession. Federal benefit extensions that ranged from 0 to 47 weeks across U.S. states at the beginning of December 2013 were abruptly cut to zero. . . In levels, 1.8 million additional jobs were created in 2014 due to the benefit cut. Almost 1 million of these jobs were filled by workers from out of the labor force who would not have participated in the labor market had benefit extensions been reauthorized.
With that, the governor explained exactly why the idea of flattening income-tax rates will never fly. To make up for a 1 percent rate reduction in tax rates on the few with incomes of more than $300,000 would require a 1 percent rate increase on everyone else.
Although California’s unemployment dropped fractionally to 7 percent in December, the state stands alone with the nation’s second-highest rate, exceeded only by Mississippi’s 7.2 percent.
While there are national and global pressures on manufacturing, they are acute in California. We have cutting-edge safety and environmental regulations, high costs of living, and a large underclass that does not have the training to serve the demands that manufacturing requires.