A Texas-based conservative think tank, the National Center for Policy Analysis, has entered the debate by launching an interactive website that allows users to calculate the tax effects of moving from one state to another.
“The Census Bureau reported recently that 15 percent of California’s 38 million residents were living in poverty last year, the 20th highest rate in the nation.
However, an experimental Census Bureau method of gauging poverty, which includes a cost-of-living factor, puts California’s rate at more than 23 percent, the nation’s highest.”
“Los Angeles has the highest poverty rate among California counties, according to a new analysis announced Monday that upends traditional views of rural and urban hardship by adding factors such as the soaring price of city housing.
The measurement, developed by researchers with the Public Policy Institute of California and the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality, found that 2.6 million, or 27%, of Los Angeles County residents lived in poverty in 2011. The official poverty rate for the county, based on the U.S. Census’ 2011 American Community Survey, is 18%.”
The head of Germany’s largest utility has warned it will be years before Europe can hope to counter the US’s growing advantage in energy costs and predicts that the disparity will meanwhile lead heavy industry to abandon the continent.
State regulators gathered at a green stamp-making business Thursday to unveil what they tout as the nation’s best approach to identify consumer products containing hazardous chemicals and prod manufacturers to find nontoxic substitutes.
The nation’s statistical agencies are preparing to downsize economic reports tracking local economies and foreign investment in the U.S., as part of a new wave of budget cuts that is forcing the agencies to re-evaluate how they allocate resources in order to maintain the most prominent economic data.
“Americans unexpectedly filed fewer claims for unemployment benefits last week, highlighting labor-market gains that are shoring up consumer confidence.
Jobless claims dropped by 5,000 to 305,000 in the week ended Sept. 21, a Labor Department report showed today in Washington. The monthly average was the lowest since 2007. The Bloomberg Consumer Comfort Index rose for the third straight week, another report showed. “
“Between August 27 and September 5, Hoover’s Golden State Poll (a joint collaboration of the Hoover Institution and the research firm YouGov) surveyed 1,000 Californians on their confidence in California’s recovery – their job security and pocketbook choices (last October, a Hoover/YouGov survey sampled Californians’ attitudes toward state government and policy choices in Sacramento).
. . . Twice as many Californians reported being worse-off financially (33%) than better off (17%) over the last year.
. . . Among survey respondents who are currently employed, more than half (55%) said they weren’t confident in their ability to find another job in California within 6 months that pays as much as they are making now.”
OAKLAND – Acting to help California’s working families, Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today signed AB 10 by Assemblymember Luis Alejo (D-Salinas), which will raise the minimum wage in California from $8.00 per hour to $10.00 per hour.
In all, states welcomed more than 8.9 million new residents in 2012. Census data released last week paints a portrait of each state’s new crop of residents, showing significant variation across different demographic groups.
Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law a bill that will raise California’s minimum wage to $10 an hour by 2016, a move celebrated by workers but criticized by many businesses.
Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law a bill that will raise California’s minimum wage to $10 an hour by 2016, a move celebrated by workers but criticized by many businesses.
“California is recovering from the worst recession since the Great Depression. But as a new report from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management points out, that recovery is slow and uneven.
Meanwhile, opinion polls have found that Californians remain very concerned about whether the recovery will be complete.
Gov. Jerry Brown and other politicians have been touting recovery of late, but they cannot ignore the public’s angst. Often, therefore, when bills were traveling through the legislative process this year, their economic effects — positive or negative — became debating points.”
Virginia and North Dakota top the list of the best states to do business in 2013, according to Forbes’ annual study. At the bottom is Maine, which has been at No. 50 for four straight years. California is ranked No. 39. The best ranked states tend to have a wealth of incentives for companies and also economies that are recovering more robustly from the Great Recession. Now in its eighth year, the annual ranking takes into account factors such as labor, supply costs, the regulatory environment and growth prospects.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistic’s (BLS) August state employment report released last Friday, Texas’ entrepreneurs added more jobs over the last year than any other state in the nation. To further solidify the state’s job creation success, Texas’ unemployment rate has now been lower than the national average, and California’s, for 80 consecutive months — longer than President Obama has been in office (see below).