One of California’s few emollients for employers is its limit on “pain and suffering” medical liability judgments, which has improved access to medical care and held down health costs. But look out: Plaintiffs lawyers abetted by Attorney General Kamala Harris are now trying to gut the cap with a ballot initiative dressed in patient-protection garb.
The measure was passed by a bare majority of five votes by the Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee after some Democrats abstained and Chairwoman Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills) provided a courtesy vote to keep the issue alive for more discussions that could end up changing the bill.
As lawmakers in the nation’s capital are mired in debate over likely outcomes from raising the federal minimum wage, businesses hit with local wage increases across the U.S. already are grappling with the reality.
Deeply frustrating Silicon Valley’s tech industry, federal officials on Monday announced that the annual cap on the number of H-1B visas for skilled foreign workers has been reached less than a week after applications for the controversial program were accepted.
The reform will slow the growth of green energy, which accounts for 25 percent of Germany’s electricity, and force new investors in green power to take some risk.
Los Angeles’s entertainment and San Francisco’s tech industries are the state’s two big cash cows, home to powerful, rich, and mostly left-leaning industry leaders who support the state’s deep blue and green politics. All too often, the policies championed by the LA and San Francisco elite make life harder for people in poorer, inland parts of the state by increasing red tape and taxes and driving much-needed businesses to neighboring states.
There’s a surprise side order of sourpuss getting served up in the national argument over raising the minimum wage: Some say they’ll stop tipping when they go out to eat.
Huy Fong Foods, the creator of Sriracha hot sauce, has been closed to the public for more than 30 years, fearing that competitors would steal trade secrets. But after months of Irwindale residents and city officials accusing the sauce maker of flooding their city with an offensive spicy odor, the notoriously private company has thrown open its doors.
Germany’s exports would have been €15bn higher last year if its industry had not paid a premium for electricity compared with international competitors, according to an analysis published on Thursday.
A commission of experts appointed by the German parliament has recommended Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government to abolish all subsidies for green energy, highlighting mounting opposition to plans to reform instead of scrap the system.
Increasing the minimum wage would have two principal effects on low-wage workers. Most of them would receive higher pay that would increase their family’s income, and some of those families would see their income rise above the federal poverty threshold. But some jobs for low-wage workers would probably be eliminated, the income of most workers who became jobless would fall substantially, and the share of low-wage workers who were employed would probably fall slightly.
Every major economic sector in the state will need to play an increasing role in this effort. Success will require the creation of new policies in some sectors, and expanding and refining existing policies in others.
Raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour by 2016 would cost the economy 500,000 jobs, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Yet taken together, the federal standards effectively cancel out the California standard. Instead of promoting fuel reduction as intended, the California standard allows for the production of less-efficient vehicles, while facilitating a massive transfer of cash via credit trading. It also forms a de facto industrial policy that sends us down a path toward electric vehicles that may or may not be the best technological or environmental choice for the future.
An ordinance soon to be introduced in the City Council is expected to require 87 large hotels to pay a $15.37-an-hour “living wage,” nearly double California’s current $8-an-hour minimum.