[12th District] Conditions in the labor market remained tight. Contacts reported that worker shortages persisted across industries and skill levels. Nonetheless, several contacts reported an uptick in the pace of hiring. A major shipping and logistics business in Northern California hired more seasonal workers than usual in response to strong holiday demand. In the restaurant […]
Faced with the largest inventory of unsold finished homes in six years, Southern California’s homebuilders have resorted to price cutting. According to real estate watcher Zillow, 25.9 percent of new homes on the market in Los Angeles and Orange counties in the fourth quarter had price cuts — No. 17 of 34 major markets studied […]
California’s housing market ended 2018 on a down note, with sales for 2018 as a whole down for the first time in four years and home price gains showing signs of leveling off, Realtor economists reported Thursday, Jan. 17. A volatile stock market and political and economic uncertainty contributed to the market slowdown, according to […]
More state-funded health care for undocumented immigrants. Nearly $2 billion for early childhood programs. Millions of dollars to spur housing construction. In his first week as California governor, Gavin Newsom promised something for nearly every key interest group that backed his campaign. He outlined new spending and policies on a wide array of issues in […]
California Gov. Gavin Newsom says conversations are underway on rent stabilization, after voters rejected a rent control ballot measure last fall. Newsom spoke Tuesday in San Jose at a roundtable discussion on California’s housing crisis, saying the state is speaking with housing industry groups about possible next steps following the defeat of Proposition 10 in […]
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s has called for a first-ever water tax and an added fee on phone bills at a time when the state is enjoying what recently departed state Legislative Analyst Mac Taylor called “extraordinary” budget health. Newsom said last week that experts now forecast a $21.5 billion budget windfall in 2019-20. Until recent years, […]
While decrying economic inequality is not a new theme for California politicians, they’ve only occasionally cited high living costs as a factor. In fact, those costs are the major reason we have the nation’s highest level of poverty, as measured by the Census Bureau, and they are not confined to housing. Californians’ personal incomes, while […]
California’s job market finished 2018 on a strong note, as payrolls continued to expand despite concerns over a volatile stock market, a continuing trade war with China and fears of a possible U.S. recession. The state added 24,500 net new positions in December for a total of about 17.28 million, according to the California Employment […]
Democratic Republic of Congo opposition leader Martin Fayulu said Friday he will challenge the official election result at the country’s constitutional court, as one of his campaign aides claimed his candidate had won in a landslide. Preliminary results announced early Thursday by Congo’s electoral commission said another opposition leader, Felix Tshisekedi, had come first in […]
Nearly half of millennials say they prefer socialism to capitalism, but what do they mean? “My policies most closely resemble what we see in the U.K., in Norway, in Finland, in Sweden,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told “60 Minutes.” Yet Sweden’s experiment with socialist policies was disastrous, and its economic success in recent decades is a […]
As President Trump leads a drive to slash taxes and pare back regulation, one major economy is taking a different approach. Under President Moon Jae-in, South Korea has raised taxes and the minimum wage in the name of economic growth. So far, it hasn’t worked out as planned. Growth has slowed, unemployment has risen and […]
Enjoying the tailwinds of a massive surplus and large Democratic supermajorities in both houses, Gov. Gavin Newsom is using his first budget proposal to put his policy stamp on nearly every sector of California government. The Democratic governor described Thursday — in detail, for nearly two hours — how he would use his $209 billion […]
Tesla will stop selling the lowest-priced versions of its Model S sedans and Model X SUVs from Monday, the automaker’s CEO Elon Musk wrote in a tweet late on Wednesday. The Model S and X are Tesla’s second and third major lines of electric vehicles, and are higher-priced lines compared to its newest Model 3. […]
Hundreds of Faraday Future employees laid off in late October have wondered for weeks when — and even if — they would get back to work. That answer may come by the end of this week, said John S. Lehn, head of government affairs for the startup electric car company in Hanford. In an interview, […]
AMERICA’S AGEING economic boom can still produce pleasant surprises. Companies added an astonishing 312,000 new jobs in December, the Bureau of Labour Statistics reported on January 4th, and raised pay at the fastest clip in years. For the third of working-age Americans without any college education, such spells of rapid income growth have been exceedingly […]