Housing affordability has hit a 10-year low throughout most of California, new data show, as three out of four state residents can no longer afford sky-high median homes prices. Buyers in the capital region are feeling similar pressure. The percentage of people able to afford an average-price home dropped sharply from 31 percent at the […]
Unfilled jobs are piling up in the transportation, retail and business-services sectors as workers become scarce in the fast-growing economy. The number of available jobs grew by nearly 750,000 this spring, compared with a year earlier, according to Labor Department data released Tuesday. There were 6.7 million job openings on average in the three months […]
Despite expressing verbal support for reform, however, Brown has been reluctant to make it a priority and his governorship probably will end in a few months with no major CEQA overhaul – which gets us back to those 142 bills. Most of them would either exempt certain activities, or even specific projects, from CEQA, or […]
A second judge in as many months has tossed a climate lawsuit brought by cities against major energy companies. In dismissing the New York City lawsuit, U.S. District Court Judge John F. Keenan wrote, “Global warming and solutions thereto must be addressed by the two other branches of government. ” Judge Keenan, like his fellow […]
Two back-to-back events last month frame California’s educational conundrum. A Superior Court judge in Los Angeles County rebuffed efforts by state schools Supt. Tom Torlakson and other state officials to block a lawsuit alleging that California has failed to teach reading to some black and Latino children. The suit, filed on behalf of children in […]
The Ontario basic income pilot project is coming to an end, says Children, Community and Social Services Minister Lisa MacLeod. MacLeod said Tuesday that the project was expensive, and “clearly not the answer for Ontario families.” She said the ministry would have “more details at a later date” about how the government would end the […]
The Sacramento City Council vote to place a tax increase on the November ballot is representative of what we’ll see around the state in many localities: a call for more taxes to maintain basic services when in reality the money is needed to meet pension obligations. In one sense the argument that the money is […]
For the past century, a public pension was an ironclad promise. Whatever else happened, retired policemen and firefighters and teachers would be paid. That is no longer the case. Many cities and states can no longer afford the unsustainable retirement promises made to millions of public workers over many years. By one estimate they are […]
The Trump administration is proposing to freeze fuel-efficiency standards for cars and light trucks in 2020, a move that will ease rules for auto makers and also likely intensify a legal fight with California. The proposal outlined Thursday would eliminate the sharp increase in fuel-economy requirements adopted under the Obama administration in collaboration with California. […]
Using 4 decades of variation in the federal and state Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), we estimate the impact of exposure to EITC expansions in childhood on education and employment outcomes in adulthood. Reduced-form results suggest that an additional $1,000 in EITC exposure when a child is 13–18 years old increases the likelihood of completing […]
U.S. workers received their biggest pay increases in nearly a decade over the 12 months through June, a sign the strong labor market is boosting wages as employers compete for scarcer workers. The Labor Department’s employment-cost index rose 2.8% in the year to June compared, the government said Tuesday. Wages and salaries, which account for […]
The U.S. trade deficit expanded in June at the fastest rate since November 2016, driven by a stronger dollar and buoyant economic growth. The trade deficit in goods and services increased 7.3% in June from the previous month to a seasonally adjusted $46.35 billion, the Commerce Department said Friday. Exports fell 0.7% from May, while […]
U.S. hiring cooled but remained solid in July and the unemployment rate fell, showing the labor market remains firmly in expansion mode. U.S. nonfarm payrolls rose a seasonally adjusted 157,000 in July, the Labor Department said Friday. The unemployment rate, a seasonally adjusted 3.9%, ticked down from 4.0% the prior month. (Follow our live analysis.) […]
The location of individuals determines their job opportunities, living amenities, and housing costs. We argue that it is useful to conceptualize the location choice of individuals as a decision to invest in a ‘location asset.’ This asset has a cost equal to the location’s rent, and a payoff through better job opportunities and, potentially, more […]
The leading current bill to establish single-payer health insurance, the Medicare for All Act (M4A), would, under conservative estimates, increase federal budget commitments by approximately $32.6 trillion during its first 10 years of full implementation (2022–2031), assuming enactment in 2018. This projected increase in federal healthcare commitments would equal approximately 10.7 percent of GDP in […]