03/29/2024

News

For Many Workers, ‘Gig Economy’ Has A Dark Side

The expanding gig economy in California is often praised for giving workers flexibility and independence. Be your own boss, set your own schedule, companies tout, and these companies would like us to think that drivers, cleaners and personal shoppers actually prefer the gig economy to traditional employment. The rosy spin ignores the reality for California’s […]

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Will California Ever Deal With Its Worsening Housing Dilemma?

The state Department of Finance reported this month that California, which has a stubborn and growing shortage of housing, added just 77,000 houses, apartments and condos in 2018. Actually, private and public housing developers drew permits for well over 100,000 units, and about that many were constructed. But a whopping 23,700 existing homes were burned […]

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U.S. New-Home Sales Fell In April

New-home sales in the U.S. declined in April, posting the largest monthly drop since the end of last year, but there are signs the market for new homes is brightening. Purchases of newly built single-family homes—a relatively narrow slice of all U.S. home sales—declined 6.9% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 673,000 in April, […]

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Southern California Housing Crunch: Just 30 New Units For Every 100 Jobs Created

Southern California’s best year for housing creation since the Great Recession left the region trailing the national growth pace and a local hiring spree. Fresh Census Bureau statistics detail the slow pace of new housing added to the region. The number of housing units — owned or rented — in the four counties covered by […]

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California Community Colleges Will Extend Chancellor’s Contract Through 2023

The California Community Colleges Board of Governors intends to extend the contract of the system’s chancellor Eloy Ortiz Oakley through 2023, the board said Tuesday. Oakley’s four-year contract was due to end in December 2020, but the board has decided to give him another four-year contract beginning in December of this year. “Chancellor Oakley has […]

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PG&E Says It Will Build Paradise Power Lines Underground

Facing intense pressure to eliminate fire risks, PG&E said Wednesday night it plans to rebuild the electric distribution system in devastated Paradise with underground power lines. The utility, which has been blamed by California investigators for causing the Camp Fire, said the underground lines will make Paradise’s system safer. “As part of our commitment to […]

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The Race Is On To Build A Better Battery

At first glance, all seems serene on a spring morning at the research-and-development campus of SK Innovation, one of Korea’s biggest industrial conglomerates. The campus sits in Daejeon, a tidy, planned city an hour’s high-speed-train ride south of Seoul that the national government has built up as a technology hub. Dotting SK’s rolling acres are […]

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One-Quarter Of Working Americans Have Zero Retirement Savings

Many American households remain financially fragile and uncertain about their retirement prospects despite a booming job market that is lifting wages, according to a Federal Reserve survey released Thursday. One-quarter of working individuals say they have no retirement savings at all, the survey said, and 44% worry that their saving isn’t on track. Among younger […]

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CalChamber-Backed Study Says Service Tax Would Disadvantage California Businesses

Aiming to short-circuit an idea that has long captured the imagination, if not yet the votes, of legislators, a study backed by California Chamber of Commerce has found that adopting a business service tax—i.e., a tax on lawyers, accountants and consultants—would hurt the economy and put the state at a competitive disadvantage. The 56-page report […]

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Why California’s Efforts To Limit Soda Keep Fizzling

Earlier this year, Democrats in the state Capitol introduced several measures intended to limit Californians’ consumption of soda, arguing that rotting teeth and rising diabetes presented a public health crisis demanding action akin to regulations on cigarettes. They proposed taxing soda, banning Big Gulps, prohibiting in-store discounts on soft drinks, banishing them from the front […]

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New Report Finds Difficulty In Moving Up To Middle Class

A report from the California Business Roundtable says the state’s working poor are finding it harder than ever to move up the economic ladder toward the middle class. The roundtable’s president, Robert Lapsley, says the cost of living is the biggest barrier to upward mobility in the state. Lapsley says that’s in addition to cumbersome and confusing […]

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Presidential Hopefuls Harris, Buttigieg Endorse Los Angeles Schools Measure EE

On June 4, voters in the Los Angeles Unified School District will vote on Measure EE, a proposal to enact a special property tax to fund local schools. Approval of the measure would authorize a $0.16-per-square foot parcel tax for twelve years to fund educational improvements, instruction, and programs. School district officials have estimated that […]

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Key Conflicts Roil California’s Ever-Evolving Waterscape

As 2018 was winding down, one of California’s leading newspapers suggested, via a front-page, banner-headlined article, that the drought that had plagued the state for much of this decade may be returning. Just weeks later, that same newspaper was reporting that record-level midwinter storms were choking mountain passes with snow, rapidly filling reservoirs and causing […]

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Opinion: Why Building More Shelters Won’t Solve Homelessness

Many naive policymakers discuss homelessness in purely economic terms, perpetrating a distracting myth. Sure, people become homeless for diverse reasons. One might be a LGBT youth, kicked out by parents. Another might be a spouse fleeing an abusive relationship. Those are prime candidates for conventional outreach and solutions: Make them aware of shelters and house […]

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High-Profile California Housing Bill Dies Without A Vote: ‘I’m Deeply Disappointed’

The highest-profile bill moving through the California Legislature aimed at addressing the state’s housing crisis has effectively been killed for the rest of the year. Proposed by state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, Senate Bill 50 would have rewritten zoning laws and forced local governments to allow taller apartment buildings and other multi-family complex near […]

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