States’ unemployment insurance trust funds were battered by the Great Recession. Thanks to a spike in demand for jobless benefits, some went deep in debt to pay for help for the unemployed. Some still have billions left to repay.
Industry partnerships are just one strategy states are using to fight persistent unemployment and a less-discussed but troubling trend: In every state and the District of Columbia, the labor force participation rate is shrinking.
As the U.S. economy gains strength and states are in their best financial position in years, governors are proposing unconventional tactics to create jobs, especially in health care and high-tech.
After four years of a fragile and uneven recovery, the U.S. job machine is likely to kick into high gear in 2014. Even recession-battered states such as Arizona and Florida are expected to generate jobs at a healthier clip.
. . .the newly released data provide an interesting glimpse at how salaries for both public and private sector workers are recovering from the recession. State employee salaries are growing at dramatically different speeds, in comparison to both their peers in other states and private sector workers in their own states.
The U.S. is on track to create 55 million new job openings by 2020, but will face a shortage of five million workers with the education or training to fill these positions, according to a new report by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.
Michigan has given large tax breaks and subsidies to employers more often than any other state, according to a new report that tallies up state and local “megadeals,” or incentive packages worth more than $75 million.
As data dragnets and information breaches dominate the news, states are scrambling to cash in on a rapidly expanding business sector by offering tax incentives to firms that protect sensitive information from outside attacks.
States this year awarded tax breaks to businesses, touted worker-training programs and even poached jobs from each other to boost their economies and create work for the nearly 12 million Americans still unemployed.