Tagged: Economy

OLYMPIA, Wash. – Washington’s jobless rate continues to inch downward. The April numbers out Wednesday put unemployment at 8.1 percent . That’s down from 8.3 percent in March. Most of April’s job growth was in manufacturing.

State economist Dave Wallace says so far 2012 is proving to be a recovery year in Washington.

“We now have eight sectors that are on the positive side of the ledger, three sectors on the negative side," Wallace says. "Overall the private sector on the annual basis has grown by 1.9 percent and added 43,900 jobs.”

The price of gasoline keeps rising for Americans, but it's not because of rising demand from consumers.

Since the first Arab oil embargo of the 1970s, the U.S. has struggled to quench a growing appetite for oil and gasoline. Now, that trend is changing.

"When you look at the U.S. oil market, you see that there's actually no growth," says Daniel Yergin, chairman of IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates.

He says gasoline demand peaked in 2007 and has fallen each year since, even though the economy has begun to recover.

"The U.S. has already reached what we can call 'peak demand.' Because of increased efficiency, because of biofuels, we're not going to see growth in our oil consumption," Yergin says.

Quick update on income inequality in America.

Emmanuel Saez, an economist who's one of the leading scholars on the subject, just published some new numbers.

Saez tracks income growth since 1993. He compares the top 1 percent of earners to everybody else.

Three things to note in this table:

1. Over the long term, the top 1 percent have seen much larger gains than everyone else.

2. During the recession, the incomes of the top 1 percent fell more sharply than the incomes of everyone else. This happened because the stock market crashed, and the highest earners get a big chunk of income from investments.

"After negotiating through the night," NPR's Yuki Noguchi reports, states attorneys general, federal officials and five major banks have agreed on a plan that will provide about $26 billion in mortgage relief and aid to homeowners who got crushed when the housing bubble burst.

The Justice Department, NPR's Carrie Johnson tells us, just announced that "Attorney General Eric Holder, Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Shaun Donovan, Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller and other federal and state officials" will unveil details of the much-anticipated plan at 10 a.m ET.

OLYMPIA, Wash. – The number of people who are out of work in Washington is falling. It’s a sign the economy is recovering – albeit slowly. But it’s only been in the last two months that the government sector has started hiring again.

Tacoma’s 31-million-dollar predicted budget shortfall might be even worse than expected.  An outside review done by Herbert Research has found that Tacoma actually faces a 32-million dollar deficit of the current budget. 

But officials from the research firm say that they did not take into account any of the recent actions taken by the city to generate revenue. 

WASHINGTON, D.C. – A special budget panel lead by Washington Senator Patty Murray remains gridlocked as it nears its deadline next week. Some Northwest lawmakers are urging the so-called "super committee" to exceed its goal of cutting $1.2 trillion from the nation's debt.

If the "supercommittee" fails to reach a bipartisan solution by next Wednesday, deep spending cuts are slated to fall on nearly all of the federal budget. That puts a lot of pressure on Murrray, a co-chair of the panel.

But she's getting support from some Northwest Republicans who are going against their party's anti-tax mantra. Idaho Congressman Mike Simpson says he can support increasing revenues if the panel can cut around $4 trillion from the nation's debt over the next decade.

Strategic News Service publisher Mark Anderson is predicting the technology sector will end the year on a relatively high note. But, as he tells KPLU's Dave Meyer on The Digital Future, he's worried about the first quarter of 2012.

Our high school teachers always said that a college education was a sure fire way to ensure financial stability down the road but now there’s mounting evidence that no one is immune to financial disaster.

A new study found college graduates are the fastest growing group of consumers filing for bankruptcy in the nation.  And Washington State is no exception.

NEAR CLE ELUM, Wash. – Anti-poverty activists tried to crash a meeting of business leaders at a resort in Central Washington. The action – dubbed “Showdown at Suncadia” – happened today as the state’s chamber of commerce held its annual policy summit.

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn wants Congress to put aside partisanship and pass President Obama's $450 billion American Jobs Act.

If passed, it could mean big bucks for the state of Washington; The federal government could fund up to $1.8 billion worth of public works projects that it says, would create jobs and improve infrastructure.