Show #023 “Wages, Fracking, Casinos and Power Lines. Also, Turkey” Show Notes
Description
Welcome to Your Friendly Neighborhood Economist Show #023 “Wages, Fracking, Casinos and Power Lines. Also, Turkey” originally aired on Tuesday May 13, 2014. In this show I discuss the minimum wage (again) in light of the recent failure of a minimum wage to get through the Senate, and bring you the first part of my interview with my old friend Yahya Madra of Bogaziçi University in Istanbul on the recent developments in the Turkish economy and their intersection with the Gezi park uprising.Local News
- Sliding-scale health care facility opens - Columbia-Greene Media: News
- Meeting set for Joslen Blvd. housing project - Columbia-Greene Media: News
- County surveys broadband accessibility - Columbia-Greene Media: News. Go fill it out!
- Parent confronts school board over Common Core - Columbia-Greene Media: News. Well, what can you say about this sort of thing. The Common Core, is not an attempt to indoctrinate children any more than education in general is and I don’t think anyone involved with it actually had the Hitler Youth in mind as a model. I’m more worried about the push to privatize education.
- Olana receives $950K in state aid - Columbia-Greene Media: News
- WGXC Newsroom · Local unemployment rates fall sharply in March
Energy
- WGXC Newsroom · Ghent joins local switch to green power plan
- County switches to renewable energy - Columbia-Greene Media: News
- Expanded gas pipeline would pass through Chatham, New Lebanon, Canaan – SamPratt.com: Sam Pratt is on the case! Sneaky trying to get a pipeline through while we’re all paying attention to power lines.
Municipal Finance
- WGXC Newsroom · Village tax levy increase under two percent cap
- WGXC Newsroom · Coxsackie budget decisions down to the wire
- Columbia County receives negative outlook from Moody’s Investor Services - Columbia-Greene Media: News. Is this the same Moody’s that gave top ratings to all those toxic mortgage backed securities in the lead up to the financial crisis? Oh, it is? Just wondering.
- WGXC Newsroom · Auditor chides Catskill for lack of purchase docs. That lack leaves room for suspicion of wrongdoing…
- WGXC Newsroom · Greene calls for phased state takeover of mandates. The Greene County legislature is pushing back against the thirty-five year trend of s**t flowing downhill, fiscally speaking. By which I am referring to the tax-cutting religion combined with the practice of cramming costs down from the Federal to the State level and from there to municipalities.
- Proposed budget calculations questionable by state standards - Columbia-Greene Media: News
- WGXC Newsroom · Greene Co. close to deal for Candyman building
- Village passes budget, public drinking law - Columbia-Greene Media: News. Looks like Kinderhoookians (Kinderhookites?) will be getting rebate checks come election time.
- Moore urges council to privatize parking bureau management - Columbia-Greene Media: News. '“Nothing will change. The city of Hudson will still employ the four who already issue tickets,” Police Commissioner Gary Graziano said.' So their working conditions, pay and benefits will be the same as before? Will they still be represented by a union? Just asking.
Local Business
- NEW: Lafarge, Holcim cement massive merger deal - Columbia-Greene Media: News. We’ll have to wait and see if this has any local ramifications…
- WGXC Newsroom · Ravena cement plant rebuild to launch Friday
- Lafarge breaks ground on new, modern plant - Columbia-Greene Media: News
- WGXC Newsroom · Seeley: No casino this round for Greene County. Three cheers for lack of infrastructure!
- Love’s construction to begin in May - Columbia-Greene Media: News. Terribly written.
- Minimum apartment size bedevils city board - Columbia-Greene Media: News. 1500 square feet sure is big for a minimum apartment size.
Power Lines
- Solomon addresses state’s planned Energy Highway proceedings - Columbia-Greene Media: News An improvement in the transmission line part of the ongoing power line saga: Governor Cuomo said that plans that used existing right of ways would be given priority. That mean that additional land will probably not be taken from landowners in the path of the power line expansion.
- Nat’l Grid takes eminent domain off the table - Columbia-Greene Media: News. Perhaps. a response from Farmers and Families for Livingston.
- Coalition responds to Nat’l Grid plan - Columbia-Greene Media: News If you're interested in checking out the documents and comments submitted to the Public Service Commission on this matter, click here.
- WGXC Newsroom · PSC: Central Hudson can balance electricity rates
- WGXC Newsroom · PSC announces transmission line hearings. The Public Service Commission is open to comments from the public on the West Point Partners project, that would among other things bring underground high voltage DC transmission lines through the middle of Athens.
- WGXC Newsroom - PSC hears opposition to West Point project
Musical Interlude:
New York State News
- NY unemployment rate ticks up to 6.9% in March - Politics on the Hudson. Not really much change, overall. Still well down from a year ago, which is good.
Casinos
- Casino bidders keep cards close to vest at conference - Politics on the Hudson
- Developers submit 22 casino application fees, state says - Politics on the Hudson. Speaking of minimum wage jobs…
- WGXC Newsroom · Casino bids in for Howe Caverns, Albany sites
Budget
- WGXC Newsroom · Cuomo adds funds to solar efforts
- WGXC Newsroom · Report: 30 school districts considered mergers. Perhaps the governor should have looked at this before he decided municipalities needed to find savings through merging functions.
- DiNapoli finds good, bad and ugly in recently approved state budget (Updated) - Politics on the Hudson
- Database: Sales-tax revenue sluggish in NY - Politics on the Hudson. Revenues were 2.75% higher in Columbia County and 3.03% lower in Greene County in the first quarter of this year compared to the first quarter of last year. In the state as a whole, revenues were 1.15% higher.
- Cuomo announces commission for school-bond act - Politics on the Hudson
- State approves $128 million for storm prep - Politics on the Hudson. Just the first down payment on adaptation to climate change. Which is totally not happening. And if it were happening would totally not be our fault. And even if it were, it would be too expensive to prevent. This political propoganda brought to you by American Petroleum Enterprises (APEs).
Fracking
- Health Department declined to join national fracking study - Politics on the Hudson. Completely legit reasons, I’m sure, why the State’s health department wasn’t interested in participating. It would have been very helpful, especially if the state turns out not to allow fracking. It would have made the Pennsylvania fracking a natural experiment, with New York as the control.
- WGXC Newsroom · Senate committee blocks effort to ban frack waste
Health
- As deadline passes, NY health exchange reports nearly 961k enrollees - Politics on the Hudson
- Feds approve NY's $8 billion Medicaid waiver - Politics on the Hudson. Not much detail about how the savings are achieved. But, the state is saving the Federal government $17 billion and gets to keep $8 billion of that to invest in the health care system in New York. Not bad.
- In New York, Hard Choices on Health Exchange Spell Success - NYTimes.com
- Low-income NYers can get free air conditioners - Politics on the Hudson. "New York residents with documented medical conditions worsened by extreme heat may be eligible for aid to buy air conditioners this summer, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Monday."
Musical Interlude:
National News
Employment
- Jump in Payrolls Is Seen as a Sign of New Optimism – NYTimes.com. Big jobs number, but no movement in wages and a decrease in unemployment rate sue almost entirely to people leaving the labor force. Not all great news, really.
- The Jobs Report Isn’t as Good as It Looks - NYTimes.com
- It’s a Mistake to Pretend This Jobs Report Tells a Consistent Story - NYTimes.com
- The Jobs Number Is Actually Four Numbers - NYTimes.com
- Spending and Pay Gains Suggest Better Economy - NYTimes.com
- Manufacturing is doing great — but not for workers. Here’s what that means. - Washington Post | Wonkblog. Long story short: manufacturing output, profits and productivity are up, but employment and earnings are flat. But, those people who can’t get jobs in manufacturing may be able to get higher-paying jobs in services, if they don’t end up stuck in retail, that is.
- Unemployment Claims Decline to Nearly a 7-Year Low – NYTimes.com. lowest number of new unemployment claims since before the recession
Minimum Wage
- The dignity of labor martin luther king jr
- Daily Show Clip: Wage Against the Machine. The Daily Show Schiffsplains the problem with the minimum wage. Apparently, I’ve had it all wrong.
- Congressional Budget Office: The Effects of a Minimum-Wage Increase on Employment and Family Income
- Economic Policy Institute: Raising the Federal Minimum Wage to $10.10 Would Lift Wages for Millions and Provide a Modest Economic Boost, By David Cooper | December 19, 2013
- Treating Inequality with Redistribution: Is the Cure Worse than the Disease? | iMFdirect - The IMF Blog. Strange title. Given that the answer given in the text of the blog post is an emphatic NO. Also, Marxists have infiltrated the International Monetary Fund! Rejoice!
- The World's 85 Richest People Are as Wealthy as the Poorest 3 Billion - Derek Thompson - The Atlantic
- What's the State of Economic Inequality in America? | The Business Desk with Paul Solman | PBS NewsHour | PBS Guess who actually gets the level of inequality in the US right? Hint: it's not the middle class white folks waiting in line for a show.
- My Life as a Retail Worker: Nasty, Brutish, and Poor - Atlantic Mobile
- Pay Higher Wages, Earn More Profit - NYTimes.com
- Wall Street bonuses up 15% - Politics on the Hudson. They really need a different stock photo of Tom DiNapoli. They always have him looking like he's smiling about the worst news.
- Income inequality hinders economic growth, according to new report | MSNBC
- Nasa-funded study: industrial civilisation headed for 'irreversible collapse'?< | Nafeez Ahmed | Environment | theguardian.com/a>
- All Economics Is Local - NYTimes.com
- Minnesota Lawmakers Vote to Raise Base Wage – NYTimes.com. Minnesota’s state minimum wage had been $6.15, so the federal minimum wage of $7.25 was binding. They voted to raise their state's minimum wage to $9.50.
- Seattle Mayor Details Plan for $15 Minimum Wage – NYTimes.com. Details about the implementation of Seattle’s $15 per hour minimum wage not so great. Tips and healthcare included? Plenty of room for creative padding of those costs.
- Obama Signs Measures to Help Close Gender Gap in Pay – NYTimes.com. Once you control for occupation, education and experience, there is still a pay gap. Not as big. But still there.
- Recovery Has Created Far More Low-Wage Jobs Than Better-Paid Ones – NYTimes.com. This pattern is surprising only to people or insulated from the job market the most workers face. This pattern of good jobs being replaced by bad jobs is at least 30 years old. These jobs don’t have to be bad but will remain so until workers get more organized.
- A Low-Wage Recovery? The Evidence Isn’t There – NYTimes.com. This supposed refutation doesn’t refute the fact that low-wage job gains have been twice the losses in the recession, while in other industries, job gains have been smaller than the losses suffered during the recession. Of course it’s true that there are high-wage occupations in every industry, but those are always going to be smaller in number than the low-wage jobs and in industries like retail, much smaller.
- In Tepid Wage Growth, a Potent Sign of a Still-Fragile Economy - NYTimes.com
- Thinking Big: The Global Minimum Wage. A year after the Rana Plaza disaster, can a movement for a global minimum wage be built on the existing anti-sweatshop movement?
- New York Lawmakers Push to Raise Wages at Biggest Chains – NYTimes.com. These businesses certainly can afford it, without raising prices much, either:
- “A group of Democratic lawmakers from New York City on Wednesday announced a new push to raise the minimum wage for many low-paid workers, calling for a $15-an-hour “fair wage” for employees of McDonald’s and Walmart and other businesses with yearly sales of $50 million or more.”
- Small Business Majority Report - Small Businesses Support Increasing the Minimum Wage to $10.10
- Hawaii set to become third state to hike minimum wage to $10.10 | MSNBC
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