Kriss Sjoblom

S&P/Case Shiller Home Price Index for Seattle

The S&P/Case-Shiller house price indexes for March (based on January, February and March transactions) were released yesterday. The seasonally adjusted (SA) March value for the Seattle Metro area is 148.8. (The unadjusted index for March is 145.2.) The Seattle index peaked in May 2009 with a value of 190.6 (SA). From that point the the […]

Oregon revenue forecast increased

Down in Salem, the Office of Economic Analysis today updated its forecasts of state revenues. For the current 2011–13 biennium, revenues to Oregon’s general fund are now forecasted to be $14.248 billion, an increase of $126 million (0.9 percent) from the amount forecasted in February. For the upcoming 2013–15 biennium, the new forecast is $15.606 […]

The impact of a 160,000 barrels per day refinery

Last year, we prepared a study of the economic impact of the state’s petroleum refineries. These impacts can be expressed in terms of the hypothetical Washington refinery producing 160,000 barrels of product a day. In 2011, such a refinery would have provided 552 jobs, and its workers would have received $66.4 million in wages and […]

Preliminary estimate shows Washington gained 3,800 jobs last month

The state Employment Security Department has released its Monthly Employment Report for April (here). The preliminary estimate is that the state gained 3,800 jobs (seasonally adjusted, net) from March to April. Of these jobs, 3,600 were private private sector and 200 were government. The original estimate that the state lost 5,500 jobs from February to […]

Benchmarking added 12,900 to April Washington employment estimates

Here is a follow up to my earlier post on the April employment report. The estimates of Washington employment that are reported monthly by the state Employment Security Department (ESD) are derived from a survey of employers (the establishment survey) conducted by U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Because the estimates are […]

State revenues exceeded forecast by $57.6 million during April 11 to May 10 collection period

For the second month in a row, state revenue collections have beaten the forecast. Collections for the April 11 to May 10 period beat expectations by $57.6 million. Of this, $29.5 million represents property tax payments. State economists suspect that the positive variance in property taxes will be reversed in the May 11–June 10 collection […]

Arteries of Commerce

Here are a couple of cool maps showing flows of goods by truck to, from and within Washington state.  Flows include domestic and international freight moving by truck on highway segments with more than twenty-five trucks per day and between places typically more than fifty miles apart. The first map, for 2007, is based on […]

Tax bill passes House

Yesterday the House passed the Houses finance committee’s tax bill (ESHB 2038) with one amendment, which concerned section 401. (My previous posts on this bill are here and here.) As it passed the House finance committee, section 401 of the bill eliminated the sales tax exemption for goods (other than motor vehicles, boats and trailer […]

House finance committee passes tax increases

Yesterday morning the House finance committee passed a substitute version of committee chair Reuven Carlyle’s tax proposal, which we described in a this policy brief. The substitute bill (SHB 2038) eliminated increases in taxes on beer, insurance agent commissions, stevedoring and janitorial services that would have been imposed in the original bill. The removed tax […]

New policy brief: House Finance Committee Considers Tax Increases

Our new policy brief on the House finance committee chair’s tax proposal can be downloaded here.