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President's proposal would increase federal minimum wage, nearly to Washington's level

In his State of the Union address last night, President Obama proposed increasing the federal minimum wage to $9.00 by the end of 2015 and indexing it to inflation. (It is currently $7.25.) Twenty-two states currently match the federal minimum wage, 19 states and DC have minimum wages above the federal requirement, four have minimum […]

Monthly state revenue collections report released today

The state Economic and Revenue Forecast Council issued its monthly Economic and Revenue Update today. Here are the document’s summary points on revenue. Major General Fund-State revenue collections for the January 11 – February 10, 2013 collection period were $8.4 million (0.6%) lower than the November forecast, but a shortfall had been anticipated due to […]

Congratulations to Arun Raha, named top forecaster by the Wall Street Journal

Arun Raha, former Executive Director of the state Economic and Revenue Forecast Council, has been named top economic forecaster for 2012 by the Wall Street Journal. From the WSJ’s Real Time Economics blog: Arun Raha of power-management company Eaton Corp. was the year’s top economic forecaster, according to the Wall Street Journal’s annual rankings. The […]

Washington imposes 2nd heaviest cell phone tax

The combined state-local tax on cell phone users in Washington is 18.62 percent. According to a new Tax Foundation study, that’s the second highest rate in the nation. Only Nebraska, at 18.67 percent, is higher. The weighted state-local across the country is 11.36 percent. The feds tack on another 5.82 percent. The Tax Foundation notes, […]

WA union membership, 2012

Last week, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released 2012 data on unionization in the U.S. (Dick wrote about it here.) In 2012, the total union membership rate in the U.S. was 11.3 percent, the public-sector union membership rate was 35.9 percent, and the private-sector union membership rate was 6.6 percent. Washington’s total union membership rate […]

Union membership continues to fall across the nation

The Bureau of Labor Statistics yesterday reported another year of decline in union membership. In 2012, the union membership rate—the percent of wage and salary workers who were members of a union—was 11.3 percent, down from 11.8 percent in 2011, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The number of wage and salary workers […]

Louisiana and Kansas consider scrapping income taxes to improve business climate

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback have both voiced support for pro-growth tax reform based on eliminating personal income taxes. From NRO: “Eliminating personal income taxes will put more money back into the pockets of Louisiana families,” Jindal said in a statement earlier this month, “and will change a complex tax code […]

"Big Sort" author Bill Bishop to speak at WRC's annual dinner June 4

Bill Bishop, author of the Big Sort, will be the featured speaker at the WRC annual meeting June 4. Bishop’s book, published in 2008, authoritatively documented America’s shifting demographics. Going far beyond the simplistic red state/blue state divide, journalist Bill Bishop (in collaboration with sociologist and statistician Robert Cushing) marshals original data and incisive reporting to show […]

Talent shortage a bigger threat to software industry than the fiscal cliff?

Here in Microsoft’s backyard, we’ve heard this story for a while. Today Investors Business Daily leads with the tale of the tech talent shortage. The big challenge facing the U.S. software industry might not be the economy, looming fiscal cliff or growing competition. First things first — the companies are begging for qualified job candidates. […]

Tax incentives get additional attention after NYT series

Last week we wrote about the NYT series looking at tax incentives. Since then, I’ve come across a number of reports that shed additional light on the issue. Economist Tim Bartik, quoted in the Times stories, points out that the paper flubs the figures on Michigan’s tax breaks. …most public finance economists would argue that […]