Seattle real estate market still hot for now
The Wall Street Journal has an article about the Seattle-area real estate market: Despite Stay-at-Home Order, Seattle’s Real-Estate Market Continues to Show Up Multiple offers. Bidding wars. All-cash deals hours after listings go live: This is all still happening in Seattle, the city that four weeks ago was considered an epicenter of the coronavirus epidemic, […]
The economic downturn could increase the number of Medicaid clients in Washington by 17–37 percent
Health Management Associates (HMA) has modeled what could happen with health insurance coverage in the states during this downturn. They consider low, medium, and high unemployment scenarios and find that, nationally, “All three scenarios result in a significant shift from the number of Americans covered by employer provided insurance to some form of Medicaid or […]
10th of April 2020
More on initial claims
Yesterday I posted a chart showing initial claims for unemployment insurance in Washington from March 1 to April 4 by individual sector as a percentage of sector employment. Here is an update to this chart that includes a bar for private employers overall: From March 1 to April 4, overall private sector claims were 14.9 […]
9th of April 2020
Initial claims by industry
I have updated three charts I posted previously showing initial claims for unemployment insurance by sector to include data for the week of March 29 to April 4. The first chart shows initial claims sector as a proportion of the sector’s employment in February: Accommodation and Food Services; Arts, Entertainment and Recreation; and Construction remain […]
In Washington 170,063 filed for unemployment insurance last week
This morning the state Employment Security Department reported that it received 170,063 new claims for unemployment insurance during the March 29-April 4 week. This is a decrease of 11,912 from the 181,975 claims filed during the preceding week. The four-week moving average of claims is 123,721, up from 82,842 for the preceding week. We estimate […]
Nationwide, 6,606,000 filed for unemployment insurance last week
The U.S. Department of Labor issued its weekly report on initial claims for unemployment insurance this morning. Nationwide, the number of seasonally adjusted claims was 6,606,000 last week. This is 261,000 less than the (upwardly revised) number of claims for the previous week, 6,867,000, which is the record. The 4-week moving average of seasonally adjusted […]
6th of April 2020
Gov. Inslee’s vetoes increase unrestricted ending fund balance by about $242 million in 2019–21
Friday afternoon, Gov. Inslee vetoed sections of the operating budget and numerous bills that affected state revenues. (Here is his operating budget veto message and here is a table of the vetoes. Here is our policy brief on the budget as passed by the Legislature.) Accounting for his vetoes, appropriations from funds subject to the […]
3rd of April 2020
Recognizing the negative budget outlook, Gov. Inslee vetoes portions of four policy bills
Yesterday Gov. Inslee signed several bills. He also vetoed sections of four policy bills in recognition of the changing outlook for the operating budget. The vetoes and the rationale behind them: Three pilot projects for law enforcement officer behavioral health in SSB 6570: “With the rapidly changing environment related to the state’s response to COVID-19 […]
Initial claims by industry
I have updated three charts I posted last week on initial claims for unemployment insurance by industry to include data for the week of March 22 to March 28. The first shows initial claims industry as a proportion of the industry’s employment in February: Accommodation and Food Services, and Arts, Entertainment and Recreation remain the […]
Labor and logistical challenges for agriculture these days
Agricultural concerns are—of course—essential businesses. The industry continues to work during this time, but it faces logistical and labor challenges. The Spokesman-Review has a good story on the logistics: While items from flour to eggs have been flying off supermarket shelves, including a wild run on apples, that hasn’t immediately helped farmers in Washington, several […]