It’s never a bad time to construct a counterfactual. What if Rick Perry had never said, “Oops”? What if he could have, for Christ’s sake, just remembered that he had wanted to gut the Department of Energy? What if he hadn’t climbed into a tan coat and Brett Favre jeans and released that abominable Youtube [...]
Posts Tagged ‘unemployment’
Thinking outside the box on the city’s finances
We’ve seen the ideas generated by the Long Term Financial Management Task Force, which I thought lacked a certain amount of breadth to its perspective. Here’s a taste of what else might be out there to think about. Good Jobs Great Houston, of which the Houston Organization of Public Employees is a member, held a [...]
How’s that Texas miracle going?
Not so good. The Texas unemployment rate reached 8.5 percent in August, its highest rate since June of 1987. That’s an increase from 8.4 percent in July. Those numbers come from the U.S. Department of Labor. The numbers were confirmed by the Texas Workforce Commission, which says the state lost 1,300 jobs in August. Texas [...]
Our education gap
Apparently, we have one in Houston. The Houston area doesn’t have enough educated workers to fill all the jobs that local industry creates, according to a study released today by the Brookings Institution. That education gap, in turn, pushes up the local unemployment rate, according to the study, which ranked the Houston area 94th among [...]
On Texas’ government jobs
Since I had previously complained about a lack of acknowledgement by Texas writers about the role that growth in the public sector has played in the so-called “Texas Miracle”, I want to give credit where it is due. In the Texas that Perry has presided over as governor since December 2000, the job-creation record is [...]
Texas’ unemployment rate spikes
Texas unemployment rate hits its highest mark since 1987. That’s probably not the kind of headline Rick Perry wants to read right now. As Gov. Rick Perry touts job creation and limited government on the campaign trail, the Texas’ unemployment rate tied a 1987 record in July and the Austin-area took the brunt of the [...]
The Lege’s job killing budget
Do you think this is what all those people who came out to vote last November had in mind? The Legislative Budget Board, a nonpartisan state agency that helps lawmakers with budget numbers, predicts that House version of the 2012-2013 state budget would result in 272,000 fewer jobs in Texas the first year and 335,000 [...]
What about the jobs?
With all of the public sector job cuts coming, will the private sector pick up the slack? This Statesman story paints a picture that I think is a tad bit too optimistic. Government employment, which includes local school districts and higher education, made up 22 percent of total nonagricultural jobs in the Austin area in [...]
Budget cuts are bad for the economy
In case you missed this last week. Texas’ cuts-only approach to its budget shortfall won’t solve the state’s long-term fiscal problems, according to Standard & Poor’s, a major bond rating agency. “We believe that a balanced approach that includes both revenue enhancements and expenditure cuts has a higher potential of success in preserving the state’s [...]
Happy talk about Texas employment
2010 was a better year for employment in Texas than 2009 was. Texas employers expanded payrolls by 20,000 jobs in December, the third straight month the state has gained jobs, according to data released Friday by the Texas Workforce Commission. The state gained in most major employment sectors, led by construction, with 8,700 jobs. “It’s [...]
Texas 20/20 on the budget
Via First Reading, a group called Texas 20/20 has taken a look at what other states have done to deal with their budget shortfalls, and how that may apply to Texas in next year’s legislative session. The author is former Deputy Comptroller Billy Hamilton, who was a high-ranking aide to Democratic and Republican comptrollers. Here’s [...]
We have a new illustration of “chutzpah”
From Sen. John Cornyn, who knows a thing or two about shamelessness. Sen. John Cornyn pinned Democrats with the failure of a plan to extend jobless aid for millions of unemployed workers, only a day after Democrats fell a vote short of pushing through their version of the legislation. “The blame for what happened has [...]
How to really put the unemployed to work
Texas Workforce Commissioner Tom Pauken has the germ of a good idea here. Unfortunately, he’s incapable of seeing what it is, and so goes off a cliff with it. “Even in good economic times, there were people in Texas who saw the unemployment system as simply another entitlement program, which it’s not,” Pauken, who served [...]
Some good job news
It’s a start. At least, I hope it’s a start. A surge in temporary federal Census Bureau jobs coupled with new leisure and hospitality positions helped local employers create 20,200 new jobs during May. The data, released Friday by the Texas Workforce Commission, marks the biggest one-month April to May increase of the past decade, [...]
Just a reminder about Perry’s unemployment tax increase
Lisa Falkenberg watches some video of Texas Workforce Commission Executive Director Larry Temple testifying before the Senate and reiterates something we knew. Temple acknowledged Thursday to the Senate Committee on Economic Development that Texas’ decision not to take $556 million in unemployment stimulus dollars directly led to higher taxes for business owners and more borrowing [...]
The recession and the Texas Enterprise Fund
A report worth reading from Texans for Public Justice: The global recession that hit Texas in 2008 is playing havoc with Governor Perry’s signature business-incentive program: the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF). A review of 45 TEF projects that received $363 million in public funds reveals that an increasing number of TEF recipients defaulted on their [...]
Unemployment up in Texas
Not the kind of story Rick Perry wants to see with an election coming up. The state’s economic recovery hit a snag in December, as employers cut 23,900 jobs after expanding payrolls in October and November. The Texas unemployment rate climbed to 8.3 percent in December from 8 percent the month before, the Texas Workforce [...]
Unemployment taxes triple
Here comes the Rick Perry unemployment tax increase that we’ve been waiting for. Nearly two-thirds of Texas businesses will see the unemployment taxes they pay per employee per year nearly triple – from $23.40 to $64.80 – under rates announced today by the Texas Workforce Commission. The minimum tax is paid by nearly 255,000 employers, [...]
Playing politics: Not just for the Forensic Science commission
Hey, you know that two billion dollars of federal funds we need to borrow to shore up the unemployment insurance trust fund? I’m sure you’ll be shocked to hear that Rick Perry’s appointees on the Texas Workforce Commission are thinking about delaying the inevitable tax hike to pay for all that until after the 2010 [...]
Always go to the source
If you find yourself in the position of needing to file for unemployment insurance from the state of Texas, be sure you go to the Texas Workforce Commission page to do it. Do not go anywhere else. As if it’s not bad enough to lose a job, some people trying to apply for unemployment benefits [...]
It’s hard to be unemployed in Texas
I’m sure this comes as no surprise. If you lose your job in Texas, you may be out of luck in more ways than one. The Texas Workforce Commission rejected about a third of jobless claims last year and 27 percent the first half of this year. When jobless people appealed those initial decisions, their [...]
Watson on unemployment
State Sen. Kirk Watson reviews the bidding on how the state of Texas has handled its unemployment issues. As was noted during this past legislative session by Workforce Commission Chairman Tom Pauken (who was appointed by the Governor and once led the Texas Republican Party), unemployment assistance is not a welfare program. It exists to [...]
More unemployed, fewer benefits
Boy, no one could have predicted this. In a sign of lingering hardship, more than 15,000 Texans will lose their unemployment checks at the end of the month because they have exhausted their benefits after 59 weeks without a job. They are among 82,000 Texans who are on their last allotment of unemployment benefits. Though [...]
From the “Things are tough all over” department
Texas trying to keep up with unemployment claims. The rising number of jobless Texans has generated more claims than the Texas Workforce Commission can handle. The commission has added hundreds of workers and phone lines to call centers to deal with soaring unemployment claims, but officials acknowledge that they can’t answer every call. A commission [...]
More unemployment funds available
The bad news is that Texas’ rate of unemployment continues to rise. The good news is that this means more federal funds for unemployment insurance are available, and these come with no conditions on them. Texas now qualifies, thanks to the state’s steadily rising unemployment rate, for $250 million of string-free federal money. That money [...]
UI update
The headline says it all: GOP holds key to unemployment stimulus dollars. Against the wishes of Gov. Rick Perry, lawmakers are pressing ahead with efforts to claim $555 million in federal economic stimulus money for unemployment benefits. With all of the Senate Democrats already on board, a small group of Republican senators hold the key [...]
Oh by the way, the unemployment trust fund is going broke
Floor Pass has the bad news. The Texas Workforce Commission released its latest projection for the unemployment insurance trust fund balance, and the news is even worse than last month’s. TWC estimates the fund’s balance will have plummeted to just $19 million by October 1 – that’s $840 million below the trust fund’s legal minimum [...]
Property values declining
I have three things to say about this. The housing slump that has battered much of the country for two years finally has trickled down to Harris County, where residential property values have declined or stagnated for the first time since the oil bust of the 1980s, the county’s top appraiser said Friday. Nearly half [...]
Not everybody isn’t hiring
The downturn in the economy has created an opportunity for the Houston Police Department to bolster its ranks. A year ago, the Houston Police Department could barely muster enough recruits to fill a 70-seat academy class. Now with 1,000 applicants in the pipeline, HPD is benefiting from the nation’s [worsening] economy, and so are several [...]
Lege versus Gov on unemployment funds
Showdown time. The House committee charged with recommending how to use the federal stimulus money does not see eye to eye with Gov. Rick Perry on the $555 million for unemployment insurance. In a 5 to 1 vote, the committee on Thursday endorsed enacting the necessary changes to state law so that Texas would be [...]