How healthy is our economy? If you’ve just returned from the grocery store or gas station, you may be inclined to rate it poorly. Although prices aren’t rising as fast as before, that phenomenon is properly called disinflation. It isn’t the same thing as deflation. The cost of living remains much higher than it was...
According to the latest report from the N.C. Department of Commerce, North Carolina has a 3.3% unemployment rate, the lowest in decades.
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics just released its latest jobs report for North Carolina and the rest of the country. As usual, the report contained a mixture of good news and bad. First the good. Our headline unemployment rate of 3.8% isn’t just low. It’s much lower than our 5.3% average rate over the...
Most economic forecasters expect us to enter a recession sometime in 2023. I sure hope they’re wrong. Even a mild recession would throw tens of thousands of North Carolinians out of work. And the ranks of displaced workers would rise into the hundreds of thousands if we suffered a downturn as serious as the Great...
Nearly half a billion dollars in first-time unemployment benefits in North Carolina were not paid out in a timely manner during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s according to an audit released from State Auditor Beth Wood’s office on Monday. The Division of Employment Security didn’t issue $438 million of first unemployment benefit payments during...
Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed a bill Friday that would have ended $300 in extra weekly federal unemployment benefits in North Carolina. The bill also would have tightened job search requirements to continue collecting unemployment. North Carolina would have joined 25 other states in cutting off the federal unemployment supplement. Other states have cited labor shortages...
On Wednesday evening, the N.C. Senate and House voted in quick succession to end the $300 in extra pandemic-related federal unemployment assistance. The Senate voted 26-22 on a final compromise version of Senate Bill 116. The House followed suit, 65-45, roughly 30 minutes later. The extra payments were part of the federal benefits supplement after...
In selling the supposed benefits of his recently unveiled spending proposals – that would total more than $4 trillion over several years – President Joe Biden bragged that his plans are “designed to redistribute the nation’s wealth.” On this point, I agree. But the wealth redistribution will not be in the way he means it....
Terry Stoops on politics of teacher vacancies; Tyler Collins on commercial drone use; legislators discuss when to hold presidential primary & how much to change requirement for unemployment benefit recipients; Katherine Restrepo on Obamacare reform plans
RALEIGH — The latest federal employment report delivers excellent news for North Carolina. That's the assessment from the John Locke Foundation's chairman, who notes that state employers added 14,000 new jobs in September. That means a net employment gain of 108,500 over the past year.
Katherine Restrepo on law that allows state to say yes or no to medical facilities; update on paying down $2.8 billion debt to feds; lawmakers on options for new HHS home; Mark Steckbeck on morality of capitalism; Sarah Curry on two gov't revenue streams
