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Nevada Government Salaries - (www.transparentnevada.com) Another good public DB showing thousands of Nevada state employees being paid over $200K. And we wonder why our states are going bankrupt.
| Name | Job Title | Total Pay | Jurisdiction | Year |
| $643,511.82 | 2008 | |||
| $535,754.46 | 2008 | |||
| $447,788.49 | 2008 | |||
| $433,771.25 | 2008 | |||
| $423,484.12 | 2008 | |||
| $400,708.90 | 2008 | |||
| $392,563.79 | 2008 | |||
| $388,271.15 | 2008 | |||
| $375,925.11 | 2008 | |||
| $366,692.57 | 2008 | |||
| $357,593.27 | 2008 | |||
| $342,677.45 | 2008 | |||
| $333,430.86 | 2008 | |||
| $306,318.02 | 2008 | |||
| $302,275.31 | 2008 | |||
| $297,098.55 | 2008 |
Unemployment Worst Since Great Depression - (www.usnews.com) Hidden behind the unemployment rate are some startling numbers. The "Great Recession" is the name that has stuck for the economic decline that began in late 2007. But there's some reason to think that using the word recession is being kind. The U.S. gross domestic product has shrunk 3.9 percent in the past year, the worst drop since the Great Depression. Plenty of observers are willing to say that this recession is much deeper than anything we've seen since the 1930s—including the big dip in the early 1980s, generally accepted as the other candidate for the worst recession since the Great Depression. "I think it's way worse today," says Ridgely Evers of Tapit Partners, a longtime entrepreneur and venture capitalist who founded the software company Netbooks (now known as WorkingPoint). In the recession of 1981 and 1982, "people recognized it as a dip. [Today,] nobody thinks we are going to come back out in relatively short order." This recession seems to have dragged on longer. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), the U.S. economy was in recession from July 1981 to November 1982—16 months. But the current recession started in December 2007, says the NBER, so it's already longer than the last big one. The NBER defines a "recession" based on the all-encompassing gross domestic product figure. That economy-wide statistic may not mean much to the average American. In other words, the question "What is the economy's output?" usually doesn't matter as much as "How hard is it to find a job?" When we look at that question, how does the "Great Recession" compare? The unemployment rate is a murky number. It seems simple enough to look at the national unemployment figures released every month by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In July, that number was 9.4 percent. At the peak of the early '80s recession—December 1982—unemployment hit 10.8 percent. So where's the murkiness? The problem is that many of the people one would think of as "unemployed" are not included in this unemployment rate. For one, the Bureau of Labor Statistics does not count unemployed people who have been discouraged by the labor market and have given up looking for work. You are counted as a "discouraged worker" if you are available to work, want to work, and tried to look for work in the past year but gave up within four weeks for reasons including the belief that no work is available. The fact that the national unemployment rate excludes these discouraged workers has led many observers to believe it does not reflect the "real" level of unemployment. "Ask the average person if he or she is unemployed, and there is little hesitation in giving you an answer, but that may not agree with government definitions," says John Williams, an economist who examines government statistics at shadowstats.com. Other people who aren't counted in the official number are those who have been forced by the economy to work part time. The number of workers who wanted full-time jobs but could find only part-time work was 1.8 million last month, which amounts to 1.3 percent of the labor force. Still, that's not as bad as December 1982, when forced part-time workers accounted for 3 percent of the labor force. What happens when you start counting all these people who have been heavily battered by the labor market? The Bureau of Labor Statistics has another rate that includes "marginally affected workers" and part-time workers. That number, referred to as U-6 because of its identification in bureaureports, was 16.3 percent last month—nearly 7 percentage points higher than the official unemployment rate. What's more, the number of people who have given up on finding work has been steadily rising over the past few months, from 685,000 in May to 796,000 in July. "If you have that number of people leaving the workforce, that seems to me a serious problem," says economist John Lott. Many people are giving up because the labor market is so bad—but how bad historically? A U-6 rate of more than 16 percent certainly does not compare to the Great Depression, when a quarter of the workforce was unemployed. And Williams points out that a much larger number of workers were agricultural workers in the 1930s. These farm workers are not included in today's statistics. So, by his estimates, nonfarm unemployment was at 35 percent in 1933). Trying to compare that U-6 number with the early '80s recession gets a bit tricky. The U-6 measurement did not come into use until 1994. Before that, the Bureau of Labor Statistics used a broader measurement, referred to as U-7, to figure out the number of unemployed plus workers dropping out of the labor force. In 1982, U-7 hit a peak of 15.3 percent, below the current U-6 of 16.3 percent. But 1982 should probably look even better compared with the labor market of today. U-7 overestimates the number of discouraged workers compared with how we measure them today. For example, the Bureau of Labor Statistics started asking people in surveys if they were actually available to work. These and other changes reduced the measurement of discouraged workers by 50 percent, according to some estimates.
U.S. Cities’ Woes to Worsen as Taxes Trail Pace of Recovery - (www.bloomberg.com) U.S. city officials say they expect to face further financial strains because tax collections won’t recover until after the economy emerges from the deepest recession since the Great Depression, a national survey found. Eighty-eight percent of city finance officers said they are less able to cover the cost of running their governments than a year ago, up from 64 percent a year earlier, according to a survey of 379 cities by the National League of Cities between April and June. It was the most negative assessment since the survey began in 1986. Eighty-nine percent said the next budget year would be even worse. The survey points to increasing pressure on municipal officials even as the economy shows signs of recovering from the recession that began in December 2007. While property values have plunged since 2006, with home prices down 15.4 percent in June from the year before, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller home-price index, it can take years for that decline to be fully reflected in real-estate taxes. They provide about 32 percent of municipal revenue, according to the city group. Sales taxes can also drop until months after consumers start spending. “Since city fiscal conditions tend to lag behind national economic conditions, the effects of a depressed real estate market, low levels of consumer confidence and high levels of unemployment will likely play out in cities well into future years,” according to the National League of Cities. While states cut their budgets during the most-recent budget year, the survey shows that cities continued increasing spending even as they stopped hiring, delayed projects and adopted other cost-saving measures. Nearly half of city budget officials said they raised fees to boost revenue. Budgets Grow: City spending was estimated to increase by 2.5 percent in the current budget year when the survey was conducted, the smallest rise since 2002. About one-third of the cities’ budget years ended in June, while others end in September or December, according to the group. The cost of paying employee wages, health benefits and pension costs were cited among the biggest factors influencing city budgets in the current year. Eighty-one percent said the economy had a negative effect on their budgets for the year.
California homeowners facing insurance rate hikes - (www.latimes.com) Reporting from Sacramento - As California heads into another season of wildfires that have been growing more frequent and more ferocious, homeowners are facing higher prices to insure their property. In the last year, some big insurance companies have won approvals from regulators for premium hikes ranging from 4% to 7%. And a round of requests for similar increases has been submitted to the state insurance commissioner. In a state parched by a three-year drought, wildfires are at least partly to blame for the price increases, industry officials and even some consumer advocates agree. "We seem to be having year after year of [major wildfire] events, when before they occurred every six or seven years," said Sam Sorich, president of the California Assn. of Insurance Cos., a lobbying group in Sacramento. But Amy Bach, executive director of the San Francisco-based consumer group United Policyholders, said she was more concerned about the quality of the coverage than its cost. She said more fire victims could find that they didn't have enough coverage to pay the entire cost of rebuilding their homes. "My big concern is that the insurance companies are going to use these fires as an excuse to increase their rates, and the underinsurance problem is going to be the same as it ever was," Bach said. "People are going to be paying more for less." With an estimated 15 million homes statewide, even a tremendously destructive wildfire like the blaze that destroyed 3,000 San Diego homes in 2003 shouldn't cause a massive surge in the cost of insuring a home, experts say. In addition, rate increases, which must be approved by the state Department of Insurance, are based on three years of loss experience, delaying the effect on premiums of the fires that occur in any one year. The dramatic images of firestorms now sweeping through the San Gabriel Mountains produce fear and dread "but don't make for any actuarial implication," said Douglas Heller, executive director of Consumer Watchdog, a Santa Monica group. "We're talking about not even 1% of homes." But the cumulative effect of six years of more frequent, larger and costlier fires in built-up parts of once rural extended suburbs is bound to show up in homeowners' insurance bills, industry officials say.
Ron Paul: The Fed's Interesting Week – (www.dailypaul.com) See video as well. It has been an interesting week indeed for the Federal Reserve. Early this week, it was announced that President Obama intends to reappoint Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke to a second term in January, signaling a vote of confidence in him. Bernanke seems to be popular with the administration and with Wall Street, and with good reason. His lending policies have left big banks flush with newly created cash that covers up old mistakes and allows for new ones. By buying up mountains of Treasury debt he has also enabled spending to soar to ridiculous levels that should startle any responsible economist, and scare any American concerned about the value of the dollar. However, these highly sensitive decisions about our money are not made by economists, they are made by politicians. Bernanke, like most of his predecessors, is the politician’s best friend. However, there is no reason to believe any other central planner would behave any differently, considering the immense political pressure on the Fed. Fed policies have been as bad for the economy as they are good for politicians and bankers, as the recently released numbers on the debt and deficit demonstrate. For the first time since World War II the annual budget deficit is projected to be over 11 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product. It is also projected that by 2019 the national debt will be 68�f GDP. Our path, if unchanged, is completely untenable. The administration claims that it inherited a dire situation from the last administration, which is absolutely true. However, that hasn’t stopped them from accepting all the policies and premises that got us here, and accelerating those policies to rapidly make a bad situation much worse. The bailouts started with the last administration. They have gotten bigger with this one. The last administration gave us expanded government involvement in healthcare with a new prescription drug benefit. This administration gave us a renewal and expansion of SCHIP, and now the current healthcare takeover attempts. In reality, we can afford none of this, but shady monetary policy allows Washington to continue along its merry way, aggravating all our economic problems. Not everyone in government finds it acceptable that the Fed wields so much power and privilege in secrecy. Last week, a federal judge ruled against Fed secrecy, compelling them to release under the Freedom of Information Act information regarding which banks received emergency loans, and under what terms. The Fed will, of course do everything in its power to fight this ruling and it is certainly not the last word on the issue. Still, it is encouraging to see that the interests of the taxpayers were defended victoriously in court, while the Fed only sees the plight of its big banker friends. Meanwhile HR 1207 and S604, legislation to open up the Fed’s books to a complete audit, continue to gain momentum in Congress as the people continue to insist on real transparency of the Federal Reserve. One way or another, the days of Fed autonomy are coming to an end, as well they should. No one should have the power to debauch the currency and gut the economy as they do. It is time they answered for their actions, so the people can understand that we truly are better off with freedom instead of Fed tyranny.
OTHER STORIES:
Banks Lead Decline in U.S. Stocks on Concern Over More Losses - (www.bloomberg.com)
Oil Falls to Two-Week Low as Equities Drop, Dollar Strengthens - (www.bloomberg.com)
Treasuries Rise as Drop in Stocks Overshadows Data on Economy - (www.bloomberg.com)
Gold May Break Out to Record, Grabham Says: Technical Analysis - (www.bloomberg.com)
China targets some, not all, derivative deals: source - (www.reuters.com)
Bigger shakeup for US watchdogs - (www.bloomberg.com)
Goldman Sachs Wrong on Economic Recovery, Macro Hedge Funds Say - (www.bloomberg.com)
China Manufacturing Grows at Fastest Pace Since 2008 - (www.bloomberg.com)
Europe Unemployment Rate Rises to Highest in More Than 10 Years - (www.bloomberg.com)
China Tightens Grip on Rare Minerals - (www.nytimes.com)
Canada Economy Shrank at 3.4% Pace in Second Quarter - (www.bloomberg.com)
UK mortgage paybacks exceed new borrowing in July - (finance.yahoo.com)
Victors in Japan Are Set to Abandon Market Reform - (www.nytimes.com)
India’s Growth May Falter as Drought Threatens Crops - (www.bloomberg.com)
Russian Delinquent Loans Grew to 5.5% in July, Report Shows - (www.bloomberg.com)
Manufacturing in U.S. Expands More Than Forecast - (www.bloomberg.com)
Cities Brace for a Prolonged Bout of Declining Tax Revenues - (online.wsj.com)
Pending Sales of Existing Homes in U.S. Rose in July - (www.bloomberg.com)
One Thing's Clear on Economy: Mixed Signals - (www.washingtonpost.com)
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