Rory Mcllmoil (Downstream Strategies ) and I will be testifying Monday, July 19 at 11am to the Subcommittee B of the Joint Standing Committee on Finance on our report, "The Impact of Coal on the West Virginia State Budget." We will be joined in adiscussion of coal's impact on the West Virginia state budget and…
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Jumping off from from my previous entry about unemployment benefits, I wanted to share this chart, which was presented to the House Budget Committee earlier this month by Mark Zandi, the chief economist of Moody's Economics and former economic adviser to Senator John McCain during his presidential run. Mr. Zandi's full testimony is available here, and is worth…
There is a lot of buzz lately at the national level regarding tax cuts, unemployment extensions, and the federal deficit. Last month, Congress failed to pass an extension of unemployment subsidies, which means by the end of this month 13,300 unemployed West Virginians will have exhausted their benefits, putting them at risk of succumbing to the dangers of long-term unemployment.…
Major hat tip to Daniel Indiviglio of the Atlantic Monthly for this chart.
This is the only conclusion I can reach after reading Steve Roberts' op-ed in the State Journal attacking our report on coal's fiscal impact on the state's budget. It's obvious that Mr. Roberts didn't read the entire report. In the op-ed, he responds to the report's findings by calling us "anti" everything and he dismisses…
As the Daily Mail pointed out yesterday, Moody's Investors upgraded the state's bond rating. As I've opined before, how could this happen if the state has a debt "crisis" due to OPEB? The reason is quite simple. West Virginia's long-term OPEB liability is just one of numerous factors that Moody's uses to determine our credit…
African Americans in West Virginia earn significantly less than their white counterparts. From 2006 to 2008, the median family income for white West Virginians exceeded that of black families by over $17,000. Obviously, numbers like this - since they are consistent with national trends - are far from surprising. And clearly, many factors are at play…
The jobs picture in West Virginia continues to look bleak. This is especially true for males. The male 2010 1st quarter unemployment rate was 11.6% compared to a strong 4.0% in the last quarter of 2007. While the female unemployment rate increased 2 percentage points since the start of the Great Recession, the male unemployment…
The Wall Street Journal joined the fray yesterday in making the time honored claim that West Virginia under performs neighboring states because of its tax laws (not to mentioning bashing our late Senator Byrd). It's important to note that no one, I mean no one, has ever proved this, people just say it all the…
West Virginia has one of the lowest per capita incomes in the country, and nearly 25 percent of personal income in West Virginia comes from government transfer payments. The national average is just under 15 percent. Transfer payments are mainly made up of payments by the government for various social benefit programs. These programs include Social…