Charleston Gazette-Mail - Last month I traveled to New York for my birthday on my first trip since COVID hit. Read the full op-ed.
Economy
Charleston Gazette-Mail - I've covered the state budget process long enough to know that budget surpluses are better than budget deficits, so November tax collections of $435.6 million, $88.03 million above projections, is good news. Read the full article.
Charleston Gazette-Mail - State officials Monday discussed state and federal workforce shortage issues and the role the "benefits cliff effect" plays in exacerbating those shortages. Read the full article.
Charleston Gazette-Mail, Huntington Herald-Dispatch - Bolstered by another month of strong severance tax collection, the ongoing influx of billions of dollars of federal pandemic stimulus funds and plain old good timing, West Virginia tax collection for November came in at $435.6 million, or $88.03 million higher than projected, figures released by the Senate Finance Committee…
Mountain State Spotlight, Beckley Register-Herald - It was October 2020. And with each passing day, the COVID-19 pandemic escalated. Read the full article. West Virginians’ suffering extended beyond sickness and death. The virus had dealt a powerful economic blow, with many state residents struggling to meet their basic needs. With the coming winter, that struggle…
Last week, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the overall year-over-year inflation rate in October was 6.2 percent, a notably high rate. While there are many reasons to believe that inflation will ease in the coming months, some, including West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, are arguing that current high rates of inflation are not…
It's Halloween week -- time to get spooky! Who needs ghost stories when you have spine-tingling bars and trend lines? Here are five ghoulish charts about West Virginia in 2021 that will make your bones rattle and your blood curdle. At the beginning of the pandemic, West Virginia lost an unprecedented 101,000 jobs as total…
This blog post, co-authored by the Keystone Research Center's executive director Stephen Herzenberg and the WVCBP’s senior policy analyst Sean O'Leary, was originally published by the ReImagine Appalachia coalition. West Virginia is at the center of the national political storm surrounding the need to invest in infrastructure, in families, and in combating climate change. Notably, West Virginia…
Charleston Gazette-Mail - Last week was an eye-opener at the Legislature. Read the full article. Not because Senate President Craig Blair, R-Berkeley, compared vaccine mandates to Nazi Germany. Not because Sen. Mike Maroney, R-Marshall, got so upset with the shady, secret, closed-door backroom dealings going on that he blurted out a curse word on the Senate floor.
Charleston Gazette-Mail - West Virginia’s COVID-19 death toll reached 4,219 Wednesday, including 2,878 deaths of unvaccinated or partially vaccinated individuals since vaccines became available, a point state coronavirus czar Dr. Clay Marsh drove home during the state COVID-19 briefing. Read the full article. Since COVID-19 vaccines became available last December, the virus has killed 3,102…