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Economy
Quick Hit
by Adam Doster
10:48am
Tue Aug 3, 2010

DGA Jumps On Brady's Minimum Wage Stance

While GOP gubernatorial candidate Bill Brady backtracked slightly on his support for lowering Illinois' minimum wage by $1-per-hour, he hasn't changed his mind that the state's current wage floor is too high. And that's one position the Democratic Governors Association will make sure voters know about before November. Listen to the group's new radio ad below, which debuts today:

For more on the topic, check out our minimum wage primer here.

Quick Hit
by Adam Doster
4:57pm
Wed Jul 28, 2010

Medicaid, TANF Funding Still On The Way?

Just when it appeared that the U.S. Congress was prepared to leave state governments flailing in the wind, a few key Democrats are making some noise on Capitol Hill about re-upping their support for Medicaid assistance and a successful TANF jobs program. Annie Lowrey has gathered the latest developments at the Washington Independent.

Quick Hit
by Adam Doster
12:35pm
Wed Jul 28, 2010
419 comments

Schumer And The 99ers

Maybe Congress isn't ignoring the 99ers after all. In an interview with a local New York television station, which was flagged by the Michigan Messenger, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) hinted that he was interested in establishing a fifth tier of emergency unemployment benefits later this year. "There are some people who go beyond the 99 weeks," he said last Friday, "and we're gonna try to do that next."

Of course, no Republicans in the U.S. Senate backed the latest unemployment insurance bill, which was less aggressive than Schumer's latest pet project. That makes the odds of passage long. But it's a development you can bet the newly-radicalized online unemployment community will follow.

Quick Hit
by Adam Doster
1:23pm
Thu Jul 22, 2010

Krugman Vs. Kirk On The Federal Debt

Like his Republican colleague Rep. Peter Roskam and other House GOP leaders, U.S. Senate candidate Mark Kirk is using the local airwaves to advance the flimsy argument that President Obama is largely responsible for the exploding the national debt. "Bush certainly had deficits," he told Fox Chicago's Mike Flannery on July 12, "but nothing compared to the deficits of today." (You can watch the full interview here.)

For some competing data, check out these graphs compiled by New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. They show that most of the nation's new debt piled up in the first two quarters of 2009 --mere months into the Obama presidency and before his policies had "begun to take effect." This famous graph produced by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities  is instructive, as well. The D.C.-based thinktank concludes that, were it not for the Bush-era tax cuts (which Kirk supported), the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (which Kirk supported), and the ongoing economic slump, "we would not be facing these huge deficits in the near term."