According to the Minnesota Reformer, Uber and Lyft drivers have begun organizing themselves to press state lawmakers to force the tech giants to address long-standing driver complaints of meager wages, unsafe working…
The Star Tribune ran a story last Wednesday titled “Minnesota’s big economic challenge is where to find people to fill jobs, state demographer says.” It followed this with another on…
State and local taxes and spending The Globe: Worthington City Council talks budget ahead of December certification deadline Alexandria Echo Press: Douglas County commissioners approve 2023 budget of nearly $64.6…
Why are prices rising? One theory is ‘cost-push’ inflation. According to my old Dictionary of Economics, this is: Inflation induced by a rise in the costs of production of goods…
Three things are essential for economic growth: an increase in labor (number of hours worked), an increase in capital, and an increase in total factor productivity, which can be understood…
Last week, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released data showing that the United States economy added 263,000 jobs in November. Some, such as Senator Elizabeth Warren, saw this as unequivocally good news:…
State and local taxes and spending Pine and Lakes Echo Journal: Nisswa taxpayers likely to see 12% hike in city taxes Rochester Post Bulletin: Letter: Tax increases in a time…
Between November 15th and 16th, leaders of the G20 met in Bali, Indonesia, for their annual summit. Like the past couple of years, growing income inequality was one of the…
Compared to many other metropolitan areas in the country, the Twin Cities metro — or rather the Minneapolis-St. Paul- Blooming Statistical Area (MSA) area as defined by the Bureau of…
Last week, in a report on low unemployment rates in Upper Midwestern cities, the Star Tribune noted that: The entire state of Minnesota came in at a 2.1% unemployment rate for…
The Star Tribune reported last week that Mankato “has the lowest unemployment rate forany metro in U.S.” So it does, as Bureau of Labor Statistics data show. The Star Tribune…
Just recently, the Fraser Institute released its newest edition of the Economic Freedom of North America Index — a yearly publication that ranks U.S. states and provinces of Mexico and…
State and local taxes and spending Duluth News Tribune: Local View: Parks question doomed by Duluth’s dependence on property taxes Alexandria Echo Press: Property values take big jump in Douglas…
On Monday and Tuesday this week, I wrote about how the number of people employed in Minnesota has been falling since June. This is bad news. As I noted in…
Childcare is in a crisis. While employment in most sectors has returned to pre-pandemic levels, the same is not true for childcare. Nationally, over 100,000 workers are still missing from…
Despite the rosy reports of new jobs carried by Minnesota’s media, when we look at the number of people actually employed in our state, that number has fallen by 27,700…
Despite being one of the most expensive places for housing in the country, New York City has done very little, if anything, to reform its strictly regulated housing market. Instead,…
Minnesota’s media carried the following stories last week: Twin Cities Business: Minnesota Unemployment Rate Inched up to 2.1% In October Pioneer Press: Minnesota added 17,000 more jobs in October, the…
State and local taxes and spending West Central Tribune: Litchfield school bond referendum fails, but operating levies pass in Hancock, Paynesville Pioneer Press: Real World Economics: Structural or cyclical in…
“What I shall argue”, writes Lorenzo Forni in The Magic Money Tree, “is that the main principles of economics remain unchanged; it is only the circumstances in which they operate…
Over 100,000 employed workers stayed out of work in October due to issues with childcare, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). This is over double the amount during…
If you cleared $1,661 in your semi-monthly paycheck on November 1, 2021 (the take home for the average salary in Minnesota), then, thanks to inflation, you would need to clear…
While writing a recent post about how Minnesota’s economic growth is below average, I was struck by the diverging post-COVID-19 growth rates of our neighbors. As Figure 1 shows, from…
Sam Bankman-Fried, founder of bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, donated to both Minnesota Rep. Angie Craig and Sen. Tina Smith this election cycle. According to records at the Federal Election Commission…