Here’s a chart to help put the latest local unemployment statistics in perspective: You can see that yes, unemployment reached yet another record high in March. However, the good news is that the rate of increase in the unemployment rate has slowed significantly. For the last six months or so the unemployment rate had been…
Month: April 2009
Mid-Week Open Thread (2009-04-15)
Here is your open thread for the mid-week on April 15th, 2009. You may post random links and off-topic discussions here. Also, if you have an idea or a topic you’d like to see covered in an article, please make it known. Be sure to also check out the forums, and get your word in…
Study: So What if Boeing Does Leave the Puget Sound?
The Puget Sound Business Journal posts today about an interesting study just released by the Washington Alliance for a Competitive Economy: What if Boeing Left Washington? (pdf) The report explores the effects of both an immediate withdrawal of Boeing in 2013 and a 10-year phased withdrawal from 2013 to 2022. In addition to estimating the…
Plummetting Real Estate Excise Tax Revenue Drags on City, State
According to a pair of reports released yesterday, the real estate slowdown is still a serious drag on state and local revenues, thanks to significant sagging in real estate excise tax collections. From the latest state revenue collection report (pdf): Collections [for the March 11, 2009 – April 10, 2009 collection period] were $8.7 million…
Local First-Hand Journal of the Custom Home-Building Process
I had the pleasure of speaking with Mike Davidson (founder and CEO of Newsvine) at last week’s No News is Bad News event. During our conversation, he alerted me to an excellent blog that he has been updating since October 2007 in which he is chronicling his journey to build a custom home: A House…