Category: Economy

BLM’s Leaders Used Charitable Funds to Enrich Themselves and Their Families, New Documents Show

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Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation (BLMGNF) has paid out millions in contracts to insiders, newly released tax documents show.

The nation’s largest BLM organization approved lucrative contracts to firms owned by members of the organization’s leadership and their family members between July 2022 and June 2023, tax filings show. The shuffling of charitable funds to private companies owned by interested parties raises considerable ethical concerns given the lack of oversight and the possible conflicts of interest, experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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Department of Transportation Estimates Cost of $1.7 Billion to Rebuild Baltimore Bridge

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Francis Scott Key Bridge

Following the long-awaited reopening of the federal channel in the Port of Baltimore after the infamous shipping accident in March, the Biden Administration’s Department of Transportation (DOT) estimates that it will cost between $1.7 billion and $1.9 billion to rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge.

As ABC News reports, the work to remove debris from the collapsed bridge and the damaged vessel culminated in the reopening of the McHenry Federal Channel to a passage of about 700 feet wide and 500 feet deep, allowing traffic to flow through the harbor once again. Workers will continue removing debris within an established safety zone, and deep draft vessels are required to have a single-escort tug until the cleanup work is completed.

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Saudi Arabia and U.S. Mum as 50-Year Petro-Dollar Agreement Expires

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Joe Biden and MBS Petro Dollar

On Sunday, with no official statement from either side, Saudi Arabia apparently allowed a deal with the U.S. to expire that could have dire financial ramifications.

The Kingdom reportedly did not renew its 50-year petro-dollar agreement with the United States when it expired on June 9, meaning Saudi Arabia can now sell its oil in other currencies, including the Chinese renminbi (RMB), Euros, Yen, and Yuan, instead of exclusively in U.S. dollars. According to reports, the use of digital currencies like Bitcoin is also being considered.

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Georgia’s Cobb and Gwinnett Counties Voters to Decide Transit Tax on November 5

The Center Square
Cobb County Bus

Voters in two metro Atlanta counties will decide on a tax to support transit when they head to the polls for November’s presidential election.

On Tuesday, Cobb County commissioners voted 3-2 to place the 1% 30-year Mobility SPLOST on the Nov. 5 General Election ballot. Officials previously said a 1% SPLOST could generate $10.9 billion in tax revenue for the county over 30 years.

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Ford Drops Certain Equipment Requirements for EVs as Sales Continue to Struggle

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Electric Mustang

Ford Motor Company told dealers on Thursday that it was dropping certain equipment requirements to boost the sales of its struggling electric vehicle (EV) line, according to Bloomberg.

Dealers had previously needed to invest up to $1.2 million in certain equipment like chargers in order to be eligible to sell Ford’s EV line, with the change allowing all 2,800 dealerships with contracts to the company to sell EVs, according to Bloomberg. The changes to the program are intended to boost struggling sales of Ford’s EV models, which has contributed to the automaker taking a $1.3 billion loss on its EV production in just the first quarter of 2024 after selling only 10,000 vehicles.

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$12.5 Million in Water Investments Announced in Arizona

The Center Square
Glen Canyon Dam

Arizona will be getting millions more in federal taxpayer dollars for water infrastructure projects.

The $12.445 million in investment will be going to Glen Canyon Dam outlet works, Bypass Drain O&M Access Road Repairs and Deer Island Backwater Infrastructure Replacement. Nearly $9 million of those funds is going to Glen Canyon for “recoating” steel pipes, valves, and gates, according to a news release. The Glen Canyon Dam reportedly has major issues involving the infrastructure that is being funded for repair, as it could impact how it functions, according to the Associated Press in April.

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Biden’s Ambitious EV Charging ‘Fantasy’ May Be on a Collision Course with Reality

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President Biden observing EV charing station demonstration

President Joe Biden has pledged to install 500,000 public electric vehicle (EV) chargers around the U.S. by 2030, but logistical hurdles may be too much to overcome.

The Biden administration landed $7.5 billion to build out a network of public EV charging stations around the country in the bipartisan infrastructure package of 2021, but those funds have only led to a handful of operational charging stations to date. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg reaffirmed the administration’s goal to build 500,000 chargers with the money by 2030 during a May television appearance on CBS News, but challenges like adding transmission lines, navigating the permitting process and coordinating with utility companies figure to make the goal improbable.

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Former Atlanta Assistant City Attorney Sentenced to Prison for PPP Fraud

The Center Square
Shelitha Robertson

A federal judge has sentenced a former assistant Atlanta city attorney to prison following her conviction on charges she fraudulently applied for and received Paycheck Protection Program loans.

In December, a jury convicted Shelitha Robertson, 62, of Atlanta, of one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, one count of money laundering and three counts of wire fraud. U.S. District Judge Steven D. Grimberg sentenced Robertson to seven years and three months in prison followed by three years of supervised release.

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Commentary: The CFPB Attacks the Credit Card Rewards Programs Consumers Want

RealClearWire
Consumer using a credit card

Unsurprisingly, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s recent report on Credit Card Rewards is dismissive of programs that are popular with tens of millions of American households. However, its objections manifest the same sort of deceptive advertising and hiding of details that it complains are characteristic of credit card rewards, and the data in its report does not match the conclusions its director, Rohit Chopra, has made in his statement about the report as well as his testimony before Congress on the issue.

The CFPB’s press release announcing the Credit Cards Rewards: Issue Spotlight report denigrated rewards programs, alleging that “Consumers tell the CFPB that rewards are often devalued or denied even after program terms are met;” that “Consumers who carry revolving balances often pay far more in interest and fees than they get back on rewards;” and that “Credit card companies often use rewards programs as a ‘bait and switch’ by burying terms in vague language or fine print.”

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Analysis: RCM/TIPP Economic Index Slumps Again

RealClearWire

The RealClearMarkets/TIPP Economic Optimism Index, a leading gauge of consumer sentiment, dropped sharply 3.1 percent in June to 40.5. Since September 2021, the index has remained in negative territory for 34 consecutive months. June’s reading of 40.5 is 17.6 percent lower than the historic average of 49.2.

Optimism among investors edged up 0.4 percent from 46.3 in May to 46.5 in June, while it slumped by 6.0 percent among non-investors, from 40.1 in May to 37.7 in June.

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Next Tennessee Budget Accounts for Drop in Tax and Use Collections

The Center Square
Governor Bill Lee

Tennessee has $144 million for education freedom scholarships that won’t be spent and will deposit an additional $100 million in the budget set to go into place for July 1.

Sycamore Institute, a non-partisan public policy research institute, recently published an analysis of what changed from Gov. Bill Lee’s initial proposed budget to the $52.8 billion budget that passed the Tennessee Legislature.

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Full-Time Jobs Vanish While Americans Race to Take Up Part-Time Work

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Door Dash

Americans took up part-time jobs in huge numbers in May as full-time jobs evaporate under President Joe Biden’s economy, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released Friday.

There were around 133.3 million people employed in the U.S. in May with full-time jobs, 625,000 less than the month before, while the number of people employed in part-time jobs surged by 286,000 to just over 28 million, according to the BLS. The total number of American workers collapsed by 408,000 as a result of the loss in part-time jobs to 161 million.

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CEOs’ Pay Increases in 2023 Widen Income Gap with Workers

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CEO Pay

The average salary for a company’s chief executive officer (CEO) soared by 13% in 2023, thus producing an even greater income gap between top executives and the workers they employ.

According to ABC News, a data analysis by Equilar for the Associated Press revealed that the median compensation package for a CEO rose in 2023 to $16.3 million, marking a 12.6% increase. At the same time, wages and benefits for the average worker rose by just 4.1%. At half of the companies included in the Equilar survey, it would take one worker at least 200 years to make the same amount of money that their CEO makes.

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Congressional Report Finds Half of All New Jobs are Going to Immigrants

Just the News
Staff Meeting

The House Budget Committee released a report Friday that found more than half of all new jobs are going to immigrants, including those in the country illegally.

The report comes after the Labor Department released its jobs report for May, which saw a small decrease in labor participation, which shrank from 62.7% in April to 62.5% in May, and the unemployment rate ticking up slightly from 3.9% in April to 4% in May. Immigrants have filled 840,000 new jobs since November, according to the Washington Times.

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Unemployment Ticks Up as Job Growth Beats Expectations

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Office Meeting

The U.S. added 272,000 nonfarm payroll jobs in May as the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.0%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data released Friday.

Economists anticipated that the country would add 190,000 jobs in May compared to the 175,000 jobs that were added in initial estimates for April and that the unemployment rate would remain unchanged at 3.9%, according to U.S. News and World Report. The job gains follow predictions that the economy is slowing down, with an early estimate for second-quarter gross domestic product (GDP) being revised down to 1.8% from 4.2% over the last month by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.

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Georgia Approves $16.9 Million in Loans and Grants for Transportation Projects

The Center Square
Georgia Freeway Construction

Georgia officials approved $16.9 million in loans and grants for five transportation infrastructure projects across the state

Republican Gov. Brian Kemp and the State Road and the Tollway Authority Board of Directors approved the funding from the Georgia Transportation Infrastructure Bank. The latest round of funding includes the fourth-largest loan amount in the program’s history.

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Commentary: Corporate Media Desperately Wants People to Ignore This Alarming Factoid in Newest Jobs Report

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Stressed Worker

Ignore the May jobs report‘s topline establishment survey number and the media’s celebratory reporting. It’s not to be trusted.

A new analysis by the Daily Caller News Foundation shows that payrolls were overstated by 1.3 million last year after accounting for the constant downward revisions. A new Bloomberg Economics report finds monthly job gains were overstated by 730,000 last year. Bloomberg says a surge of business closures is to blame.

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Pennsylvania Zoning Restrictions Debated in Committee Hearing

The Center Square
Home Construction

When questions on land use arise in the General Assembly, Pennsylvania politicians play a game of role reversal. Republicans, generally quicker to defend the free market, stand up for local government control, while Democrats tell of the virtues of the market at work and the dangers of government heavy-handedness.

So it was in the House Local Government Committee hearing on Wednesday as Democratic Rep. Josh Siegel, D-Allentown, proposed the removal of zoning restrictions and Republican Reps. Jack Rader, R-Effort, and R. Lee James, R-Seneca, defended the power of zoning officials.

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Georgia Committees to Explore Forest Innovation, Farmland Preservation, and Tree Safety

The Center Square
Georgia Forest

Several Georgia study committees will explore various agricultural issues facing the Peach State, including the potential impact of sustainable aviation fuel.

The Senate Advancing Forest Innovation in Georgia Study Committee, created by Senate Resolution 786, will examine how public policy can encourage continued investment in facilities that create sustainable manufacturing components, practices, energy sources and other high-demand products derived from Georgia’s forest products.

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PJM Needs More Electricity to Meet 2040 Estimates in 13 States

The Center Square
Transformer

While demand for electricity is set to significantly increase by 2040, planning is not in place to increase electricity production to meet those estimates, according to a new report from Clean Energy Grid related to PJM Interconnection.

PJM coordinates wholesale energy movement for 65 million people through parts or all of Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia.

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Pennsylvania Democrat Claims Buying Israel Bonds Risky Due to Gaza War, Hackers

Tom Pappert
Eric McClelland

Erin McClelland, the Democratic nominee to become the next Pennsylvania Treasurer, raised concerns about foreign policy, credit worthiness and hackers to explain why she would not use state money to buy Israel Bonds in remarks published Tuesday.

McClelland won her party’s nomination after establishing herself the only candidate opposed to Pennsylvania Treasurer Stacy Garrity’s decision to purchase $20 million in Israel Bonds, and in remarks to the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, claimed Garrity and other Republicans are inappropriately taking sides in a foreign conflict while neglecting financial and security ris

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Lithium Mining Research Center Opens in Arizona

The Center Square
Paul Lloyd

A lithium company celebrated the opening of a new research center in Tempe last week.

Arizona Lithium, which is hoping to further the “The Big Sandy” lithium mining project in northwestern Arizona, opened the center intending to research “extraction of lithium” methods for the local deposit as well as the Prairie Project in Canada, according to a news release from the Arizona Commerce Authority.

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Vast Majority of Small Business Owners Worried Biden’s Economy Will Force Them to Close

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A large portion of small business owners are concerned about their future amid wider financial stress under President Joe Biden, according to a new poll from the Job Creators Network Foundation (JCNF) obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Around 67 percent of small business owners were worried that current economic conditions could force them to close their doors, ten percentage points higher than just two years ago, according to the JCNF’s monthly small business poll. Respondents’ perceptions of economic conditions for their own businesses fell slightly in the month, from 70.2 to 68.1 points, with 100 points being the best possible business conditions, while perceptions of national conditions increased from 50.4 to 53.2 points.

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Commentary: The Consequences of Delaying Offshore Oil and Gas Lease Sales

RealClearWire
Offshore oil rig

Offshore drilling has been a cornerstone of global energy production since the 1800s, fueling the American way of life and powering the global economy. From the early days of “on-water-drilling” to the advancement of the fixed platform units of today, offshore drilling has consistently contributed around 30 percent of global oil production. In the U.S., supply on federal offshore lands in the Gulf of Mexico alone accounts for approximately 15 percent of total crude oil production.

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Commentary: Globalists are Deceiving the Masses in an Age of Fakes

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Justin Trudeau

Given the constant stream of Hollywood end-of-the-world calamity blockbuster movies, many are generally distracted from the real-life disaster scenarios we face. The globalists are advancing their evil agenda at every turn, and time is running short to effectively oppose them. They are the real existential threat facing humanity.

This is the threat of an idealization of fake foundations. It begs the question: will our historical era be remembered as the “age of fakes?” We live in an ecosystem filled with fake news, fake policies, fake freedoms, and fake outrage, among many other “fakes.”

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Economist: ‘True’ Federal Debt Masked by Draining U.S. Treasury

The Center Square
Janet Yellen

The federal debt continues to climb to unprecedented levels, but the “actual, true” debt is higher if the Treasury weren’t being drained, a national economist says.

Citing Bureau of the Fiscal Service data, E. J. Antoni, Ph.D., an economist at the Heritage Foundation, argues that as the federal debt increases, the “true daily deficit” is being masked by the amount of cash being drained from the U.S. Treasury by Treasury Department Secretary Janet Yellen.

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Commentary: Vaccine Mandates Likely Exacerbated Healthcare Worker Shortage, New Research Shows

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tired medical staff

In his book Economics in One Lesson, Henry Hazlitt makes a famous distinction between good and bad economists:

The bad economist sees only what immediately strikes the eye; the good economist also looks beyond. The bad economist sees only the direct consequences of a proposed course; the good economist looks also at the longer and indirect consequences. The bad economist sees only what the effect of a given policy has been or will be on one particular group; the good economist inquires also what the effect of the policy will be on all groups.

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Three Tennessee Cities Among Top 20 Places Most Americans are Moving to, Report Says

Peter D'Abrosca

A report from POD, the moving and storage company, says that three cities in Tennessee are among the top 20 in America where people are moving. 

“We’re seeing more people move to the Southern Appalachian region, which includes states like North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama,” the report said. “Tennessee tied with Florida for the third most popular state for new moves.”

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Companies Scale Back Pride Month After Last Year’s Public Response Cost Them Millions

Just the News
Starbucks

June 1 will mark the start of “Pride” month, in which advocates of LGBTQIA+ causes celebrate that movement. In recent years, June has seen major corporate chains feature an array of “Pride”-themed merchandise and decorations, though some offerings have prompted considerable backlash from a non-receptive — even hostile public — in recent years.

2023 saw major retailers such as Target become the subject of boycotts over more controversial products marketed for children. Other companies, such as Anheuser-Busch came under scrutiny over marketing campaigns that failed to resonate with their traditional clientele.

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New Report Details Just How Much Regulations Under Biden Have Cost Average Americans

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Joe Biden

The Biden administration has set in motion a wave of new regulations that have already cost the U.S. more than $1 trillion, which equates to thousands of dollars per family, according to a new report from the Job Creators Network.

There have been $1.6 trillion in costs imposed from a total of 923 new federal regulations that have been finalized under President Joe Biden, with $1.2 trillion of those being put in place in just the past few months, according to the JCN. In just the first two years of the Biden administration, new regulations are estimated to have led to an average of almost $10,000 in added future and present costs to American households, which could jump to $60,000 if the trend continues across a two-term presidency.

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China’s Electric Vehicle Giant Claims to Have New Hybrid That Runs American Automakers Off the Road

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BYD Car

China’s largest electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer, BYD, announced Tuesday that two of its new hybrid models have ranges that far exceed those of American competitors, The Wall Street Journal reported.

BYD’s chairman Wang Chuanfu claimed at an event in Xian, China, that the company was launching two new hybrid models that could go 2,100 kilometers, or 1,306 miles, on a single tank of gas and a full charge, according to the WSJ. The range is almost double the range of global hybrid competitors, which is around 1,100 km, or 683 miles, at the upper limit, and far exceeds the 700-mile range achieved by America’s longest-driving hybrid in 2023, the Lexus ES 300h.

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Home Prices Under Biden Hit Yet Another All-Time High

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Home prices surged in March to another all-time high for the sixth month out of the last twelve, S&P Global announced Tuesday.

The Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index, which measures home prices across the entire country, rose 6.5 percent year-over-year in March, matching the annual gain in February, according to S&P Global. The increase in the price of homes is higher than the general pace of inflation, which increased 3.4 percent year-over-year in April.

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Tennessee U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett Slams Department of Energy over Use of Strategic Oil Supply

Tom Pappert
Rep Tim Burchett

U.S. Representative Tim Burchett (R-TN-02) declared Biden administration Department of Energy Secretary Granholm either “ignorant” or “a liar” during a Sunday interview after previously sparring with her in a U.S. House Oversight committee meeting over the Biden administration’s decision to release part of the country’s strategic oil supply.

Burchett previously confronted Granholm on May 23 over the Biden administration’s oil and energy policies, as well as its recent decision to release part of its strategic oil supply ahead of the Independence Day holiday on July 4, and told Katie Smith of One America News Network (OANN) that Granholm is “either ignorant or she’s a liar.”

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Tennessee FastTrack Grants $21.7M to Reach 21 Businesses

The Center Square
State Funding Board

Tennessee has handed out $21.7 million in FastTrack business incentive grants so far this year through April to a total of 21 businesses.

The Department of Economic and Community Development’s FastTrack grant program are state grants sent to companies to help offset the costs of expanding or moving into the state with the goal of increasing the number of full-time jobs and the average wages of jobs available in an area.

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Pennsylvania House Passes Bill Offering Tax Credits to Businesses Covering Employee Child Care

Tom Pappert
Pennsylvania Sate Rep. Morgan Cephas with Pennsylvania State Rep. Liz Hanbig (composite image)

The Pennsylvania House of Representatives approved legislation that would provide tax credits to businesses that cover childcare costs for employees, with employers able to offset up to 30 percent of the costs.

HB 1958, also known as Incentivizing Employer Contributions to Employee Childcare, passed the Pennsylvania House last Wednesday with 155 votes in favor and 47 against.

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Maricopa County Homeless Population Sees Small Decline

The Center Square
Homeless Camp

The annual point-in-time count of homeless conducted by the Maricopa Association of Governments presented stabilized news for the county.

The count that took place in January 2024 determined that there are 9,435 people who are experiencing homelessness in the county, 57% of which are sheltered and 43% are unsheltered. This figure was a 2% decline from 2023, which marked 9,642 people as homeless. When broken down, there was a 17% decline from 2023 in unsheltered and a 13% increase in those who were sheltered.

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KC Fed Analysis: Migrants Cooled Overheated Labor Market, Slowed Wage Growth

The Center Square
Farm Workers

The increase of migrant workers during the last two years cooled an overheated labor market and slowed wage growth across industries and states, according to an analysis of government statistics.

“The influx of immigrant workers appears to have helped alleviate the severe staffing shortages in certain industries that were pervasive during the pandemic’s volatile period,” Elior Cohen, an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, wrote in the organization’s Economic Bulletin. It serves Colorado, Kansas, western Missouri, Nebraska, northern New Mexico, Oklahoma and Wyoming.

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Release from Gasoline Reserve Raises Doubts Biden will Replenish the Strategic Petroleum Reserve

Just the News
U.S. Oil and Gas Reserves

The Biden Administration announced Tuesday that it would release 42 million gallons of gasoline from the Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve. The release, the Department of Energy explained, is “strategically timed and structured to maximize its impact on gas prices.” This will, according to the DOE, help lower prices at the pump during the summer months when prices tend to go up along with demand.

The Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve was created in 2012 following Superstorm Sandy, which damaged two refineries and shut down 40 terminals in New York Harbor. Some New York gas stations went as long as 30 days without a supply of gasoline as a result of the supply disruption. The Obama administration established the gas reserve to prevent such a shock from happening again.

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