The SunBreak » economy

Seattle Takes Light Rail Train to Job Growth

Michael van Baker — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 15:30:34 +0000

In a related Reuters story, APTA spotlights Seattle, "where transit rides rose 11.8 percent over the year as the metropolitan area added more than 30,000 jobs." From January 2012 to January 2013, the state of Washington added some 65,800 jobs (98 percent of which were in the private sector), with the unemployment rate now holding steady at around 7.5 percent statewide, 6.3 percent in Seattle.

Reading “Turbulence,” Keith Hennessy’s Dance About the Economy

Michael van Baker — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 00:18:44 +0000

The "only nonimprovised piece in the show" is the building of a human pyramid, with the performers and volunteer audience members stripped down to underwear or nudity. They have hoods made of a shiny gold cloth on. Given that "Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine" are the first five words in Hennessy's program note, it would be difficult not to see a reference to Abu Ghraib here.

Richard Florida’s “Seattle Boomtown” Source? Seattle Times Columnist Jon Talton

Michael van Baker — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 17:16:31 +0000

Florida emailed Talton for more background, all featured in his Atlantic Cities post, but the upshot is this: "Today, Seattle provides a good example of the back-to-the-downtown trend that is reshaping cities across the United States as workers relocate to formerly neglected urban cores that offer transit, walkability, and central location."

Washington Federal’s Roy Whitehead on Banking, Public Trust, and Regulations

Michael van Baker — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:22:12 +0000

Whitehead's point deserves underscoring because it illustrates reason for economic optimism. Investors may well be "once bitten, twice shy," but investor psychology can turn on a dime, much faster than can institutions with serious structural weaknesses. Not that winning back trust will be--or should be--easy. "If I could wave a magic wand," admitted Whitehead, "I would bring back Glass-Steagall--or something like it."

Washington’s Unemployment Rate & Economic Outlook, October/November Edition

Michael van Baker — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 20:22:17 +0000

Here's a riddle for you. Washington State's unemployment rate is tracked to the tenth of a percentage point (though whether the data supports that level of precision is arguable). It has "fallen" for seven out of ten months in 2011, yet in January the (preliminary) rate was 9.1 percent and in October it was 9.0. Is this a new instance of Zeno's Paradox?

Washington State Economy’s Upside and Downside Risks Grow

Michael van Baker — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 18:20:22 +0000

The Grand Hyatt conference room was packed with Puget Sound Business Journal readers who, if they sympathized with Ray Davis's optimism, also have had their expectations tempered by the experiences of the past several years. Yet the takeaway was that while double-dip recession risks have risen, at the same time, so have recovery "risks," due to the length of time people have cut back on spending. At some indefinable point, the dam is going to break.