April 2020 Posts

Amid continuing controversy over some of the companies receiving federal financial assistance under the Paycheck Protection Program, a new website launched today makes it easier to see the accountability track records of companies getting help through the PPP and the other programs authorized by the massive CARES Act.

Good Jobs First – a non-profit, non-partisan research center focusing on economic development accountability – today published the second half of a 13-state report “Putting State Pension Costs in Context.” The report found that Colorado, Georgia, Louisiana, Missouri, South Carolina, Texas, and Vermont together spend more than $17 billion per year in development subsidies and tax breaks for corporations, about five times the states’ yearly pension obligations.

It was only a few days ago that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced that nursing homes will be required to notify residents and their families when coronavirus cases have been discovered in a facility.

The global COVID-19 pandemic has created an associated economic crisis as many businesses have been forced to close because of lack of demand (travel, for example) or social distancing (too many to list). With predictions of a possible 32% unemployment rate in the United States, how does the response to the economic crisis here compare with those of other countries?

Like everything else, economic development is adapting to a new reality. Some states and localities are making special efforts to help small businesses to stay afloat, yet at the same time some of the worst giveaways to large companies are continuing as if the global public health emergency and the national financial crisis were not happening.