Biz bankruptcies decline in Bergen and Passaic counties
JANUARY 29, 2015 LAST UPDATED: THURSDAY, JANUARY 29, 2015, 1:21 AM
BY HUGH R. MORLEY
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
* Business filings in Bergen, Passaic at lowest since 2007
A decline in the number of business bankruptcies in Bergen and Passaic counties from 2013 to 2014 has left New Jersey with its lowest level of business bankruptcy since the recession started at the end of 2007, federal figures show.
Business bankruptcies fell by 13 percent in Bergen and 30 percent in Passaic, according to figures released by the U.S. District Bankruptcy Court in New Jersey. Figures for the state show the business bankruptcy level as a whole nearly the same in 2014 as it was the previous year.
Figures for the state and the two counties now show there were fewer bankruptcies in 2014 than at any time since 2007, the year the recession began in December.
The number of consumer bankruptcies provides a less positive picture, however. Although Bergen, Passaic and New Jersey as a whole saw a fall in the number of consumer bankruptcies, they remain well above the 2007 figure.
Bankruptcy attorneys differed in their assessment of what the data say about the economy, and what is driving the figures.
New Jersey and You : Cop tells NJ teens to stop seeking snow shoveling jobs
JANUARY 28, 2015, 7:23 AM LAST UPDATED: WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 28, 2015, 7:23 AM
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BOUND BROOK, N.J. (AP) — Two enterprising teens who were looking to make some money shoveling snow ran afoul of a New Jersey town’s ordinance and were told by police to stop.
Matt Molinari and Eric Schnepf were handing out fliers in Bound Brook during a winter storm on Monday night.
Police Chief Michael Jannone tells the Courier News of Bridgewater (https://mycj.co/1Bnuw6s ) a resident reported a suspicious person.
NJ’s annual job growth slow, with some bright spots
JANUARY 23, 2015 LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY, JANUARY 23, 2015, 1:21 AM
BY HUGH R. MORLEY
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
* State’s growth trails well behind nation’s
Four years after New Jersey reached its post-recession employment low, figures released Thursday show the state’s economic recovery continues to be slow.
The state added a modest 29,000 jobs in 2014, leaving employment far below its pre-recession peak and lower even than the level 14 years ago, according to the monthly employment report released by the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development.
The report showed New Jersey shed 400 jobs last month, even as national employment forged ahead strongly, adding 252,000 jobs in December. And although the state’s jobless rate dropped from 6.4 percent to 6.2 percent, it remains above the national figure of 5.6 percent.
The report, nevertheless, contained some positive elements, including the fact that the state added more jobs in 2014 than the previous year, despite the loss of thousands of casino jobs in Atlantic City, a very harsh winter and the lingering effects of Superstorm Sandy.
“It was a sustained, moderate pace of growth,” said Patrick O’Keefe, director of economic research at the accounting firm CohnReznick.
CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER/DIRECTOR OF PARKING UTILITY
Village of Ridgewood, Bergen County is searching for a position of Chief Financial Officer/Director of Parking Utility. The successful candidate shall have a minimum of 5 years’ experience as a New Jersey municipal CFO, a Bachelor’s degree in accounting or finance from an accredited college and must possess a valid certification as a Chief Municipal Financial Officer issued by the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs. In addition, in overseeing the Parking Utility, will be responsible for strategic planning; cost/revenue optimization and working with a changing paradigm of parking in the Village, resulting in improved controls and increased resident, business, and visitor satisfaction. Send cover letter detailing experience and qualifications, resume and salary history to: Sharyn Matthews, Senior Human Resources Professional, Village of Ridgewood, 131 North Maple Ave., Ridgewood, NJ 07451; or email to [email protected].
Rep. Scott Garrett (NJ-05) :Mr President stop creating jobs at the IRS
january 21,2015
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rep. Scott Garrett (NJ-05) issued the following statement tonight after President Obama delivered his State of the Union address to Congress:
“As outlined in tonight’s speech, President Obama is pressing hard to continue to advance his ideological agenda at the expense of our economy. The president talks about bringing in ‘more revenue’ and ‘investing’ it. But you and I both know that this is a fancy way of saying he wants to tax you more so he can spend more.
“The answer isn’t higher taxes; it’s about creating more jobs. It’s time for the president to stop creating jobs at the IRS and get out of the way of the job creators in New Jersey and the rest of America. The first step in this process is working with Congress to enact real, meaningful tax reform that will lower rates, simplify the code, and close special-interest loopholes.
“Given the recent election, it’s clear that the American people are eager to get our economy back on track. They want to be rewarded for their hard work and ingenuity, they want to maximize their opportunities so they can get ahead, and they want to forge a better future for themselves and their families. Republicans in the House and Senate are in total agreement with this plan and fully expect the president to help us achieve it.
“Although we are only three weeks into the new Congress, my colleagues and I in the House have already shown that we are serious about working together to make positive changes. We have advanced several bipartisan bills that will allow Americans to find better paying jobs, help American businesses to grow, and put more money back in American taxpayers’ pockets.
“It’s time to put aside partisan politics and advance public policies that help poor and middle class Americans, not those who curry favoritism in Washington. Mr. President, join us.”
JANUARY 17, 2015 LAST UPDATED: SATURDAY, JANUARY 17, 2015, 1:21 AM
BY MELANIE ANZIDEI
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
* New Jersey’s fourth-quarter figures buck the national trends
Venture capitalists invested $320 million in New Jersey companies last year, a decline of $2 million from the previous year and an extension of a downturn in investments in the state that began in 2008. The falloff is in marked contrast to a surge in VC investing nationally that rose to its highest level in 2014 since the end of the dot-com period.
Investments in the Garden State have dropped by about $400 million since the recession, with the drop slowing in recent years, according to a report released Friday.
During the fourth quarter, about $51.9 million was put into 11 deals in New Jersey, a more than $100 million drop from the quarter prior. Only one of last quarter’s deals included a North Jersey company. Teleservices Solutions Holdings LLC, a telecommunications company in Montvale, received $540,000 early-stage investment.
Investors poured the most money into New Jersey’s medical devices and equipment industry. Venture capitalists invested $22.4 million in the state’s medical device industry during the fourth quarter. For the full year, that sector had nearly $81.7 million in investments, making it the most-invested industry in New Jersey last year.
The retail and distribution sector was second with $80 million invested last year. Biotechnology, which has held such promise for job growth in the state, was third with $41.6 million in investments by year’s end.
Eying a White House bid, New Jersey’s Chris Christie faces economic challenges at home
NEWARK, N.J. — As he casts his eye toward a potential presidential bid, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie must also take on some work at home. First up: a statewide address expected to touch on nagging economic issues that could complicate his political plans.
Observers expect Christie to use his fifth State of the State address on Tuesday to define his tenure as governor on his own terms, while not missing the chance to articulate his rationale for a potential run for president. (Minneapolis Star Tribune)
More expected to flee New Jersey as baby boomers age
For Raymond Francisco, landing a job at the General Motors auto plant in Linden at 25 years old was like winning the lottery.
The New Brunswick native was a welder by trade, and enjoyed working hard for the good money he made at the plant. But when GM announced in 2002 it would close the factory — about six years after he started — Francisco decided he had to go where the jobs were.
That meant packing up his wife, two small children and moving to Lordstown, Ohio, where GM offered him another job at an assembly plant.
People are leaving New Jersey at a higher rate than 47 other states, just behind New York, which is No. 1, and Illinois, according to James Hughes, a demographer and dean of the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. (Kachmar/Asbury Park Press)
The economy added 252,000 jobs in December, down from 353,000 in November. With GDP growth slowing, prospects for jobless Americans are worsening.
The unemployment rate fell to 5.6 percent, but only because so many working age Americans quit looking for work and are no longer counted in the official jobless tally. If the same percentage of adults were in the labor force today as when Presidents Obama took office, the jobless rate would be about 9.9 percent
The Administration alibis Baby Boom retirements are driving down adult participation. However, nearly one in six men between ages 25 and 54 — too old for college and too young to retire — are jobless. Many are simply sitting at home watching ESPN, playing video games and relying on relatives, friends and government benefits for support.
The Obama recovery has managed only 2.3 percent GDP annual growth, and the economy has added only 6.4 million new jobs on his watch. Whereas during the Reagan recovery, the pace of economic growth was 4.8 percent, and 9.5 million jobs were added through the end of his sixth year.
America has not lost its capacity to innovate and create new products and industries but in a globalized economy, poor government policies block Americans from playing their strengths.
The nation still enjoys strong comparative advantages in manufacturing, but President Obama refuses to confront China, Japan and Germany about exchange rate and monetary policies that purposefully undervalue their currencies and artificially underprice their exports. And now it seems the president is intent on jamming through congress new free trade agreements that would further open U.S. markets to foreign competition, while countenancing continued currency manipulation and mercantilism abroad.
Restrictions on offshore drilling and onshore pipeline construction continue unnecessary U.S. dependence on foreign oil, divert billions of consumer dollars abroad and rob Americans of millions of jobs.
The cost of hiring workers is greatly increased by Obamacare health insurance mandates, minimum wages above the federal standard in 29 states and needlessly cumbersome business regulations. Along with threats of government-inspired litigation, those accelerate automation.
Amazon recently purchased Kiva Systems, which makes robots that will permit it to eliminate thousands of jobs at its fulfillment warehouses. Those systems are already at retailers including Crate and Barrel and Gap.
Administration polices have encouraged monopolization in key industries that are major contributors to the Democratic machine — greatly slowing growth and jobs creation.
Dodd-Frank lending regulations have proven too costly for smaller banks, and many have sold out to larger banks. Deposits are even more concentrated among “too big to fail” Wall Street banks, who often are not much interested in lending to Main Street businesses and homebuyers.
Cable companies enjoy considerable freedom to raise Internet and TV rates, and have taken the profits to acquire media companies and other businesses instead of enhancing service. For example, Comcast, whose CEO often hosts Obama fundraisers, has used monopoly profits from high cable rates to purchase NBC, where it underwrites political activists like Al Sharpton, instead of investing in systems that could raise Internet speeds and support more web-based businesses.
Major airlines, which are well represented in Washington, have consolidated to individually lock up many inter-city routes. Instead of passing along lower fuel prices by trimming ticket prices and adding flights, airline shareholders and employees are feasting on windfall gains. American Airlines is urging its pilots to accept a union contract that raises pay more than 20 percent — more than arbitrators awarded.
Obama’s lax immigration enforcement and amnesty are increasing competition for jobs. A study by the Center for Immigration Studies, released last June, found foreign born workers are taking the lion share of new jobs, especially those going to prime working age adults between the ages of 16 and 65.
Those forces combine to push down wages. Average family income, adjusted for inflation, has fallen from about $57,000 in 2000 to $52,000.
Peter Morici is an economist and business professor at the University of Maryland, and a national columnist. He tweets @pmorici1
A record 92,898,000 Americans 16 years and older did not participate in the labor force last month, according to data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The BLS defines people not in the work force as people 16 years and up who are not employed and haven’t “made specific efforts to find employment sometime during the 4-week period ending with the reference week.” The labor force participation rate — or the “The labor force as a percent of the civilian noninstitutional population” — also dipped back down to 62.7 percent, from 62.9 percent in November.
September also saw a labor force participation rate of 62.7 percent, however prior to then, the last time the rate hit 62.7 percent was in February of 1978.
While the level of labor force participation declined — due not only to potentially discouraged workers but also baby boomers hitting retirement age — the BLS reported Friday that in December the unemployment rate declined to 5.6 percent and payroll jobs increased by 252,000.
“Today’s solid employment report caps off a strong year for the U.S. labor market, which achieved a number of important milestones in 2014,” Jason Furman, Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, said in a statement. “Total job growth last year was the strongest since 1999, while the unemployment rate fell at the fastest pace in three decades.”
Lure of the South takes a toll on corporate NJ; new demographics, globalization play roles
JANUARY 7, 2015, 11:36 PM LAST UPDATED: THURSDAY, JANUARY 8, 2015, 6:28 AM
BY HUGH R. MORLEY
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
Forty-five years after New Jersey’s manufacturing industry began its decline, as companies started moving their factories to the South, there are signs that the state’s corporate sector may be going the same route.
Tuesday’s announcement by Mercedes-Benz USA that it plans to move its corporate headquarters from Montvale to metro Atlanta followed similar announcements in the last 18 months by Hertz of Park Ridge, which moved to Florida’s Gulf Coast, and Sealed Air of Elmwood Park, which is moving to Charlotte, N.C.
So now three Fortune 500 companies, along with nearly 2,000 jobs, are moving or have moved to Southern locations that years ago would likely not even have been considered by corporate executives.
Though they cited reasons for their moves specific to their business or industry, it’s clear that the South now holds an attraction that it once did not. A variety of factors are in play, including lower taxes and operating costs, an improved quality of life and a stronger workforce.
“I don’t think it’s a tidal wave yet,” said James Hughes, dean of the Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy at Rutgers University. But change is clearly afoot, he said.
“What’s changed is the perception of the South,” he said. “After the first frontier companies moved there, they proved that there is no problem securing a high-quality workforce, and that people would migrate there if there were good jobs available.”
To be sure, many companies have left New Jersey for other destinations. New York’s Rockland and Orange counties, for example, still attract a good number of companies, including Hunter Douglas and Croton Watch Co. recently. Yet the lure of the South appears to be growing.
N.J.’s incentives to Mercedes couldn’t offset cost of doing business
JANUARY 6, 2015, 11:21 PM LAST UPDATED: TUESDAY, JANUARY 6, 2015, 11:28 PM
BY HUGH R. MORLEY AND LINDA MOSS
STAFF WRITERS |
THE RECORD
New Jersey “worked tirelessly” for months to persuade Mercedes-Benz USA to stay in Montvale, the car company said Tuesday, including several meetings and calls between Governor Christie and company CEO Stephen Cannon and a last-ditch offer three days ago.
The state wielded an arsenal of incentive programs that were revamped just over a year ago to enable New Jersey to award more generous tax breaks that would counter the high cost of doing business in the state.
Yet the state’s effort fell short, rebuffed by the reality that even the heavily fortified programs – which enabled New Jersey in 2014 to award about $2 billion in breaks – couldn’t negate the high cost of doing business in the state, and the lure of Atlanta, where the company said Tuesday it will move its heaN.J.’s incentives to Mercedes couldn’t offset cost of doing business
JAdquarters.
While critics immediately suggested that the German car giant’s departure announcement showed the redundancy of the state’s strategy of offering big-dollar tax breaks, state officials dismissed that suggestion.
Michael Drewniak, a spokesman for Christie, said the governor “took a direct role in trying to keep Mercedes-Benz USA in New Jersey.”
People are fleeing N.J. faster than any other state, moving company says
By Jeff Goldman | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
on January 05, 2015 at 1:30 PM, updated January 05, 2015 at 4:56 PM
Nearly two of every three families making an interstate move involving New Jersey last year were leaving the Garden State, the highest rate in the country.
New Jersey had the greatest percentage of outbound moves of any state nationally last year with almost 65 percent departing, according to a company which bills itself as the largest transporter of household goods in the country.
The Garden State has led the nation in outward migration for the fourth time in five years.
In all, United said it tracked 4,003 moves out of New Jersey in 2014 compared to 2,169 inbound.
Nearly half of those leaving New Jersey were bound for Florida (15 percent), California (14), Texas (9) and North Carolina (7.5), spokeswoman Melissa Sullivan told NJ Advance Media.
Retirement and jobs were the top reasons to leave the state last year, according to a United Survey of departing New Jerseyans.
About 42 percent reported leaving for a new job or company transfer. Forty-one percent attributed their move to retirement. More than half (56 percent) of people leaving New Jersey were over the age of 55, with 22 percent older than 65.
December 28, 2014, 6:58 PM Last updated: Sunday, December 28, 2014, 6:58 PM
By JULIE PACE and NANCY BENAC
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — It was supposed to be a joke. “Are you still president?” comedian Stephen Colbert asked Barack Obama earlier this month.
But the question seemed to speak to growing weariness with the president and skepticism that anything will change in Washington during his final two years in office. Democrats already are checking out Obama’s potential successors. Emboldened Republicans are trying to push aside his agenda in favor of their own.
At times this year, Obama seemed ready to move on as well. He rebelled against the White House security “bubble,” telling his Secret Service detail to give him more space. He chafed at being sidelined by his party during midterm elections and having to adjust his agenda to fit the political interests of vulnerable Democrats who lost anyway.
Yet the election that was a disaster for the president’s party may have had a rejuvenating effect on Obama. The morning after the midterms, Obama told senior aides, “If I see you moping, you will answer to me.”
People close to Obama say he is energized at not having to worry about helping — or hurting — Democrats in another congressional election on his watch. He has become more comfortable with his executive powers, moving unilaterally on immigration, Internet neutrality and climate change in the last two months. And he sees legacy-building opportunities on the international stage, from an elusive nuclear deal with Iran to normalizing relations with Cuba after a half-century freeze.
“He gained some clarity for the next two years that is liberating,” said Jay Carney, who served as Obama’s press secretary until this spring. “He doesn’t have as much responsibility for others.”
In early October, President Obama warned his supporters to “make no mistake: these policies [of mine] are on the ballot. Every single one of them.” After the November elections, he probably wishes he hadn’t said that. The scale of the liberal defeat is remarkable, as are its causes.
In 2008, Obama had long coattails: When he took office in 2009, the House of Representatives had 256 Democrats. In 2015, it probably will have 188.
But the underlying reasons for Obama’s failure run deeper than the normal swings of the political pendulum. Four of them are vital. The first is that a good part of Obama’s appeal in 2008 was that he was supposedly above politics. He was compared to Abraham Lincoln, a canny politician we now misremember as being above the partisan fray.
This was nonsense. If you want to get anywhere in politics, you have to be a politician. And the essence of politics has not changed since Aristotle’s time. That doesn’t mean that politicians are all liars. But it does mean that anyone who looks for salvation in a politician is going to be disappointed. Obama was hyped so high in 2008 that he had nowhere to go but down.
Another reason for Obama’s failure was that he sought, in his words, to begin “the work of remaking America.” The entire American political system was designed by the Founding Fathers to frustrate his plans. The Constitution, with its checks and balances and its separation of powers, was intended to limit the government and prevent transient majorities from having their way.
Within those limits, Obama has actually – and from a conservative perspective, regrettably – done a lot: Obamacare itself is proof of that. But inevitably, having set out to, as he claimed, fundamentally transform the United States, Obama has come up short. He has increasingly resorted to unilateral executive actions precisely because he resents the system’s constraints, but that just feeds the narrative that he’s more emperor than president.
The third reason for Obama’s failure is that most of his ideas were wrong. There were no shovel-ready jobs waiting for the stimulus spending. Fixing health care did not require ripping apart the insurance market. The answer to a weak economy was not expensive green energy.
Iran was not waiting for an outstretched hand of friendship. Russia wanted a reset for malicious reasons of its own, not because it wanted to be our friend. Al-Qaida was not on the run. The Arab Spring was not a new democratic dawn. The European Union was not a force for prosperity. Israel was not the reason the Middle East is so troubled.
Everyone makes mistakes. But it’s hard to bounce back from so many fundamental errors, especially when – and this was Obama’s fourth error – the administration has been terrible at the boring business of being competent.
The fiasco of Obamacare was bad enough. But then there was the Veterans Administration scandal, the Secret Service’s prostitute parties, the Internal Revenue Service targeting of conservative groups, Ebola and the Justice Department’s gun-running into Mexico, to name only a few of the screw-ups that have tainted the administration.
We should never attribute to malice what can plausibly be explained by incompetence. And conservatives aren’t shocked when governments make mistakes: It’s what we expect them to do. But incompetence wears more heavily on liberals, because they are the ones who always want government to do more. The evidence is overwhelming that government can’t do it well.
Obama came into office wanting, in his words, to make government cool again. But as respected U.S. political analyst Michael Barone points out, since Watergate and with the exception of the 9/11 aftermath, trust in government peaked under Ronald Reagan, precisely because Reagan sought to limit government. Under Obama, it has fallen to near-historic lows.
The conservative triumphs in 2010 and 2014 have not irrevocably set America’s destiny: there are no permanent victories in politics. But there was a fundamental contradiction between the apolitical fantasy that Obama embodied and the real-world desire of the American people to support liberal policies, especially when incompetently administered.
Once the fantasy wore off, reality set in. And for liberals, reality is often bad news.
