62.8%: Labor Force Participation Has Hovered Near 37-Year-Low for 11 Months
March 6, 2015 – 10:01 AM
By Ali Meyer
(CNSNews.com) – The labor force participation rate hovered between 62.9 percent and 62.7 percent in the eleven months from April 2014 through February, and has been 62.9 percent or lower in 13 of the 17 months since October 2013.
Prior to that, the last time the rate was below 63 percent was 37 years ago, in March 1978 when it was 62.8 percent, the same rate it was in February.
“The civilian labor force participation rate, at 62.8 percent, changed little in February and has remained within the narrow range of 62.7 to 62.9 percent since April 2014,” the BLS said in its release on the February employment data.
92,898,000 Americans were not in the labor force in February, according to data released from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) on Friday.
The labor force participation rate is the percentage of the civilian noninstitutional population who participated in the labor force by either having a job during the month or actively seeking one.
In February, according to BLS, the nation’s civilian noninstitutional population, consisting of all people 16 or older who were not in the military or an institution, reached 249,899,000. Of those, 157,002,000 participated in the labor force by either holding a job or actively seeking one.
The 157,002,000 who participated in the labor force was 62.8 percent of the 249,899,000 civilian noninsttutional population, which matches the 62.8 percent rate in April, May, June, and October of 2014 as well as the participation rate in March of 1978. The participation rate hit its lowest level since February 1978 (62.7 percent) in September and December of 2014.
Poll: Majority of Americans Believe Obama has ‘Done Little or Nothing’ to Help the Poor and Middle Class
By Barbara Boland | 24 hours ago
Most Americans believe the government of President Barack Obama has helped the rich, and believe it’s done “little or nothing to help” the poor or middle class, according to a Pew Research Center poll released yesterday.
72% believe the government’s policies have “done little or nothing to help middle class people;” 68% believe Obama’s policies have provided little or no help for small businesses and 65% say the same for the poor.
Photo from Congressman Darrell Issa ,had a great seat for Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech this morning.For Israel, the Iranian pursuit of a nuclear bomb is an existential threat. Is it any wonder they do not trust this administration to decide when Iran will obtain the weapon with which it threatens to wipe Israel off the map?
Obama’s ‘shameful’ snub of Netanyahu
By Darrell Issa5 P.M.MARCH 2, 2015
For all of the attention being given to the fact that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is coming to address Congress Tuesday, so many of those covering the upcoming speech have gotten it backward. The story is not that Benjamin Netanyahu is coming to the United States at the behest of congressional leaders. The story is that one of America’s closest allies in the world feels so alienated by President Obama that he believes his best hope in protecting his nation from a nuclear Iran lies in making his case directly to the American people, having lost confidence in a U.S. president who has rejected his counsel and sought to demonize and marginalize him. Put simply, rather than standing behind our allies, President Obama has thrown himself decisively in front of them, as an obstacle to be circumvented.
Though it is shameful that a staunch ally feels the need to go directly to the American people, it should not be surprising to those who have watched this administration’s actions. The attacks on Israel’s leader continued this week, as Secretary of State John Kerry questioned Prime Minister Netanyahu’s judgment, suggesting that Netanyahu’s support of American involvement in Iraq (involvement Kerry himself supported) somehow rendered him untrustworthy. National Security Adviser Susan Rice called his upcoming Capitol Hill speech “destructive.”
For Israel, the Iranian pursuit of a nuclear bomb is an existential threat. Is it any wonder they do not trust this administration to decide when Iran will obtain the weapon with which it threatens to wipe Israel off the map?
Obama’s 2016 Budget: Analysis shows plan would result in reduced GDP and the loss of upwards of 809,000 jobs
March 3,2015
Washington, DC ,In his 2016 budget, President Obama proposes a variety of tax increases on saving and investment as well as the creation or expansion of a number of tax credits. Some economists are concerned about the impact these changes could have on the U.S. economy, and according to the latest numbers, many of their concerns are warranted. A new analysis from the nonpartisan Tax Foundation indicates that the president’s budget would cost the U.S. a significant amount of full time jobs and result in the reduction of GDP and workers’ wages.The report’s key findings include:
The Taxes and Growth (TAG) Model finds the plan would shrink the economy by 3 percent, lower the level of investment by 8 percent, reduce wages by 2.4 percent, eliminate 809,000 jobs, and lose $12 billion in federal revenue over the long run due to lower growth.
If the revenue available for business tax reform were used to lower the corporate tax rate, it would result in a 3 percentage point cut in the rate—far less than a cut to a 28 percent rate as hoped for by the president’s budget.
With the lower corporate tax rate, the plan would still shrink the economy by 2.4 percent, decrease investment by 6.2 percent, reduce wages by 1.8 percent, eliminate 679,000 jobs, and lose $4 billion in revenue over the long run.
“The thrust of the individual income tax changes is to raise taxes on upper income taxpayers, primarily through higher taxes on income from savings and investment. The additional revenue would then be used to increase credits for families with young children, workers with low earnings, and two-earner couples,” said Tax Foundation Senior Fellow Stephen J. Entin, PhD. “However, the plan focuses only on redistribution, ignoring economic growth, and the resulting reduction in growth would hurt many of the people the plan is meant to help.”
This plan highlights a century-old debate over whether to tax income or consumption. The focus of the broad-based income tax (which taxes income when it is earned and again when investment earnings are realized) is to aid in wealth redistribution. On the other hand, the focus of a consumption based tax (one that falls equally on income used for consumption or saving and investment) is to avoid penalizing saving relative to consumption as to not discourage economic growth.
The 2016 budget aligns with the income based approach. Historically, reforms that have moved towards the broad-based income tax—like the 1986 Reagan tax reform and the Obama 2012 budget agreement and the tax elements of the Affordable Care Act—have generally reduced wages and employment and discouraged capital formation. Alternatively, reforms that moved away from this approach—such as the 1961-1963 Kennedy tax cuts, the 1981 Reagan tax cut, and the 2001-2003 Bush tax cuts—have helped to raise productivity, wages, and employment.
Obama “Very Interested” In Raising Taxes Through Executive Action
Conn Carroll | Mar 02, 2015
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest confirmed Monday that President Obama is “very interested” in the idea of raising taxes through unitlateral executive action.
“The president certainly has not indicated any reticence in using his executive authority to try and advance an agenda that benefits middle class Americans,” Earnest said in response to a question about Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) calling on Obama to raise more than $100 billion in taxes through IRS executive action.
“Now I don’t want to leave you with the impression that there is some imminent announcement, there is not, at least that I know of,” Earnest continued. “But the president has asked his team to examine the array of executive authorities that are available to him to try to make progress on his goals. So I am not in a position to talk in any detail at this point, but the president is very interested in this avenue generally,” Earnest finished.
Sanders sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Jack Lew Friday identifying a number of executive actions he believes the IRS could take, without any input from Congress, that would close loopholes currently used by corporations. In the past, IRS lawyers have been hesitant to use executive actions to raise significant amounts of revenue, but that same calculation has change in other federal agencies since Obama became president.
17,000 Federal Employees Earned More Than $200K Last Year
See which agencies employ the federal workforce’s highest earners.
BY ERIC KATZ, GOVERNMENT EXECUTIVE
February 24, 2015 More than 16,900 federal employees took home in excess of $200,000 in base salary in 2014, according to a partial database of federal salary data.
The information, compiled by FedSmith.com using data from the Office of Personnel Management and other agencies, shows the annual compensation for every civilian federal worker, save those at the Defense Department. The number of workers earning more than $200,000 represented about 1.6 percent of employees on the list and is up from about 15,000 who cleared that salary in 2013. It also makes up a slightly higher percentage of the employees on this list.
Most of the high earners worked as medical officers at the Veterans Affairs Department. Other agencies that require a highly specialized workforce paid several employees at least $200,000; these included the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
More than 1,600 federal employees cleared $300,000 in base salary last year. Just two—VA doctors in Palo Alto, Calif., and Pittsburgh—took in more than $400,000.
All of these employees are paid on systems specific to their agency or occupation. Some of these systems have much higher pay caps than the General Schedule, which sets the salaries for the vast majority of federal employees and capped annual pay—before adjusting for locality—at just less than $130,000 last year.
Obama’s regs will make Internet slow as in Europe, warn FCC, FEC commissioners
By Paul Bedard | February 23, 2015 | 2:14 pm
As the Federal Communications Commission and Federal Election Commission toy with regulating aspects of the Internet, critics on those agencies are warning that speed and freedom of speech are in jeopardy.
In a joint column, Federal Communications Commission member Ajit Pai and Federal Election Commission member Lee Goodman, leveled the boom on the Obama-favored regulations, essentially charging that it will muck up the freedom the nation has come to expect from the Internet.
In one key passage of the column published in Politico, the duo wrote Monday that heavy-handed FCC regulations like those imposed in Europe will significantly slow down Internet speech.
GENEVA (AP) — The United States and Iran are working on a two-phase deal that clamps down on Tehran’s nuclear program for at least a decade before providing it leeway over the remainder of the agreement to slowly ramp up activities that could be used to make weapons.
Officials from some of the six-power talks with Iran said details still needed to be agreed on, with U.S. and Iranian negotiators meeting Monday for the third straight day ahead of an end-of-March deadline for a framework agreement. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry joined the negotiations after arriving Sunday.
Posted by Dan Cirucci On February 23, 2015 0 Comment
By Dan Cirucci | Dan Cirucci’s Blogspot
It’s no accident that George Washington was called “the father of our country.”
From the very beginning, American presidents have been somewhat patriarchal — not in the sense of a monarch, of course but more like a strong, caring, reliable dad who sees the best in us, inspires us, rallies us and above all, defends and protects our national family.
That’s what the best dads do. That’s what we’ve come to expect from them.
But what if we had a dad who always noticed our faults? What if he was repeatedly critical? What if he kept pointing it out to others whenever he thought we did something wrong?
Instead of challenging us to aspire to our highest goals, what if he constantly warned us and attempted to lower our aspirations? What if he pushed us to pull back instead of leaping forward?
What would it be like if we had a father who at times appeared to be arrogant and occasionally disdainful toward us?
Fox’s Neil Cavuto Admits Yes Mr President its All Fox News Fault
Fox’s Neil Cavuto breaks out the sarcasm: Yes, it was somehow Fox that caused the IRS to crack down on conservative groups, Fox that told people you could keep your doctor under Obamacare. Calling ISIS the “JV team”? The measles outbreak? Blame Fox.(Brent Bozell)
Saturday Night (Pointed) Humor: Cavuto Admits That It’s All Fox News’s Fault
By Tom Blumer | February 21, 2015 | 11:59 PM EST
Thursday on his Your World show, host Neil Cavuto went after the Obama administration’s near obsession with the coverage it gets on Fox News.
While Team Obama can count on the Big Three triumvirate of ABC, CBS and NBC to toe the line, promoting its points while generally avoiding damning information, Fox has generally remained fair and balanced, an approach which has clearly gotten under their ultra-thin skins.
The occasion for Cavuto’s rant, which veered into some impressive sarcastic humor, was Eric Holder’s claim that Fox wouldn’t have anything to talk about if it wasn’t noting the failure of the administration to call Islamic terrorism what it is, i.e., Islamic terrorism:
Transcript (bolds are mine):
NEIL CAVUTO: All right, folks. I have a confession to make.
I did it again. Eric Holder caught me.
ERIC HOLDER (taped): We spend more time, more time, talking about “What do you call it?” instead of “What do you do about it?” I mean really, y’know, y’know, if Fox didn’t talk about this, they’d have nothing else to talk about.
CAVUTO: Yeah. If not for us at Fox News making such a big deal out of saying “Islamic extremism,” no one would be making a big deal out of the White House not saying “Islamic extremism.” Not this Democratic congresswoman or this former top Obama intelligence official. They say words matter too, but it’s Fox News making the big stink, so, well that’s all that matters now.
And it got me thinking. You know it happens sometimes. I know, I’ve heard this before, this whole White House mentioning this Fox News thing before.
(shows a series of derisive or negative references to Fox News by Barack Obama and Josh Earnest)
CAVUTO: Well, I am so busted. Pick a crisis, any crisis, you name it. Fox News is behind it. Worse yet, Fox News created it. And I’m here to admit the White House ain’t telling you the half of it. How clever we are, how devious we are. If only I had known that you had known.
If only I had known that Fox News said you could keep your doctor when you couldn’t keep your doctor, and it wasn’t the President saying that.
Or that it was Fox News’s plan to send your health insurance premiums skyrocketing and not the President’s plan.
Or that Fox news dismissed ISIS as “the jayvee team” and not anyone on the President’s team.
Or FOX News was the one spying on our very own James Rosen, and not the Justice Department spying on our very own James Rosen.
That Fox News was the one targeting conservative groups, and not the IRS targeting conservative groups.
Very clever. God knows what other controversies we caused. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before it all comes out.
So let me just fess up now and spill the beans. Everything bad, Every time … Fox!
All this frigid weather? Yeah, Fox News. Don’t ask, we just did it.
This whole measles outbreak thing? Bingo! Fox News!
This tepid economic recovery? Sorry, Fox News.
The housing meltdown that preceded it? You guessed it. Fox News started it.
The Internet bubble? Fox News created it, then we burst it so could keep milking it.
The energy crisis back in the 1970s: Fox News — which is amazing, because we weren’t even around in the 70s!
But that didn’t stop us from having a role in the JFK assassination. Yeah, that was a Fox News guy in the grassy knoll.
The Titanic. Yeah, the captain, see the captain? So Rupert Murdoch wth a beard, don’t you think? And now you know why the movie was so good. We damn near wrote the script!
Pearl Harbor: Fox News knew the Japanese were coming!
The potato famine. Even Fox News’s Irish-American anchors (i.e., Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity — Ed.) did nothing, nothing to stop it from coming. They’re the culprits!
“Tsunamis: Fox News! Earthquakes: Fox News! Tornadoes: Fox News!
That meteor hit in Russia that blasted buildings a couple of years back? Well, (that was) Fox’s little Putin payback.
Oh yeah-yeah-yeah, this goes way back, to the Dinosaurs: Fox News killed them off.
And the Big Bang? Fox News started life itself up, only to toy with all living creatures since, and make a mockery of political leaders today.
Giuliani defends Obama criticism, says president doesn’t believe in American exceptionalism
Published February 20, 2015
FoxNews.com
Former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani adamantly defended Thursday his controversial criticism of President Obama, one day after saying he does “not believe that the president loves America.”
Giuliani made the remarks Wednesday at a private fundraiser for Republican Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who is widely considered to be a prospective candidate for president in 2016. He added: “(Obama) doesn’t love you. And he doesn’t love me. He wasn’t brought up the way you were brought up and I was brought up through love of this country.”
The comments drew widespread criticism from Democrats and liberals.
But Thursday night on “The Kelly File,” when host Megyn Kelly asked Giuliani if he wished to apologize, the 2008 presidential candidate doubled down on his criticism.
“Not at all. I want to repeat it,” Giuliani said. “The reality is, from all that I can see of this president, all that I’ve heard of him, he apologizes for America, he criticizes America. … This is an American president I’ve never seen before.”
Giuliani said he doesn’t think Obama believes in American exceptionalism, citing the president’s remarks on police tactics in the wake of the Ferguson shooting, western atrocities in the name of religion and Obama’s longtime association with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, a controversial Chicago pastor.
He’s a Raging Partisan : The big lie of Obama’s presidency
Febuary 18,2015
by Fred Barnes
President Obama’s claim to have disapproved of gay marriage until he changed his mind in 2012 has been exposed as a lie. It was a small, politically expedient lie, but it got a lot of attention last week. Meanwhile a bigger lie hovers over the Obama presidency like an avenging angel, unseen and unheard.
The bigger lie wasn’t a fleeting comment. It was the crux of Obama’s presidential campaign. He didn’t say he was more liberal and more experienced than his opponents. But he did say he knew how to cleanse Washington of political and ideological polarization, raging partisanship, the frequency of personal attacks, and general dysfunction. This made him unique—and very, very appealing.
He repeated the theme in campaign speeches. And in his Inaugural Address in January 2009, he said: “We have come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the petty recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics . . . the time has come to set aside childish things.”
As he left the inaugural ceremony, former House speaker Newt Gingrich told his wife, Calista, “If he’ll govern the way he just spoke, he’ll be Eisenhower. . . . He’ll split the Republican party. He’ll dominate the country.”
But Obama hasn’t governed like Ike, a unifying national leader. Almost instantly, he became a highly partisan president. He had promised to consult Republicans in Congress and listen to their ideas. Yet he’s done that rarely and then usually in a false show of bipartisanship. He insinuates Republicans have nothing worthwhile to tell him.
He has passed up two opportunities to join the country in moving to the political center, the first after the Republican landslide in the 2010 midterm elections, the second after the GOP captured both houses of Congress in November’s midterm vote.
The White House is facing mounting skepticism that its high-profile summit on violent extremism this week will help to counter a rising tide of radicalism, as world leaders search for a response to another wave of attacks, in Denmark and Libya.
The summit, to be held in Washington, will draw high-level officials from more than 60 countries and will focus on how to stave off the kind of political and socio-economic exclusion that drives marginalised groups into the hands of terror groups, senior administration officials said on Monday.
Plans for the three-day summit, which have been in the works for months, took on greater urgency after Islamist extremists killed 17 people in Paris last month, starting with an assault on the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine.
Over the weekend, a gunman in Copenhagen opened fire at a free-speech event at a cultural centre and synagogue, killing two people, while on Sunday fighters affiliated with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or Isis, claimed they had killed up to 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians they were holding in the central Libyan city of Sirte.
Democrats seek relief from health law penalties
By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — The official sign-up season for President Barack Obama’s health care law may be over, but leading congressional Democrats say millions of Americans facing new tax penalties deserve a second chance.
Three senior House members told The Associated Press that they plan to strongly urge the administration to grant a special sign-up opportunity for uninsured taxpayers who will be facing fines under the law for the first time this year.
The three are Michigan’s Sander Levin, the ranking Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, and Democratic Reps. Jim McDermott of Washington, and Lloyd Doggett of Texas. All worked to help steer Obama’s law through rancorous congressional debates from 2009-2010.
The lawmakers say they are concerned that many of their constituents will find out about the penalties after it’s already too late for them to sign up for coverage, since open enrollment ended Sunday.
That means they could wind up uninsured for another year, only to owe substantially higher fines in 2016. The fines are collected through the income tax system.
This year is the first time ordinary Americans will experience the complicated interactions between the health care law and taxes. Based on congressional analysis, tax preparation giant H&R Block says roughly 4 million uninsured people will pay penalties.
The IRS has warned that health-care related issues will make its job harder this filing season and taxpayers should be prepared for long call-center hold times, particularly since the GOP-led Congress has been loath to approve more money for the agency.
“Open enrollment period ended before many Americans filed their taxes,” the three lawmakers said in a statement. “Without a special enrollment period, many people (who will be paying fines) will not have another opportunity to get health coverage this year.
“A special enrollment period will not only help many Americans avoid making an even larger payment next year, but, more importantly, it will help them gain quality health insurance for 2015,” the lawmakers added.
So far, administration officials have deflected questions about whether an extension will be granted. Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia M. Burwell has authority to grant special enrollment periods under certain circumstances.
North Dakota has ranked No. 1 for six years in a row. Gallup noted that Michigan experienced one of the “sharpest turnarounds of any state” in the seven years its has conducted the survey.
Nick Loris, an economist who focuses on energy, environmental and regulatory issues at The Heritage Foundation, said North Dakota’s No. 1 ranking came as no surprise.
“Energy development on private and state-owned lands in North Dakota and Texas is a critical reason why they rank at the top,” said Loris. “The regulatory environment has allowed companies in these states to create jobs, grow the economy, and increased energy supplies to save families money—all while effectively protecting the environment.”
Chart: Gallup
In his recent State of the State address, Gov. Jack Dalrymple, R-N.D., said energy jobs were a large factor in his state’s success.
“We should all be proud of the vital role our state is playing to help America strengthen its energy independence,” said Dalrymple.
“Over the past 10 years, North Dakota’s economy has averaged an annual growth rate of 10.3 percent, nearly three times that of the nation’s economy,” he added. “We also continue to have the nation’s lowest unemployment rate at just 2.4 percent, and our growing commercial activity has created more than 106,000 new jobs in the past 10 years.”
Dalrymple said North Dakota’s “economic progress has not been confined to oil country,” and pointed out that the state’s population and personal income rates are growing as well.
Chart: Gallup
James Sherk, senior policy analyst in labor economics at The Heritage Foundation, closely follows job growth. He noted that the labor market has slowly recovered since the recession ended. Last year represented a move in a positive direction.
“This recovery stands in marked contrast to the forecasts of Keynesian analysts who predicted that the sequester—a measure of spending restraint—and end of extended unemployment insurance benefits would harm the economy,” Sherk told The Daily Signal. “Instead, the economy has improved.”
Looking ahead, Sherk said government should remove barriers to job creation.
“The states with the fastest job growth have been those that have allowed hydraulic natural gas and oil extraction, with Texas and North Dakota enjoying some of the strongest labor markets in the country,” Sherk said. “New York decided to ban this new energy extraction technique—harming its workers and labor market.”
