Trade
U.S. ‘feckless’ on trade? — Dates set for TPP meeting — Export ban won't stop oil refining, study says Politico ...Former U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman questions whether his old boss, President Barack Obama, has the political drive and interest to win congressional approval of a pair of ambitious trade deals with Asia-Pacific countries and the European Union...
State Battles
Gov. Rick Scott’s complex finances raise new questions about his state disclosure Miami Herald ...The governor, for instance, does not disclose the entire value of assets that reside in different trust and partnership accounts and for which he’s listed in federal records as the “beneficial owner,” according to an extensive Miami Herald/Tampa Bay Times review of hundreds of federal and state documents filed in Florida, Washington, Connecticut, Texas, Nevada and Illinois...
Study: State taxpayers on the hook for $1 billion in useless highway projects due to faulty data Wisconsin Gazette ...The Wisconsin Department of Transportation will waste up to $1 billion on unneeded highway expansions if it continues to rely on inaccurate, outdated highway-use projections, concluded a comprehensive traffic study by a nonpartisan watchdog group...
Democrats question Walker's use of state planes for short trips Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ...state planes are being used to carry Gov. Scott Walker on trips around Wisconsin with legs as short as the 30-mile jaunt from Burlington to Milwaukee, according to state records...
War on Workers
Wage Theft Costing Low-Income Workers Billions NBC News ...Nearly $1 billion was recovered in 2012 by lawyers or regulatory agencies acting on behalf of workers who were paid below minimum wage, not paid for overtime or other wage and hour violations...
Workers in Part-Time Limbo Point to U.S. Job-Market Slack Bloomberg ...Forty-nine percent of people working less than 35 hours a week in 2012 and desiring full-time work were able to find such a position within a year, according to research by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. That’s down from 61 percent in 2006...
A Middle-Class Crunch Obama Didn't Mention Bloomberg View ...A new report shows that more and more U.S. workers are getting squeezed in another way: pushed into inadequate retirement plans by the country's largest employers. Worse, their employers acknowledge as much...
States probe JPMorgan Chase as hack seen fueling fraud Reuters ... Two U.S. states are investigating the theft of 83 million customer records from JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) in a massive cyber attack uncovered over the summer, and more may soon join, Reuters learned on Friday...
The Walmart Wealth Gap Is Getting Much More Troubling Huffington Post ...By at least one estimate, the Walmart family could already buy every single home in Seattle...
Germany just eliminated tuition, while Americans are drowning in $1.2 trillion student loan debt. Daily Kos ...Germany has just joined other nations of the Continental European Union to eliminate all university tuition, as a human right...
Worker dies after being struck by truck at St. Louis business St. Louis Post-Dispatch ...Police are investigating a fatal accident in which an Antler Trucking Company employee was struck by a box truck on the rear parking lot of the company in the 3000 block of North Broadway this morning...
Miscellaneous
Sheriff's department issues tickets to prompt train movement Goshen News ...Sheriff’s deputies went to the crossing and began issuing tickets to Norfolk Southern for blocking the road in violation of state statue. The officers continued writing tickets for every 10 minutes the crossing was blocked, issuing 18 citations in total...
