Rhode Island Employment Snapshot, October 2015: Two Losses Don’t Make a Gain

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[Click here for the printable one-page PDF of this post.]

For yet another month, Rhode Island’s unemployment rate dropped, from 5.4% in September, to 5.3% in September, according to data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). And for yet another month, that positive outcome resulted from two negative results. Employment actually dropped by 630 people, but 1,636 Rhode Islanders gave up looking. Meanwhile, jobs based in the state increased by a mere 100 after a sizable drop the month before.

The first chart shows that October’s results represent a turnaround in Rhode Island’s employment fortunes. (Although the likelihood remains that the year’s early increases will be revised away.) The trend of large early gains which are revised downward substnatially has been established for several years, now.

RI-laborforceandemp-0107-1015

Every state in New England lost employment, in October, so the columns in the second chart are smaller for both Massachusetts and Connecticut, this month, but Rhode Island remains the only Southern New England state well below its employment and labor force as of January 2007.

RIMACT-laborforceandemp-1015perc0107

The third chart is the most illustrative of the skepticism that readers should have when watching the unemployment rate, the red line shows what Rhode Island’s unemployment rate would have been if the labor force had not shrunk since January 2007. As of October, the unemployment rate would actually be going back up, having never dipped below 8%. For October, the unemployment rate would be 8.2%.

RI-unemploymentrate-steadyLF-0107-1015

NEW: Failing RI Report Card Grades Not Advancing Social Justice

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 17, 2015

Non-Competitive Grades Harming Work, Mobility, and Opportunity for Rhode Islanders
Preponderance of Fs and Ds Should Signal Need for Change in Policy Culture

Providence, RI — The opportunity for upward mobility for many Ocean Staters continues to be hampered by a non-competitive business climate and onerous family tax burdens, as evidenced by the poor grades the State of Rhode Island received on the 2015 Report Card on Rhode Island Competitiveness, the fourth annual such report, released today by the Rhode Island Center for Freedom & Prosperity.

Burdened with public policies that discourage work and a productive lifestyle, the state’s poor grades in 10 major categories (two F’s, seven D’s, and one C) reflect a government culture geared to benefit special interest insiders, while at the same time promoting job-crushing and soul-crushing dependency among the general populace.

Raising even further alarm, Rhode Island ranked dead-last, overall, when compared with report cards from other New England states.

“This report card clearly demonstrates the wreckage that decades of liberal policies have wrought upon our state. These unacceptable grades should be a wake-up call to lawmakers that a government-centric approach is not producing the social justice and self-sufficiency that Rhode Islanders crave,” suggested Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. “If we want to provide more mobility and opportunity for our neighbors and entrepreneurs, we must completely reform our public policy approach. We must learn to trust in our people and remove the tax and regulatory boot of government off of their backs by advancing policies that empower the average family with choices, that reward work, and that grow the economy.”

The two categories with F grades are Infrastructure and Health Care; the seven D’s are Business Climate, Tax Burden, Spending & Debt, Employment & Income, Energy, Public Sector labor, and Living & Retirement in Rhode Island; while Education received a C-. Among the 52 sub-categories evaluated, Rhode Island received 19 F’s, 24 D’s, 5 Cs, 3 Bs, and just one lone A.

In a related 1-page brief, the Center also analyzes report card trends over recent years as well as comparisons to grades for other New England states.

The RI Report Card, originally developed for the Center by a national economist, compiles into a single document the state rankings among key economic and social indexes, as published by dozens of credible 3rd party national organizations.

The 2015 report card, with citations, as well as reports from prior years can be downloaded at RIFreedom.org/RIReportCard.

Media Contact:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise research and advocacy organization. The mission of the 501-C-3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.

2015 Report Card FAILS to Provide Equal Opportunity for Rhode Islanders

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The Center’s 4th annual REPORT CARD demonstrates how RI’s political class continues to cater to special insiders, while depriving other Rhode Islanders of the opportunity for upward mobility, educational opportunity, and personal prosperity.

[button url=”https://rifreedom.org/RIReportCard/” target=”_self” size=”medium” style=”royalblue” ] 2015 Report Card [/button]

STATEMENT: Statewide Teacher Contract Is An Off Base Approach

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STATEMENT
November 11, 2015

Statewide Contract Would Infringe on Local Sovereignty, No Focus of Educating Students

Providence, RI — The focus of educational reform should be for the benefit of students – not on compensating adults – according to a statement today from the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity. Further, a statewide teacher’s contract, currently being looked at by a new Senate commission, would infringe on the sovereignty of municipalities and local school committees.

“It is a highly disturbing trend in Rhode Island for the State to continue to seek control over more and more local matters. We saw this with RhodeMap RI, with firefighter union issues, and now, potentially, with teachers. It is well established that local government is the best government where the people can best hold their elected officials accountable,” commented Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. “Too often, the teachers unions make the compensation of teachers the focus of debate rather than the education of students in our under-performing government-run school system. ”

The Center maintains that a one-size-fits-all approach is off-base and cannot possibly serve the best interests of the many and diverse local school districts in Rhode Island; and that giving more centralized influence to unions is not in the best interests of our children.

However, the Center believes there can be a state role in saving money for local school districts. Negotiating and offering a large group health insurance option, that local districts can choose to participate in or not – as opposed to a mandate that would surely be part of any statewide contract – is one such concept.

The Center is part of a statewide coalition advocating for an educational choice policy that would directly benefit students trapped in schools that do not adequately prepare them for college or for life, by empowering parents to choose the best educational path for their children. For more information, visit RIFreedom.org/EdChoiceRI.

Media Contact:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise research and advocacy organization. The mission of the 501-C-3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.

Rhode Island Employment Snapshot, September 2015: Growth Stops in Employment and Jobs

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[Click here for the printable one-page PDF of this post.]

 

Once again, Rhode Island’s unemployment rate dropped, from 5.7% in August, to 5.4% in September, according to data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). That was, however, a silver lining built on an entirely dark cloud. Employment actually dropped by 521 people, but 1,860 Rhode Islanders gave up looking. At the same time, the number of jobs based in the state fell by 1,800 — for a total drop of 3,700 from July.

The first chart below shows that this dip follows a long increase in employment and labor force. However, the number of jobs based in the state has been relatively stagnant, suggesting that the employment numbers will be revised downward at the end of the year. Employment data is based on a phone survey that the BLS conducts in each state and heavily adjusts according to benchmarks and assumptions about seasonal changes.

In the second chart, both Massachusetts and Connecticut are down from last month’s results. Still, Rhode Island alone remains well below its employment and labor force as of January 2007.

The third chart is the most illustrative of the skepticism that readers should have when watching the unemployment rate. The red line shows what the curve would have been if the labor force had not shrunk since January 2007. In that case, the unemployment rate would still be 8.1% and would have begun edging back up, in September.

RI-laborforceandemp-0107-0915

RIMACT-laborforceandemp-0915perc0107

RI-unemploymentrate-steadyLF-0107-0915

P3 PayGo Model for RhodeWorks

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[button url=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/RICFP-P3-PayGo-101515.pdf” target=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/RICFP-P3-PayGo-101515.pdf” size=”medium” style=”royalblue” ]Click for full “P3 PayGo Model” report[/button]

Beginning this spring, Rhode Island Governor Gina Raimondo proposed a controversial RhodeWorks program to implement a toll system for commercial trucks as the foundation for a massive revenue bond that would not require voter approval. RhodeWorks is the governor’s strategy for repairing and maintaining a statewide road and bridge system that is undeniably in poor condition.

Despite a report from an insider government vendor, many are concerned that the governor’s plan would place yet another tax on Rhode Islanders — in the guise of highway tolls — putting unnecessary downward pressure on an already depressed state economy and placing taxpayers and drivers at further risk for inevitable cost overruns.

More recently, to address this concern, a Republican Policy Group (RPG) of state lawmakers has proposed a pay-as-you-go (PayGo) alternative that would find an annual sum of money derived from cuts and reform to existing state expenditures in order to fund the annual cost.

The mission of the Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity is to advance market-based solutions for the Ocean State through a rigorous exchange of ideas, as well as to provide alternative perspectives in the debate about important public policy issues. We agree with the priority on infrastructure established by the governor and the RPG’s directive to fund and build a sustainable repair and maintenance program within the state’s already high tax and fee regime. However, with Rhode Island’s infrastructure in such bad condition, a large up-front investment of money may be unavoidable.

The Center proposes an out-of-the-box concept for “delivery” of this massive public works project utilizing a proven model utilized in many other states for similar projects.  Lawmakers should conduct the detailed due diligence necessary to properly consider a public-private-partnership (P3) delivery model, with a pay-as-you-go (PayGo) funding foundation.

All combined this approach would fund much needed infrastructure upgrades largely from existing general revenue, yet would offload the debt, risk, and delivery of the project to a private sector partner.

The P3 PayGo model would preclude the need for tolling and would  provide substantial benefits for Rhode Island taxpayers and drivers by:

  • Removing the risk of taxpayers’ or ratepayers’ bearing the burden of likely cost overruns
  • Requiring no major new revenue streams, such as tolls, taxes, or fees
  • Removing project management from the RI Department of Transportation (RIDOT), which has recently come under intense public criticism for ongoing internal inefficiencies
  • Delivering bridge and road repairs in a more timely manner
  • Potentially saving hundreds of millions of dollars in overall project costs

Compiling this paper, the Center found the potential cost savings of a P3 PayGo project to be massive, reducing project costs by nearly half and potentially reducing annual costs to nearly one-third of the proposed spending. However, the primary goals of this proposal are to allow an upfront infusion of money without the need for tolls or other new revenue or long-term general obligation debt and to mitigate the risk associated with a project of this size. We therefore consider cost savings to be a secondary benefit, with the expectation that the numbers will become clearer as the public debate proceeds. At the very least, it is clear that, like the state’s bloated budget, P3 PayGo has plenty of slack to make the proposal feasible.

Important note: The term “public private partnership” is often used to describe government subsidies arbitrarily handed out to private ventures, such as 38 Studios. The P3 described in this paper is very different, with delivery of a vital public works project farmed out to a private sector partner in order to achieve market-based efficiencies and risk management not usually available to the government.

[button url=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/RICFP-P3-PayGo-101515.pdf” target=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/RICFP-P3-PayGo-101515.pdf” size=”medium” style=”royalblue” ]Click for full “P3 PayGo Model” report[/button]

P3: a Compelling Delivery Model for Governor’s Proposed Infrastructure Upgrades

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A P3 Model would bypass the troubled RI DOT and enable a private sector partner to deliver vital bridge and road repairs in a timelier, safer, and less costly manner. WOULD REMOVE ALL RISK OF COST OVER-RUNS FROM RHODE ISLANDERS!

[button url=”http://www.rifreedom.org/p3/” target=”_self” size=”small” style=”royalblue” ] Read the Policy Report [/button]

Gary Sasse on RhodeWorks: Leaving No Stone Left Unturned

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State Leaders Should Remember that Rhode Island’s Transportation Funding Crisis Evolved Primarily From Debt- Driven Financing Practices

Statement from Gary Sasse:

A recent Hassenfeld Institute public opinion survey found that 76% of Rhode Islanders felt the State was  spending too little on road and bridge maintenance. This finding is consistent with the bipartisan agreement that Rhode Island’s bridges urgently need to be improved.

The key question that the General Assembly will need to address is what would represent the most efficient, economically neutral and fairest way to finance and deliver a bridge safety and improvement initiative. To answer this question the General Assembly has four optional approaches it may choose to consider.

The first is the Governor’s plan that is financed by borrowing backed by truck toll revenues. The second is a PAYGO plan that has been recommended by House Republicans. This plan would be financed by reallocating existing resources, and would not contain new tolls, fees or taxes. The third option, put forward by the Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity, constitutes a P3 public-private partnership between the State and private partner. The private partner, in exchange for pre-determined revenue guarantees, would finance, repair and maintain bridges for an agreed upon time. The final option is a hybrid PAYGO- debt plan would be based on some additional public debt, but also the use of current general revenues.

In studying these options state leaders should remember that Rhode Island’s transportation funding crisis evolved primarily from debt -driven financing practices. These practices have served to inhibit the state’s ability to properly maintain its roads and bridges. Therefore, in considering the best way to finance and deliver a bridge improvement program, the General Assembly should remember that borrowing is expensive. The most costly public debt may occur when there is a limited history with a new revenue source and any debt financing should be designed to avoid the carrying charges of issuing a large bond upfront.

While the REMI study provided additional information about the economics of the Governor’s truck toll proposal, questions remain regarding the impact of this proposal on sectors of the Rhode Island economy and operationalizing the tolling system.

In order to serve the best interests of the Rhode Island taxpayer, the General Assembly should take the time to fully evaluate all four options, leaving no stone left unturned.

About the Author:

Gary Sasse is the director of Bryant University’s Institute for Public Leadership. He is a former executive director of the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council, and for several years directed the state’s Department of Revenue and Department of Administration during the Carcieri administration.

 

STATEMENT: REMI Toll & Bond Report Overstates Benefits; New Model Next Week

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 3, 2015

Economic Drawbacks Under-Stated, Benefits Overstated
Pro Government Spending Analysis is Not Balanced with Free Market Analysis

Providence, RI – As projected months ago, the economic development analysis released yesterday by the Raimondo administration, conducted by Regional Economic Models, Inc. (REMI), is based on pro government spending theory that under-states the negative impact of extracting new funds out of the private sector economy, and does not take into account the more traditional free market economic theory, according to the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity.

“On the one hand, and obviously, when hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on a project like this there will be a near-term boost in jobs and economic activity, as the REMI report suggests,” commented Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. “However, on the other hand, there is also a negative ongoing impact on the economy through the imposition of new tolls, taxes, or fees. The REMI model minimizes this effect, while free market models normally project a greater long-term negative impact to economic growth.”

The Center plans to release a policy concept paper next week that will put forth an alternative funding and delivery model, that would complete the vital bridge and road repair project at a lower cost and in a more timely manner, while also removing risk of likely cost overruns from taxpayers or ratepayers.
Media Contact:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise research and advocacy organization. The mission of the 501-C-3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.

Rhode Island Employment Snapshot, July 2015: RI the Gem of the Southern New England Economy

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[Click here for the printable one-page PDF of this post.]

 

With another drop in unemployment, to 5.8%, July was another banner month for the Rhode Island economy, according to data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). That showing was on the strength of a 1,299 gain in the workforce from revised numbers for June and a 2,086 increase in employment.

As the first chart below shows, 2015 has brought an unabated boom in employiment, in Rhode Island — at least according to these statistics. Employment data is based on a phone survey that the BLS conducts in each state and heavily adjusts according to benchmarks and assumptions about seasonal changes.

The second chart shows that Rhode Island remains well below its employment and labor force as of January 2007 and that this is unique in Southern New England. Comparing this chart to last month’s
iteration, however, would show that Massachusetts and Connecticut are headed in the other direction. If one believes the numbers, Massachusetts lost more than 21,000 employed residents, while Connecticut lost nearly 2,000.

How Rhode Island is moving in the other direction isn’t immediately clear.

The third chart illustrates the significance of the size of the labor force. The red line shows what the curve would have been if the labor force had not shrunk since January 2007, and it ends in a conspicuous cliff. In June, unemployment would still have been 8.2%. Even that represents a huge drop, over the course of this year so far, from 11.0% in December.

RI-laborforceandemp-0107-0715

RIMACT-laborforceandemp-0715perc0107

RI-unemploymentrate-steadyLF-0107-0715