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Friday, September 12, 2014

WASHINGTON: Poor rail service threatens economy, shippers tell lawmakers | Economy | McClatchy DC

WASHINGTON: Poor rail service threatens economy, shippers tell lawmakers | Economy | McClatchy DC

Sunday, September 7, 2014

East Porterville Residents Without Water As Wells Go Dry During California Drought « CBS Sacramento

East Porterville Residents Without Water As Wells Go Dry During California Drought « CBS Sacramento

Wednesday, September 3, 2014

Wage growth in the U.S. is stuck in the '70s | Marketplace.org

Wage growth in the U.S. is stuck in the '70s | Marketplace.org: Wage growth in the U.S. is stuck in the '70s
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Jolie Myers/Marketplace
Jamaad Reed.

by Krissy Clark
Monday, September 1, 2014 - 14:21
STORY
When Jamaad Reed started his job as a cashier at a Wal-Mart near Cincinnati, he made $8.15 an hour. That was two years ago. Since then, he has seen a couple of raises, which have meant his wage has kept up with inflation — but just barely. As of March of this year, Reed was making $9.05 an hour.

“I'm stuck,” he said recently. “You know what I'm saying? I feel like I'm stuck in the same spot.”

"Stuck" is a pretty good word to describe wages for most American workers over the last few decades. Not just in the case of lower-wage workers like Reed, but along most of the income spectrum, except for those at the very, very top.

In fact, most American workers have seen little to no growth since the late 1970s, if you adjust for inflation, according to Elise Gould. She's an economist with the Economic Policy Institute and author of a new study that analyzes wage data from census surveys over the last several decades.

That's not to say that individual workers haven't seen gains. But, says Gould, “as productivity has continued to rise, typical workers’ wages simply have not.”�

That’s a very different economic picture from a half-century ago. In the first few decades after World War II, as the nation's productivity grew, so did wages. So what happened?

“This is one of the questions that people are arguing about right now,” says Linda Barrington, the executive director of the Institute of Compensation Studies at Cornell University.

Barrington says some economists point to a loss of worker bargaining power, meaning workers are less able to claim growing productivity gains in the way they could when labor unions were stronger.

Others blame a shift in business strategy over the years to one that focuses more on shareholder returns, “as opposed to sharing the returns and the gains to all of the employee base,” says Barrington.

Meanwhile, technological advances and globalization have meant there are fewer middle-wage jobs to be had in the U.S. Now, workers who in a previous era might have had relatively well-paying manufacturing or clerical jobs have to settle for lower-paying jobs in the service sector instead.

Even as economists debate the reasons behind American workers’ stagnating wages, one thing is certain. They don’t just affect individual wallets, but the economy as a whole.

As Barrington points out, “Every worker is also a consumer.” And consumers are what drive the modern American economy.

Featured in: Marketplace for Monday September 1, 2014

Frustrations, and desperate demands for more public transportation $$ on Staten Island as MTA shapes capital plan | SILive.com

If you want to learn something about Mass Transit, one must compare and contrast what others are doing with their transit systems in order to gain a much broader and more in-depth perspective of things over time. Once people know that you are highly knowledgeable about a given issue and related policies, they will give you the respect that you truly deserve, especially when you speak out in a public meetings able to use key words and phrases that many people will readily understand. People will like you even more if you are from their own community or you moved there and have stayed a long time and paid your dues so to speak. You will be taken far more seriously - besides the powers-that-be do not have a clue about how important a given issue is until you stand up for yourself and make them see things your way.      



Frustrations, and desperate demands for more public transportation $$ on Staten Island as MTA shapes capital plan | SILive.com

MBTA's 1st Rapid-Transit Station in 27 Years Opens | NECN

MBTA's 1st Rapid-Transit Station in 27 Years Opens | NECN: The MBTA's first new rapid-transit station in 27 years is open at Somerville's Assembly Square.
Tuesday, Sep 2, 2014 • Updated at 8:29 AM EDT
The MBTA's first new rapid-transit station in 27 years is open at Somerville's Assembly Square.
Orange Line trains will now have a 10-minute ride from downtown Boston. The station is the capstone of Somerville's massive $1.5 billion Assembly Row development.
Assembly Row is not completed, though it's already home to dozens of retail outlets and restaurants, two new apartment complexes, a Legoland Discovery Center and a 12-screen movie theater.
While the station will open to passengers Tuesday, construction is expected to continue through November.
It's the first Orange Line station for Somerville and one of six new T stops slated to open there in the next decade.