“I am convinced it is a good program.” Those are the comments of House speaker Tom Tillis who raised the eye brows of conservatives last Friday when he said law makers were rethinking their decision to eliminate the Teaching Fellows program (See news article). Phasing out of the Teaching Fellows program was part of the [...]
Monthly Archives: September 2011
Silly and Uninformed Spin on Unemployment Numbers
As noted here on Friday, the NC Employment Security Council announced that NC’s unemployment rate jumped from 10.1 in July to 10.4 percent in August. Naturally, the state Democratic party seized on the numbers to lay blame on the GOP-crafted state budget enacted for all of two months for the unemployment rise. Today, the Employment Security [...]
The State Employment Security Commission Tries to Put Positive Spin on Rising Unemployment
The unemployment rate in North Carolina rose from 10.1 to 10.4 percent in August, reports the state Employment Security Commission. However, in the press release announcing the increase the commission began by noting employment increased by 16,500. Its not until the fourth paragraph down the agency reports the ranks of the unemployed rose by 11,747 [...]
NC SAT scores fail to improve — again.
Scores of the North Carolina students on the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) exam declined slightly from last year, according to a press release from the Department of Public Instruction. North Carolina students posted an average score of 1001 on the national test, down three points from last year. The average score nationally in 2011 was [...]
Consumer Spending Not the Problem During Recession
The indispensable economist Robert Higgs updates us on an ongoing theme I have discussed here a number of times in the past: the myth that it is consumer spending that drives economic growth and recession. Dips in consumer spending are the result of, not the cause of, a growing or slumping economy. Higgs presents the [...]
