Molly Messick was StateImpact Idaho's broadcast reporter until May 2013. Prior to joining StateImpact and Boise State Public Radio, she was a reporter and host for Wyoming Public Radio. She is a graduate of Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
Single mom Kelly Barker has found short-term work, and hopes the job will last.
The unemployment rate has ticked down in recent months, nationally and here in Idaho. Two of the people StateImpact Idaho has followed through its “Jobless in Idaho” series are among those who have made progress in finding work. But they haven’t simply landed jobs and resumed the lives they had before unemployment.
When we first met Kelly Barker, a single mom in her mid-40s who lives in Meridian, she had been out of work for seven months. She talked about the “what-ifs” – the fears she couldn’t shake from her mind.
A sign advertises a foreclosed home in Nampa, Idaho's Blackhawk Subdivision.
Idaho borrowers will receive close to $100 million from the $26 billion agreement struck between government officials and five of the nation’s largest banks. That’s according to a statement from the Idaho Attorney General’s office, released this morning. Here are the specifics, according to that release:
The agreement provides an estimated $99,857,551 in direct relief to Idaho homeowners whose mortgages are owned and serviced by any of the five settling banks and to individuals whose mortgages were serviced by one of the settling banks and who lost their homes in foreclosures. It also creates loan servicing standards that the settling banks must follow. Continue Reading →
A worker monitored a conveyor belt at a Potlatch Corporation production facility in Lewiston in 2006. The company has since laid off workers.
Brookings Institution economist Gary Burtless highlights recent national gains in the manufacturing and construction sectors after last week’s news that the unemployment rate has dropped to 8.3 percent. However Burtless puts those gains in perspective, writing:
Service-producing employers in the private sector are the source of an overwhelming share of net new employment in the United States. Since January 2011 the private service sector has accounted for four-fifths of private-sector job growth and more than nine-tenths of overall job growth. — Gary Burtless, Brookings Institution
Nationally, construction employment has increased by 2 percent since January of 2011. That said, construction payrolls remained down by about a quarter compared to pre-recession levels.
Compared to the situation here in Idaho, that actually sounds pretty good. Between 2007 — when construction employment peaked in the state — and the end of last year, the number of construction jobs in Idaho dropped by about 44 percent. Continue Reading →
Micron shares fell nearly 3 percent today, closing the day at $7.73. That’s following the news of CEO Steve Appleton’s death in a small plane crash at the Boise airport on Friday. Micron named its president and chief operating officer, Mark Durcan, to the CEO position on Saturday.
Analysis of Micron’s position in the wake of Appleton’s death predicts the company may face some “short-term weakness” but that the long-term outlook for the company is strong.
A piece in The Wall Street Journal today indicates that Appleton’s passing may slow consolidation in the memory chip industry. The piece observes that “Micron is the last remaining U.S. competitor in an industry that American companies once dominated,” and describes Appleton’s influence this way: Continue Reading →
Click on the above image to see Gallup's interactive map.
According to a new analysis from polling firm Gallup, Idahoans are more pessimistic about the national economy than most. The state was among the ten least confident, tied with Nevada, Florida and Ohio.
Gallup explains there aren’t clear patterns among the states that register the lowest levels of economic confidence. “[T]he top 10 states vary by region and political leanings, including the most (Hawaii, along with D.C.) and least (Utah) Democratic states,” Gallup’s Jeffery Jones writes.
That said, Idahoans do have reason for concern. The state is one of the few that watched unemployment rise after June 2009, the date that marks the recession’s official end, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. (For a comprehensive look at unemployment in Idaho, be sure to take a look at StateImpact‘s new unemployment app.)
Economic confidence declined in all states in 2011, according to Gallup’s survey, but it declined the least in Idaho. The state has lagged in Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index since 2009.
Steve Appleton became Micron's CEO in 1994. He died at age 51 on Feb. 3, 2012
Micron Technology CEO Steve Appleton died in a plane crash this morning. His death has been met with shock and sorrow in Boise, where Appleton was known for his influence as a business leader and philanthropist. Micron Technology remains one the state’s largest employers, despite recent cutbacks.
Retired Boise State University Professor Dick Payne, one of Steve Appleton’s early mentors, today remembered when he first met Appleton. It was on the tennis courts at the university. Appleton had character, Payne says.
“One of the things that stood out is – he never gave up,” says Payne. “He could be down a set and just pull it out. I admire that a great deal – his tenacity, honesty. He made fair calls.”
Payne says Appleton was also a promising student.  “I think, ‘Here’s a guy that is going to do well.’ I had no dream that he could do so well,” Payne recalls. “I felt like – here’s a sharp guy, a good guy. And they win sometimes in this world!” Continue Reading →
Like the national unemployment rate, which now stands at 8.3 percent, Idaho’s jobless rate has ticked down in recent months. In December, the state’s rate stood at 8.4 percent. Put in other terms, Idaho’s economy has added 8,000 jobs since September of last year. What’s harder to know is what kinds of jobs people are finding, and what kinds of compromises — lower wages, odd hours? — they’re having to make. For an anecdotal response to those questions, StateImpact sat down with Larry Willis, a workforce consultant in the Idaho Department of Labor’s Meridian office.
Q: This office assists people in lots of ways. They can file for unemployment insurance benefits, or use computers here to search for jobs or work on resumes. How many people pass through most days?
A: That’s a tough question, but particularly on Mondays — that’s generally our busy day — you’re probably going to see couple of hundred people come through here. There’s probably, at any given time, 20 or 30 people in our lobby, and it just rotates throughout the day.
Q: You coordinate a professional networking group. What have you observed about individuals’ experiences as they try to get jobs at this particular moment? Continue Reading →
Gov. Otter delivered his State of the State speech at the Capitol earlier this month.
Idaho Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter is not alone among governors in pushing for tax cuts as states’ budget crunches begin to ease. This story on NPR’s Morning Edition highlighted Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam’s push for reductions in the state’s tax on food and the estate tax. According to the story, that plan is drawing criticism from the state’s employees association, since state workers haven’t seen raises in years.
Here in Idaho, Gov. Otter last week said he might reverse course on his earlier view that the state should make $45 million in tax cuts, but provide $41 million in one-time, merit-based bonuses for state employees only if revenue meets projections. Continue Reading →
Nowela Virginie and her daughters often visit social worker Marcia Munden at Catholic Charities of Idaho.
In the last few years, more than 4,000 refugees have found their way to Idaho. They’ve come from Africa, and from East and South Asia. Most came to Boise. For years, the city’s strong economy, good quality affordable housing and supportive community created an especially favorable environment for refugee resettlement. Now, the recession has shifted that picture.
Tomorrow's story centers on Nowela Virginie, who came to Boise three years ago after spending much of her life in a refugee camp in Tanzania.
Idaho residents know well the reversal of fortune the state has seen since the start of the recession. The state, which not so long ago had the fastest growing economy in the nation, has been hit hard. In a broadcast story tomorrow, we’ll look at how Idaho’s economic troubles have affected the state’s refugee population, focusing in on a particular family.
First, a little background. How many refugees are resettled in Idaho each year? Here are the numbers, according the the Idaho Office for Refugees, which has statewide responsibility for providing assistance and services for refugees. Continue Reading →
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