Transform Solar will lay-off at least 250 employees, shutting down its Nampa, Idaho facility.
Earlier this week, Micron-owned Transform Solar, a maker of high-tech solar cells, announced it’s closing and laying-off at least 250 people over the next three months.
We first reported Transform has been reimbursed for just over $1 million of its $3.6 million workforce development training grant from the state of Idaho. That was using data from January 29. The Idaho Department of Labor reports as of May 30, Transform has been reimbursed for $1.68 million of that grant. Continue Reading →
Less than a quarter of Idahoans 25 or older have a bachelor's degree or higher.
There are fewer people with college degrees in Idaho than in many of its neighboring states and the nation.
U.S. Census Bureau data from 2010 shows 24.4 percent of Idahoans aged 25 or older have a bachelor’s degree or higher. The national average in 2010 was 28.2 percent.
A report from Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce predicts 61 percent of the jobs available in Idaho by 2018 will require an education beyond high school. Continue Reading →
WHEREAS, public employees at the federal, state, county and city levels dedicate their careers to public service by contributing to professional industries such as health care, education, public safety, conservation, and national defense; and Continue Reading →
The Idaho Department of Labor reports the active grants range from about $10,000 up to nearly $6 million. Businesses typically have two years to use the grant money, but Labor Department spokesman Bob Fick says contracts are often extended.
Here’s a list of the active workforce training grants: Continue Reading →
The Idaho Legislature put its stamp of approval on 342 bills this year, more than half of the measures introduced, according to legislative services.
As of today, Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter has signeda fraction of them, 182. The session ended last Thursday. That means Otter has ten days to sign or veto bills he received post-session. After that they automatically become law without his signature. The governor has five days to sign or veto if he received the bill when the Legislature was still in session.
A passenger checked in at the Boise Airport early this week.
For the last week, StateImpact Idaho has been reporting on recent cuts to flights in and out of Boise. The guiding question: will airlines’ cutbacks affect Idaho’s prospects for an economic turnaround?
Airlines are, of course, responding to broader economic conditions when they determine to stop offering a flight between, say, Boise and Los Angeles. They’re considering the cost of fuel and the demand for service. The chart below gives a sense of just how that demand for flights in and out of Boise has changed over the last decade. Not surprisingly, many routes saw a substantial increase in ridership between 2000 and 2007.
It’s the declines since that time that are particularly telling. Continue Reading →
The Bureau of Labor Statistics has been compiling interesting data on the number of job openings and job turnover each month. It’s dubbed JOLTS, a handy acronym for Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey.
As of January 31, 2012 there were almost 3.5 million job openings in the U.S. During the same month more than 4 million people were hired for jobs and almost 4 million people either quit, retired, were fired or laid off.
The data isn’t broken down by state, but it is by region. The Idaho Department of Labor currently has 2,317 jobs posted on its searchable website. That doesn’t include jobs that are posted through other sites like Monster, Craigslist or Indeed. Continue Reading →
Idaho’s average annual jobless rate in 2011 wasn’t much different from 2010. Data released this week from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows Idaho’s average unemployment rate in 2011 was 8.7 percent, down one-tenth of a percent from 2010.
Idaho Department of Labor Regional Economist Kathryn Tacke says there are a couple of reasons for Idaho’s stagnant rate. One, the recession hit hard here, and recovery has been exceedingly slow. The second reason: Idaho has a significant teen population trying to enter the workforce, which can keep the jobless rate high. Continue Reading →
24.75 percent of houses sold in Idaho last year were foreclosures
Almost 25 percent of the houses sold in Idaho last year were foreclosure sales. That’s according to RealtyTrac, a company which specializes in housing market and foreclosure data analysis. Last year, foreclosure sales were about 23 percent of all houses sold, nationally.
Other western states had among the highest rates of foreclosures sales in 2011. Numbers for Idaho’s neighboring states like Montana and Wyoming are not available because RealtyTrac doesn’t have “sufficient data” for those states. Continue Reading →
In about 30 minutes, outdoor winter recreators can escape the snow-less city of Boise and find themselves in a winter wonderland. It’s the Bogus Basin Mountain Recreation Area. Downhill ski slopes along with Nordic and snowshoe trails are perched on the far southern end of Boise County, just across the Ada County line. It’s this seasonal ski hill that is Boise County’s top private employer.
Justin Marty / Flickr
Bogus Basin Ski Area, outside Boise, Idaho
Bogus Basin employs on average 200 to 300 people each year. That’s according to data from the Idaho Department of Labor. To get the data, the department calculated the average number of employees between October 2010 and September 2011. So, it’s not always an accurate measure of what’s really happening.
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