jobs and employment	261
economics	201
state and local government	188
education	186
economic development	171
indiana	171
budget and spending	145
taxes	144
law and public policy	142
workforce and human capital	139

CBER Weekly Commentaries - 2003

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2001

January 3, 2003	The Invisible Story of Job Creation "When it comes to reviewing the state's economic performance, our attention is inevitably drawn to big events."
January 10, 2003	Why Extending I-69 is So Important "The counties with low household earnings are predominantly found in the southwest corner of the state."
January 17, 2003	In Search of a Silver Lining "It's been a gruesome quarter for the manufacturing economy."
January 24, 2003	Is Indiana Job Growth As Bad As They Say? "Throughout this entire recession, unemployment rates have been lower in our state than the national average -- by at least a full percentage point. Are we really better off than everyone else?"
January 31, 2003	Passing the Baton " ... we have learned that the U.S. economy entered the new year with its momentum nearly spent."
February 7, 2003	The Economy is Bad? Show Me the Numbers "As forecasters, we see an economy that is still sticking to the script."
February 14, 2003	Rewards to Skill Just Keep Growing "Whichever way you look at it, the distribution of income in this country -- as in other developed nations -- has widened significantly."
February 21, 2003	Taking On the Real Issue With Tax Cuts "While Democrats and Republican share a common desire for political power, their tax proposals reflect genuine differences in opinion about how the actions of government affect the economy."
February 28, 2003	The Message of the 2001 Recession "When you look at manufacturing employment, the recession of 2001 has been nearly twice as severe as the recession of 1991 and is only eclipsed by the devastating downturn we experienced in 1982 in terms of job loss."
March 7, 2003	Our Love-Hate Affair with Economic Report Cards "However much it may wound our pride at times, we would be well advised to keep an eye on what our competitors are doing."
March 14, 2003	Rethinking the Recession "The capacity of the still-fragile U.S. economic recovery to absorb losses like we saw last month is limited."
March 21, 2003	NAICS Arrives in Indiana "If we had better data on the "new" economy a few years earlier, perhaps we could have been able to think a bit more rationally about what it could and could not deliver."
March 28, 2003	Can Energize Indiana Run on Just One Battery? "We're in a race to attract new capital and new residents to spread their roots in our communities, and you don't make that happen by reneging on promises and changing the rules."
April 4, 2003	Taking Stock of the U.S. Economy "From the reports on employment, industrial activity, and retail sales, there have been very few safe harbors from the stagnation that descended over businesses and consumers alike."
April 11, 2003	Let's Be Realistic About Tobacco and Gambling Revenue "With lawyers' war chests fattened immeasurably, and the facade of tobacco's legal invincibility forever gone, even money says that tobacco companies will soon be joining asbestos producers on the list of extinct industries."
April 18, 2003	The Message in Population Movements "The development problems faced by the faster and slower growing regions of the state are quite different in nature."
April 25, 2003	The U.S. Economy Dodges a Bullet "The numbers show that the war displaced, but did not ultimately disrupt consumer spending."
May 2, 2003	Will This Recession Make Us Any Wiser? "It is sobering to know, but valuable to remember, that our bold pronouncements of "new rules" for the economy stand like crepe paper when the ill winds of declining investor and consumer confidence start to blow. "
May 9, 2003	Is Indiana's Economy Still Getting Worse? "The preliminary April employment totals, as adjusted for seasonal variation by the Bureau of Business Research, were down by 39,000 jobs statewide from their high point at the beginning of this year."
May 16, 2003	In Defense of Predators, Gougers, and Greed "For all of our post-Cold War bluster about the triumph of capitalism, the simple truth is that we don't really allow markets to freely function in the West."
May 23, 2003	The Dollar's Fall: Blessing or Curse? "Given the low average savings rates by Americans, the prospect of diminished levels of foreign investment cannot be taken lightly. "
May 30, 2003	The Manufacturing Economy is Hurting "Production-related jobs lost to technological change or global competition will not come back, at least in the same form, when demand starts to rise again."
June 6, 2003	Back to School for the Business Media "As arguments over economic policy routinely pit one advocate's statistics and projections against another's, the business media has too often failed to police the debate and flag the distortions that are inevitably served up by those in the arena. "
June 13, 2003	Will the Housing Industry Innovate? "...in an economy that has some manufacturers wondering if they will ever be able to raise their prices again, the price of new homes continues to rise."
June 20, 2003	It’s Medicare Reform That Needs Reforming "Does it really make sense for working taxpayers to dig into their pockets to pay for the ordinary medical expenses of the rich? "
June 27, 2003	No Community Left Behind "In the last decade and a half, jobs in production-related occupations have not only failed to keep up with hiring in the rest of the economy, in most lines of work they’ve actually shrunk in number."
July 4, 2003	Wake Up, You're Part of Indianapolis "With the latest wave of reclassifications, exactly half of our state's 92 counties are now considered to be part of an MSA. "
July 11, 2003	Rhetoric Meets Reality in Indiana Property Tax Reform "Most legislators would rather kiss a pig than vote again on anything as significant as HB 1001 right away."
July 18, 2003	Second Half Economy: Recovery or Disappointment? "The so-called 'jobless recovery' experienced in the wake of the 1991 recession is back with us again."
July 25, 2003	Recession in the Rear-View Mirror "The data clearly indicate that businesses across all sectors of the economy have been learning how to get more out of the equipment they already have."
August 1, 2003	We Restrict Trade At Our Own Peril "... extra dollars being collected by Indiana steelmakers are being paid by automakers, appliance manufacturers, and countless other industries who buy the product."
August 8, 2003	Tearing Down Jobs in Order to Build New Ones "Small companies create an enormous number of new jobs, but the data suggest that they simultaneously destroy a nearly equal number."
August 15, 2003	Time to Put Aside Old Economic Worries? "...the data are telling us quite clearly right now that the U.S. economy has moved on from the recession."
August 22, 2003	Action at Last on the Power Grid "When you consider that transmission lines are typically of very little value to those who lie in their path, and that any regulatory obstacle that blocks even a few miles of wire renders the entire line useless, it seems remarkable that they are built at all."
August 29, 2003	Understanding Indiana 's Housing Markets " ... lower priced housing is not quite the feather in our cap that some make it out to be."
September 5, 2003	Wanted: Solution to State Government Finance " Nearly every state in the country -- including Indiana -- is confronted with a budget-busting situation every time the economy takes a dip."
September 12, 2003	Getting Used to Stagnant Job Growth "There is no "bounce-back" in hiring in the aftermath of recession because employers have made adjustments to permanently eliminate the need for the lost jobs. "
September 19, 2003	Some Simple Ideas on Taxes "Far from the economist's dream of a world where taxes are unavoidable, and thus do not influence our decisions, the real world is one where some behaviors are smiled on by the tax collector and others are not."
September 26, 2003	Shifting Sands in the Motor Vehicle Industry "For the first time ever, Chrysler has been displaced by Toyota as the third best selling vehicle brand in America ."
October 3, 2003	The Persistence of Racial Inequality "The relevance of race in statistics on economic performance has been a persistent theme in our society."
October 10, 2003	Rethinking Why We Build Roads "Better roads bring better access, which is high octane fuel for any region’s economy."
October 17, 2003	Midwest Marches to a Different Drummer "From Wisconsin to Kentucky, west to Illinois and east to Ohio forms a block of states whose employment losses have been among the largest in the nation."
October 24, 2003	Unmasking False Trends and Finding Real Ones " ... those who project that new trend forward to warn of a future where domestic manufacturing ceases to exist are going over the edge."
October 31, 2003	Now That's What I Call Growth "The news that the overall economy grew at a blistering 7.2 percent annual rate during the months July through September effectively closes the book on the 2001 recession."
November 7, 2003	Grading Indiana 's Economic Performance " ... the challenges we face, particularly in plugging into the high technology, high growth side of the national economy, are enormous."
November 14, 2003	What Kind of Jobs Do You Want? "Indiana's manufacturers are, by necessity, world class competitors, but the forces that make them so will always restrict their payroll growth. "
November 21, 2003	Let's Learn Our Lessons on Property Tax Reform "Township-based assessment is a bad idea, pure and simple."
November 28, 2003	Is the Indiana Economy Getting Better? "On a seasonally adjusted basis, payroll employment is up by almost 40,000 jobs from the low point of July of this year."
December 5, 2003	Tracking the State Economy: It's a Whole Different Game "It is ironic that in this, the information age, we are actually receiving less data than in years past on states and regions."
December 12, 2003	Understanding Indiana 's Brain Drain " ... the real problem associated with Indiana 's brain drain is not the exodus of our state's educated people to opportunities in other states."
December 19, 2003	What the Employment Statistics Really Tell Us "Although Indiana's job gains of almost one percent since the year's mid-point are encouraging, we would need to gain another 80,000 jobs statewide just to catch up with the rest of the nation."
December 26, 2003	Enjoy These Stable Prices While They Last "The economy is not inflation-proof, yet every economic forecaster who has looked at the trends and has made a prediction of higher inflation so far has been burned by the refusal of actual prices to cooperate."

Center for Business and Economic Research - Ball State University

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CBER Weekly Commentaries - 2003