MOScout Daily Update: FRA Hearing in House - NYTimes on MO - Puzzle of the Missing Workers and more...
FRA Hearing in House
Today the House Budget Committee will hear the Senate FRA bill (11AM). Rep. Nick Schroer, who has been vocal about adding Onder-esque language, filed three bills yesterday. I assume the Budget Committee will keep their focus on the Senate bill.
NYTimes on MO
NYTimes has three different stories with Missouri angles in the past two days…
MedEx (read it here)
· Some Democrats are eager to build on their Affordable Care Act victories in the Supreme Court by filling a gaping hole created along the way: the lack of Medicaid coverage for millions of low-income Americans in 12 states…
· Yet recent efforts to bring the expansion to more states have struggled… Missouri voters passed a Medicaid expansion ballot last summer, but the state’s Republican-led legislature refused to appropriate funding… Republican governors and legislators have often cited the potential costs of the program — states are responsible for 10 percent of the new spending, and the federal government 90 percent — as why they resist…
COVID Cases (read it here)
· Missouri offers the clearest example. Over the past week, it has reported more new Covid cases per capita than any other state, and they are concentrated in rural areas that have low vaccination rates, as Charles Gaba, a health care analyst, has noted…
· Vaccination is how this pandemic ends. And the Delta variant seems to be raising the human cost of vaccine skepticism.
Unemployment Benefits (read it here)
· By lunchtime, the representatives from the recruiting agency Express Employment Professionals decided to pack up and leave the job fair in the St. Louis suburb of Maryland Heights. Hardly anyone had shown up. “We were hoping we would see prepandemic levels,” said Courtney Boyle, general manager of Express. After all, Missouri had just cut off federal unemployment benefits.
· Business owners had complained that the assistance, as Gov. Mike Parson put it, “incentivized people to stay out of the work force.” He made Missouri one of the first four states to halt the federal aid; a total of 26 have said they will do so by next month. But in the St. Louis metropolitan area, where the jobless rate was 4.2 percent in May, those who expected the June 12 termination would unleash a flood of job seekers were disappointed.
· Work-force development officials said they had seen virtually no uptick in applicants since the governor’s announcement, which ended a $300 weekly supplement to other benefits. And the online job site Indeed found that in states that have abandoned the federal benefits, clicks on job postings were below the national average.
· Why businesses are having such trouble hiring when 9.3 million people were unemployed in May is a puzzle that has generated lots of speculation, but little hard evidence….
WSJ Also Looks At MO
Wall Street Journal also reporting on the puzzle of the missing workers reports from Missouri. Read it here.
· The number of unemployment-benefit recipients is falling at a faster rate in Missouri and 21 other states canceling enhanced and extended payments this month, suggesting that ending the aid could push more people to take jobs…
· Missouri cut off payments as of June 12, joining three other states as the first to do so. Seven states followed with an end on June 19, and this weekend, benefits are expiring in 10 more states. Four more states will curtail benefits by July 10.
· The number of workers paid benefits through regular state programs fell 13.8% by the week ended June 12 from mid-May—when many governors announced changes—in states saying that benefits would end in June, according to an analysis by Jefferies LLC economists. That compares with a 10% decline in states ending benefits in July, and a 5.7% decrease in states ending benefits in September…
· Some businesses in Missouri are already noticing a difference since the policy shift. Interest by job applicants began to pick up at Midas Hospitality’s Missouri locations a few weeks ago…
FYI
There’s lot of anecdotes about the labor shortage. We all see the signs and have gone into stores and restaurants now which aren’t fully staffed. But here’s the hardest data I have.
The last Missouri jobs report (see it here) shows that we have about 36,000 fewer people employed in Missouri than we did before COVID hit in March 2020. Our labor force is still smaller than it was then as well. We have about 21,000 fewer people in the civilian labor force than we did in the March 2020 report.
Transformative Workforce Academy
Here’s one solution to the labor crunch…
Press release: Amid acute labor shortages that are making national news, many local firms are exploring new avenues for recruiting quality talent. For these employers, Saint Louis University’s Transformative Workforce Academy (TWA) presents a welcome opportunity to access a largely untapped labor pool: people with criminal records. After a recent TWA virtual job fair, participating employers hired dozens of justice-involved jobseekers… Indeed, a Northwestern University study found that companies save $746 in turnover costs per justice-involved worker. These savings add up, especially when combined with the $2,400/employee available via the Work Opportunity Tax Credit for anyone hired within a year of a conviction or release from custody.
“We’re grateful for the growing movement of employers who understand that hiring justice-involved people makes good business sense,” said former state senator Jeff Smith, a TWA adviser who wrote “Mr. Smith Goes to Prison,” a book chronicling his year behind bars. “It also enhances public safety. Research shows that when people with criminal records find jobs, they are far less likely to commit a crime. Second chance employment is a win for jobseekers, employers, and the whole region.”
Hayes Joins Husch
Politico Influence reports that “Husch Blackwell Strategies, the Missouri-based lobbying firm run by one of Sen. Roy Blunt’s (R-Mo.) sons and one of his former chiefs of staff, is adding another former longtime staffer to the retiring senator, Keri Ann Hayes, to run a new practice for PAC and campaign resources. Hayes, who served as the NRSC’s director of corporate giving prior to her two decades with Blunt, will advise clients on PAC and executive-giving programs, including ensuring employees’ PAC contributions go farther, in addition to helping put on fundraisers…”
RFT on McCloskey Rally
Alternative Weekly Riverfront Times offers a blistering review of Mark McCloskey’s weekend rally. Read it here.
· Noted local criminal Mark McCloskey played host to a barbecue/political rally on Sunday afternoon, drawing tens of admirers to the sweltering parking lot of a closed outlet mall in St. Louis County to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the time he pulled a gun on a crowd of people who otherwise would never have noticed or cared he existed.
· Despite the fact that none of the big names who had been billed to speak at the June 27 event showed up, and despite the fact that ticket sales were so dismal attendance was opened to the public for free at the last minute, St. Louis' most gun-surrendering lawyer plowed right ahead with the First Annual Pink Shirt Guy BBQ and RINO Roast in the St. Louis Mills parking lot.
STL City E-Tax Plaintiffs Launch Website
Press release: Attorneys for plaintiffs [Bevis Schock and Mark Milton] in a proposed class-action lawsuit against the City of St. Louis and Gregory F.X. Daly, the City’s Collector of Revenue, have launched a new website (stlrefund.com) providing guidance to nonresidents on how to protest and seek refunds of their earnings taxes for days spent teleworking during the pandemic… The website (stlrefund.com) provides nonresidents with a form they may use to protest the City’s change in policy and seek a refund for their teleworking days…
Baker Funeral
MissouriNet reports on the funeral arrangements for former Rep. Brian Baker.
Visitation for former State Rep. Brian Baker is set for Friday evening from 6-8 at Heartland Family Ministries in Belton. The funeral is Saturday morning at 10:30, at Avenue Family Church in Kansas City.
New Committees
Ron Fitzwater formed a candidate committee (Fitzwater for Mayor ) to run for Jefferson City mayor. Fitzwater is the head of the Missouri Pharmacy Association, and pops to Rep. Travis Fitzwater. The committee treasurer is Marc Ellinger.
$5K+ Contributions
Invest in St. Louis Community College - $20,000 from John McDonnell.
Invest in St. Louis Community College - $15,000 from Missouri Laborers-Employers Cooperation and Education Trust.
Missouri United - $10,000 from Missouri Soybean Association.
Missouri United - $8,000 from Missouri Realtors PAC, Inc.
Missouri Democratic State Committee - $6,485 from MDP Federal Account.
Lobbyists Registrations
Jim Moody and Chris Moody deleted Gainwell Technologies LLC.
Shawn Rhoads deleted Advantage Capital Partners, and Lathrop GPM Consulting LLC.
Birthdays
Happy birthday to Tim Green.