By Oregon Tax News The economic impact of high student debt is a growing concern as more young adults are entering the workforce with a staggering debt burden and limited employment options.  Some experts say the student loan industry is a bubble similar to the housing bubble that popped five […]

Columbia River Crossing Bridge knocked by taxpayer group By Oregon Tax News  The watchdog taxpayer group, Taxpayers for Common Sense (TCS), has included the Columbia River Crossing Bridge in its list of what it terms “common sense cuts to avoid the fiscal cliff.” The cuts total $2.0 trillion, which is […]

Top 25 richest people of all time by celebrity net worth (adjusted for inflation). 1. Mansa Musa I (Malian Empire 1280-1337) – Net Worth $400 Billion 2. The Rothschild Family – $350 Billion 3. John D. Rockefeller (Richest single American who ever lived) – Net Worth $340 Billion 4. Andrew […]

Bloomberg business video gives stock tips on how to survive the upcoming fiscal tax cliff.

by Sheryll Poe, Free Enterprise U.S. Chamber of Commerce Power company workers from Decatur Utilities drove hours from Alabama to lend a hand in New Jersey restoring electricity to the thousands who desperately needed it, only to be told by the local power company workers union they were not welcome […]

Recreational Marijuana in Washington: Now What? By Paula A. Barran and Iris K. Tilley Barran Liebman Oregon Law Firm As of this writing, it appears that Washington is going to pass Initiative Measure 502 which begins: “The people intend to stop treating adult marijuana use as a crime and try […]

Portland firm creates James Bond commercial for Sony By Oregon Small Business Association  The Portland-based advertising firm of Wieden+Kennedy created a commercial for Sony featuring James Bond storming an embassy, being tracked and identified with the use of the latest Sony technology. The airing of the video, titled “Mouse and […]

Oregon Business Employment Dynamics: Fourth Quarter, 2011 by Phoebe Colman Oregon Employment Department In the fourth quarter of 2011, seasonally adjusted gross job gains in Oregon’s private sector decreased from 100,035 to 92,624, while gross job losses increased from 78,502 to 92,328 (Graph 1). The result of these changes was […]

Patrick Emerson PhD , OSU Economist Oregon Economics Blog And a cautionary tale of trying to control them. Before getting all pedantic let’s cut to the chase and point out two things about ‘price gouging’ now that the topic is all the rage (see here and here) given gas and […]

Food for Thought: Optimism and Intel By Josh Lehner Oregon Office of Economic Analysis Blog Almost everyone expects the recovery to remain lackluster into at least the middle of next year. However, a growing number of economic forecasters are becoming more optimistic over the medium term (2-5 years out). For […]