Ross Hunter

Month: September 2011

  • WA State Budget Update – Special Session

    WA State Budget Update – Special Session

    The papers today are reporting that Governor Gregoire is calling us (the legislature) into a special session, most likely in late November after the next revenue forecast. This is a good idea, as doing so will give us about 3 more months of traction on whatever changes we make. As you may have heard, the…

  • Planet Money podcast – I hope it isn’t prescient

    NPR’s “Planet Money” show is interesting enough that I listened to it while exercising at the gym today. This may say more about me than about the show, but I find it fascinating. It’s hard to make this stuff interesting and they do a great job. This week they talk about Japan’s “lost decade” of…

  • Washington State Revenue Forecast

    Washington State Revenue Forecast

    I don’t comment much on the “other Washington” but I have to say that I’m a little frustrated at the game of “chicken” we’re seeing played, and the impact we expect it to have here in “our Washington.” The foodfight they had about the debt limit had drastic impacts on consumer and investor confidence, and…

  • Continuing Economic Distress

    Continuing Economic Distress

    This is a fascinating chart that shows the difference between the current recession and everything after the Great Depression. As you go further back in time the data become less and less comparable to today’s situation, so we can’t really look at the craziness in the 19th century. I’m reading a lot of economics these…