CNE – Centro Para Una Nueva Economía – Center for a New Economy
Non-profit, economic research and policy development organization
There has been a heated public debate recently regarding the Commonwealth’s General Fund budget for fiscal year 2008. This debate has concentrated, specifically, on the financing mechanism that will be used to plug the $1 billion gap between exprected revenues of $8.488 billion and budgeted expenditures of $9.488 billion.
According to data recently published by Bloomberg and the Bespoke Investment Group, the price of oil has risen 729.58 percent from its low on Nov. 19, 2001 to its closing high of $138.54 on June 6 of this year. As is often the case, there is no single factor that explains this phenomenon in its entirety by itself.
The work of democracy, ostensibly government in the name of the people, cannot be carried out behind the closed doors of proverbial smoke-filled roomes for it to be done properly. Without accountability and transparency, democracy rapidly devolves into either the tyranny of the majority or, perhaps worse, the tyranny of the minority.
Last week, the U.S. House Natural Resources Committee, Subcommittee on Insular Affairs, led by Del. Donna M. Christensen (D-U.S.V.I.), and the U.S. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Subcommittee on Informacion Policy, Census, and National Archives, led by Rep. William Lacy Clay (D-Mo.), held a joint oversight hearing on “Census Data: Special Issues Related to U.S. Territories.”
The U.S. Census Bureau recently released data from the 2006 Puerto Rico Community Survey. This survey is the local equivalent of the American Community Survey that is carried out annually to update demographic, economic, housing, and social data at the state and county level in the United States.
Industrial policy is defined as any government initiative that (i) stimulates specific economic activities, (ii) promotes structural change from low productivity to higher productivity activities, and (iii) foments the change from traditional activities to more dynamic activities, regardless of whether those activities are located within industry or manufacturing per se.
In 2005, Washington state considered enacting a bill to ban discrimination against gays and lesbians. Microsoft, one of the largest employers in that state, caved in to pressure from conservative groups and initially decided not to support the measure.
Local bankers and entrepreneurs have long complained of having to pay a “Puerto Rico premium” to entice U.S. and foreign investors to invest in the island. This premium often takes the form of a slightly higher yield or return on local investments that nonetheless have a risk profile similar to comparable investments in the United States.
