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Washington is finally moving to better regulate the real estate appraisal industry, with regulators yesterday proposing new rules to strengthen appraiser independence.
An interesting proposal will be on the ballot this fall in Michigan. The measure, put forth by Michigan Energy, Michigan Jobs, would increase the state’s renewable energy requirement to 25 percent by 2025, more than double what it is today. The ballot measure would place this requirement in the state’s constitution, which would make it less susceptible to being overturned and also allow citizen’s to dictate the state’s energy future.
Today, the last state enrolled in a federal program designed to keep unemployment checks flowing, Idaho, lost its eligibility.
In 2010, Federal-State Extended Benefits program enrolled over a million people. Why stop the benefits while the national unemployment rate remains over 8%? The Wall Street Journal reports on the reason for its demise:
A Georgetown Public Policy Institute report shows the degree to which the Great Recession has exacerbated the education gap. Not only did workers without a college degree lose “nearly four out of five jobs during the recession,” but the least-educated workers, those without high school degrees, have continued to lose jobs during the recovery.
It's well known that seniors are easy prey for scam artists of every kind. What is less well-known is how big this problem is and how many of the scam artists wear suits and work for major financial service firms. Seniors were major targets of mortgage brokers seeking to push homeowners into subprime loans and win higher commissions. Seniors also get exploited by investment advisors pushing lousy annuity policies and other dubious financial products.
Ben Protess made an interesting comparison today in a DealBook article on the rise of CFTC Chief Gary Gensler and the agency's successful work on the LIBOR rate fixing scandal:
Pennsylvania state court judge Robert Simpson refused to issue a preliminary injunction against the state’s controversial voter ID legislation today, despite allegations that the law was discriminatory and passed for partisan gain.