DAILY NEWS
Lobbyist Bingo, 2nd best tax break, Murray takes a stand…
Monday, January 26, 2015
STATE GOVERNMENT
EDITOR’S NOTE — Watch the hearing on TVW at 1:30 p.m.
► At Crosscut — Legislators look at bridging gender pay gap — “Even today, women are paid 80 cents for every dollar earned by men for similar work,” said Rep. Tana Senn (D-Mercer Is). Senn and Sen. Annette Cleveland (D-Vancouver) plan to introduce companion bills to require employers to provide valid reasons — such as differences in education, training or experience — if employees challenge pay disparities between workers of the opposite sex for essentially the same work.
► In the (Everett) Herald — Inslee to area lawmakers: Step up for transportation package — A spokesman said Friday that there is no nexus between the perceived lack of political support and the number of county projects included in the governor’s $12.2 billion proposal.
► In the P.S. Business Journal — Survey: State health exchange experience overall positive but customer service needs work — Of all people surveyed, 64 percent didn’t have problems applying or enrolling with Healthplanfinder. However, 28 percent of respondents labeled the enrollment process difficult.
BOEING
► In the P.S. Business Journal — Boeing to build 900 jetliners yearly by 2020, 91 percent in Washington state — What this means for the state is that Boeing will continue to be a major driver of the state’s economy, made more certain by the fact that the 777X assembly will happen here.
LOCAL
► In today’s Tri-City Herald — Farmworker class-action lawsuit could affect Mid-Columbia farmers, farmworkers — The state Supreme Court is being asked to decide whether farmers are required to pay farmworkers who earn wages based on how much they pick additional, separate pay for rest breaks.
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
► At TPM — GOP’s new Social Security playbook: Pit disabled against retirees — Conservatives have long searched for an effective message against Social Security. Now, they seem to have found a new one to try as they set up a fight over the 80-year-old program in the coming Congress: The disabled are robbing the retired.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Who needs Iowa, New Hampshire and other primaries, when the billionaire class gets to choose which nominee can afford to run?
► At Politico — Charles Koch: We’re just getting started — Charles Koch on Saturday signaled to hundreds of donors, operatives and conservative leaders gathered in the California desert that the political operation he and his brother David created was just getting started.
► In today’s Washington Post — Partisan divide in federal employee legislation — When it comes to federal employees, one party wants to give, the other plans to take away.
NATIONAL
► In the NY Times — Middle class shrinks as more fall out instead of climbing up — In the late 1960s, more than half of the households in the United States were squarely in the middle, earning, in today’s dollars, $35,000 to $100,000 a year. Few people noticed or cared as the size of that group began to fall, because the shift was primarily caused by more Americans climbing the economic ladder into upper-income brackets. But since 2000, the middle-class share of households has continued to narrow, the main reason being that more people have fallen to the bottom. At the same time, fewer of those in this group fit the traditional image of a married couple with children at home, a gap increasingly filled by the elderly.
► At AFL-CIO Now — Union Plus scholarship deadline is Jan. 31 — Time is running out to apply for the 2015 Union Plus college scholarship program for union members and their children. Applications must be submitted by noon Eastern time on Jan. 31. The awards will range from $500 to $4,000 and are for study beginning in the fall each year.
PARTY PLANNING
The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 10 a.m.