Bob CollinsThere’s a lot of money in Woodbury, one of the most affluent communities in Minnesota. But not enough for a life guard at the city’s Carver Lake and now a five year old boy is dead. From the sound of things, it’s lucky his rescuer is waking up today, too.
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MPR News Reflections and observations on the news
Economy
Times should be good again soon for restaurants in St. Louis. Missouri is cutting the minium wage back to $7.70 again after St. Louis had hiked it to $10 two months ago and it was to go up another $1 in January. Read more →
West St. Paul and South St. Paul have passed ordinances limiting the housing options for people who are low-income and disabled. One politician insists it’s not discrimination. Read more →
Wisconsin Public Radio reported that farmers in western Wisconsin have been visited by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and warned they’ll be back, suggesting the possibility of sweeping raids that farmers say could weaken the local economy.
Dairy workers around Durand, Wis., decided to leave after rumors swept the community that ICE was in town.
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he American workplace war on your private time has developed a new weapon, the
Boston Globe reports today — the workation. Read more →
The Mesabi Daily News has had it with the big-city folk trying to destroy the Iron Range’s way of life. Read more →
Researchers at the University of Washington studied Seattle’s phased-in increases — first from $9.47 to $11 per hour in 2015 and to $13 per hour in 2016 — and found the second wage increased reduced work hours in low-wage jobs by 9 percent while wages increased only 3 percent.
They concluded that the reduction in hours cost the average employee $179 per month, while the wage increase added only $54. Read more →
The fear that the Obama administration would take guns and ammunition away from Americans was great for the guns and ammunition business.
Now that Donald Trump, a strong gun rights advocate, is in the White House, times are tough.
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Here’s an idea that probably won’t catch on at the Minnesota Legislature: If you’re going to use taxpayer funds to bail out a single resort on Lake Mille Lacs, how about naming it? Read more →
Yesterday, the auctioneer showed up in Arkansaw, Wisc., — near Durand in Pepin County — and by lunch, 62 cows at Patnode Lane Holsteins were gone. Weston and Jenni Patnode were out of business after four generations on the land. Read more →
The economy is garbage, except on paper, for many people but Fed Chair Janet Yellen pushed for the rate increase saying the fundamentals of the U.S. economy warrant it. She sees it as a way to keep inflation at bay.
Neel Kashkari sees a different economy, which is interesting because the economy of Minnesota and surrounding states has been better than the rest of the country. Read more →
He had no family to attend the graduation and his friend Keyira Nunn, 17, a junior at the school, was shot and killed in a shooting late last Friday afternoon. She died at the scene.
So yesterday afternoon, a day after arresting a suspect in the killing, the two investigators for the the St. Paul Police Department attended the commencement, accompanied St. Paul Police Senior Cmdr. Tina McNamara, who heads the homicide unit. Read more →
Homelessness doesn’t look like it’s getting any better in the Twin Cities, but it’s not for lack of trying — and there are successes. Check out La Crosse, Wis.
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Storm Lake, apparently, is considered a model of how to keep rural America alive. Attract plenty of immigrants who’ll work in the drudgery of a processing plant for poor wages, go through the growing pains, and weather the hostility toward them as if what happened to rural America is somehow their fault. Read more →
At one time, IBM was considered an innovative, model employer, and boasted of the number of its employees who telecommuted. Those days are over.
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