State of the Cities 2018
Now in its 5th year, the National League of Cities’ annual State of the Cities report provides an in-depth analysis of mayoral speeches. The analysis pinpoints specific tactics and policies, as well as broader policy directions, and finds that:
- Economic development is the most prevalent major policy issue across mayoral speeches (58%) and has been for the past 5 years.
- Infrastructure, budgets and housing rise in importance this year, overtaking public safety. Mayors offered more detailed infrastructure plans this year, while presenting a narrower scope of discussion on public safety.
- Economic development, infrastructure, budgets, housing and public safety are consistently the top issues for the 5th year in a row.
How Americans have viewed surveillance and privacy since Snowden leaks | Pew Research Center
Five years ago this month, news organizations broke stories about federal government surveillance of phone calls and electronic communications of U.S. and foreign citizens, based on classified documents leaked by then-National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. The initial stories and subsequent coverage sparked a global debate about surveillance practices, data privacy and leaks.
Here are some key findings about Americans’ views of government information-gathering and surveillance, drawn from Pew Research Center surveys since the NSA revelations:
xkcd: Clickbait-Corrected p-Value
Hmmmmmmmmmm…
A Better Way To Think About This Month’s Jobs Numbers | FiveThirtyEight
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/jobs-report-growth-unemployment/
The unemployment rate, adjusted or otherwise, is a useful metric for economists, but it doesn’t quite capture how we tend to think about employment and joblessness in our day-to-day lives. What about your cousin who wants a gig but gave up looking a few months back? As far as the U-3 is concerned, your cousin isn’t in the labor force, so he isn’t part of the official unemployment rate.
States Turn to New Tool to Sustain Pension System Funding
http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/analysis/2018/05/16/states-turn-to-new-tool-to-sustain-pension-system-funding
Eager to strengthen the long-term financial health of their public-sector pension systems, officials in several states have embraced a nonpartisan, data-driven approach to more precisely assess their ability to fulfill the benefit promises made to public employees.
Called stress test reporting, this new practice can show policymakers how adverse economic scenarios could affect retirement system investments and state budgets. Because earnings on investments typically make up the largest share of pension fund revenue, lower returns or losses need to be offset by higher contributions from the state government and workers. The stress testing model created by The Pew Charitable Trusts also allows states to account for the condition of their economy and tax collections, offering a broad look at the impact of pensions on their overall fiscal health.
David C's Blog 
You must be logged in to post a comment.