Welcome to The WonkLine, a daily 10 a.m. roundup of the latest news about health care, the economy, national security, immigration and climate policy. This is what we’re reading. Tell us what you found in the comments section below. You can also follow The Wonk Room on Twitter.
Economy
According to the New York Times, before its collapse, the investment bank Lehman Brothers “used a small company — its ‘alter ego,’ in the words of a former Lehman trader — to shift investments off its books.”
“The push to return unemployed workers to the nation’s payrolls is hamstrung by a decades-old legacy of poor schooling that has left tens of millions of Americans without the basic reading or math skills necessary for today’s jobs,” the Washington Post reports.
In a federal filing yesterday, bailed out insurance giant AIG “strongly objected” to limits on compensation placed onto it by Special Master for Compensation Ken Feinberg.
Health Care
“Public outrage over double-digit rate hikes for health insurance may have helped push President Obama’s healthcare overhaul across the finish line, but the new law does not give regulators the power to block similar increases in the future.”
“Taxpayers earning less than $200,000 a year will pay roughly $3.9 billion more in taxes — in 2019 alone — due to healthcare reform, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation, Congress’s official scorekeeper.”
“A judge ruled Monday against Massachusetts health insurers in a dispute over premiums with state regulators.”
Immigration
The Labor Department report on hours worked and earnings by state reveals a positive correlation between state hourly earnings and the percentage of immigrants.
US Citizenship and Immigration Services has received only 13,500 requests for H1-b high-skilled visas, which is significantly lower than the 42,000 requests filed during the same period last year and the 65,000 visas allotted for 2010.
Yesterday, the Center for American Progress released a report highlighting the flaws of SBInet — a program focused on transforming border control through technology and infrastructure — and proposing recommendations to address border security.
Climate Change
In “one of the most concrete signs yet that glaciers are disappearing in Peru” from global warming, a “huge glacier broke off and plunged into a lake,” causing a “75-foot tsunami wave that swept away at least three people and destroyed a water processing plant.”
The Change to Win Investment Group has called on Massey Energy to “immediately seek the resignation of Donald L. Blankenship as Chairman and CEO,” as “bodies of all 29 West Virginia coal miners killed in an explosion last week have been recovered from the mine.”
Deere & Co. is under fire from FreedomWorks and the National Center for Public Policy Research in television advertisements “that claim the company’s participation in the U.S. Climate Action Partnership in supporting cap-and-trade legislation is “almost a suicidal business strategy.”
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