Less is more

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Credit: Flickr/Rob_Cornelius

Home office. Credit: Flickr/Rob_Cornelius

It’s Wednesday, and don’t you wish tomorrow was the last day of the workweek? Shortening the traditional five-day workweek has been floated for years as a way to reduce layoffs and bring down overhead costs. Could it work as a national policy to stimulate the economy?

Paul Solman at the NewsHour Business Desk responds to this question with a response from Dean Baker at the New York Daily News, who suggests a tax break for employers who reduce the workweek:

“How would this help the economy? The tax break would allow the employer to compensate workers for fewer hours up to some limit, say a maximum of $2,500 per worker. That would cut work hours but maintain staffing levels.”

Time Magazine reports this week that Utah’s state government is trying out a four-day workweek experiment that’s getting praise around the state so far.

The Paid Vacation Act is going before Congress soon, and WNYC’s Brian Lehrer Show looks at the work-life balance and how giving folks a break could mean saving money for employers and saving sanity for employees.

In France, the 35-hour work week and at least four weeks vacation are the norm, and The Daily News’ Baker says that this doesn’t just sound good to overworked Americans – in fact it can increase productivity.

“The advantages of a so-called 4-10 schedule are clear: less commuting, lower utility bills. But there have been unexpected benefits as well, even for people who aren’t state employees. By staying open for more hours most days of the week, Utah’s government offices have become accessible to people who in the past had to miss work to get there in time.”

But the lack of time in the office could force businesses to do what many have already had to learn in these hard times – how to do more with less. This NPR piece from last July talks about the challenges businesses face with a smaller number of workers at a given time.

Financing the fires

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Station Fire, Los Angeles. Credit: Anthony Citrano/ZigZagLens.com

Station Fire, L.A. Credit: Anthony Citrano/ZigZagLens.com

The fires burning in the Angeles National Forest near Los Angeles have already cost two lives and thousands of acres of protected land. How much will the emergency spending to control the disaster cost the already bankrupt state?

Patt Morrison of Pasadena-based public radio NPR station KPCC reported this morning that the California Department of Finance has spent $106 million out of a $182 million emergency firefighting fund.

Even before the latest fire, California’s resources were burned out on fire control costs. In this piece from last July, the LA Times reported that fire service costs had grown exponentially:

“Wildfire costs are busting the Forest Service budget. A decade ago, the agency spent $307 million on fire suppression. Last year, it spent $1.37 billion. Fire is chewing through so much Forest Service money that Congress is considering a separate federal account to cover the cost of catastrophic blazes. In California, state wildfire spending has shot up 150% in the last decade, to more than $1 billion a year.”

At the time I wrote this blog, the biggest fear for radio and television stations in the region is the threat the fire poses to Mt. Wilson, where most of LA’s communications towers are set up. Media blog LA Observed reports that “Several area radio stations without backup sites at other facilities could be especially vulnerable, although information coming out of the fire area is understandably incomplete.”

PBS station KCET has a warning ticker on their its Web site, noting that services could be interrupted due to fire damage on Mt. Wilson. By the time you read this the fires could have already consumed Mt. Wilson. In fact, fire officials were predicting that such an occurrence was only a matter of when, not if, it would happen. Endangered fire fighters were already pulled from the top of Mt. Wilson for safety reasons.

For the latest on the Station Fire, follow LA public media resources SoCal Connected (on Twitter, @socalconnected) and KPCC’s Patt Morrison (@patt_Morrison). KPCC is also asking readers to send in their images of the fires and stories from the local area.

Hurricane economics

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Credit: Flickr user leh4

Four years ago, Hurricane Katrina slammed into New Orleans and threw the economy of the Gulf Coast into a tailspin. While national coverage has largely moved on, local broadcasters in these areas are still grappling with the storm’s lingering effects.

Radio news program Mississippi Edition at Mississippi Public Broadcasting in Jackson spoke with former Mississippi Governor William Winter and Richard Nathan of the Nelson A Rockefeller Institute of Government about how recovery is faring four years on.

Back in March, MPB analyzed the progress of where federal recovery money has gone and how it should be spent.

In 2005, David Lee Simmons left New Orleans following the hurricane and flood. Now’s he’s the Arts Contributor at Public Broadcasting Atlanta – one of thousands who moved to Atlanta after Katrina. PBA show City Café’s John Lemley program spoke with Simmons about his life has changed since the move.

There are several investigative projects that are looking at the Katrina recovery in various fields. ProPublica recently partnered with the New York Times to take a deeper look at health care after Hurricane Katrina. The Greater New Orleans Data Center is analyzing how New Orleans is faring in the national recession, by tracking neighborhood recovery indicators, and making local, state and federal policy recommendations. This piece from WWNO in New Orleans further reports on the GNODC’s work.

For more on the Hurricane Katrina anniversary, PRX has a playlist featuring stories ranging from how pets are faring since Katrina to the state of levees four years after they were destroyed.

Tonight on Tavis Smiley, historian Douglas Brinkley talks about his hometown and the recovery efforts in the context of other disasters in American history.