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☆ Amazon Union President Chris Smalls Seen Fighting Worker in Video
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Katherine Long | Jack Newsham | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +27 min

On the night of December 5, the president of the Amazon Labor Union pummeled another union member. Some longtime Amazon Labor Union organizers decided to begin organizing on their own, without Smalls. All three said they believe in Smalls' mission and support the goals of the Amazon Labor Union, but worry about Smalls' ability to lead. Amazon Labor Union members consoled each other after the union lost the vote at its second warehouse, LDJ5, last April. One purpose of the organization appears to be to raise funds for the Amazon Labor Union, according to its certificate of incorporation.

☆ Rising Rates Take Some Shine Off Private Markets
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-03 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

After years of shifting money into private market investments, public pension and investment funds are taking a fresh look at publicly traded debt, thanks to the highest yields in more than a decade. “Bonds are back,” said California State Teachers’ Retirement System investment chief Christopher Ailman . He predicted that public pension funds will shift an additional 2% to 5% of assets into publicly traded debt, reversing a multidecade trend of shrinking fixed-income portfolios.

☆ A grassroots group took on Amazon and won. Then came the hard part
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-01 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +11 min

Amazon still refuses to recognize the union or come to the bargaining table, dashing the Staten Island workers’ hopes of creating their first contract. Union organizer Christian Smalls (L) celebrates following the April 1, 2022, vote for the unionization of the Amazon Staten Island warehouse in New York. “I told Christian, ‘We have a problem, you need to stop traveling, you need to focus on the workers,’” Goodall told CNN. The company has claimed the independent federal agency tasked with overseeing union elections exerted “inappropriate and undue influence” with the Staten Island effort. An Amazon employee signs a labor union authorization for representation form outside the Amazon LDJ5 fulfillment center in the Staten Island borough of New York, on Monday, Feb. 7, 2022.

☆ The Unraveling of the U.S. News College Rankings
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-21 | by ( Melissa Korn | Photographs Christopher Capozziello For The Wall Street Journal | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Yale Law School Dean Heather Gerken floated the idea past a small circle of colleagues. And then, on Nov. 16, she started the revolt. Like many university administrators, Ms. Gerken had tried for years to get U.S. News & World Report to rethink its law-school rankings. The problem for Ms. Gerken wasn’t Yale Law’s score—it had been No. She worried about the broader effect on schools and their priorities.

☆ Some Public Pension Funds Are Pulling Back on Private Equity
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-20 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Some U.S. public pension and investment funds are pulling back on private equity after a decade of state and local retirement systems aggressively pursuing the expensive, risky and hard-to-trade asset class. Maryland’s $65 billion retirement system is investing less new money in private equity. At Alaska’s $77 billion state fund, the investment chief wants to cancel a planned ramp-up. And the $615 million pension fund of Mendocino County, Calif., last month opted against introducing private equity to its investment mix.

☆ U.S. Stocks Gain; First Republic Keeps Falling
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-20 | by ( Caitlin Ostroff | Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

U.S. stocks climbed Monday on hopes for stability in the banking sector after regulators engineered a deal for Swiss banking giant UBS to take over rival Credit Suisse . The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 382.60 points, or 1.2%, to 32244.58, its largest one-day percentage gain since Jan. 6. The S&P 500 rose 34.93 points, or 0.9%, to 3951.57. The tech-focused Nasdaq Composite climbed 45.02 points, or 0.4%, to 11675.54. The indexes declined Friday.

☆ Minnesota Republican votes against free school meals bill because 'I have yet to meet a person in Minnesota that is hungry'
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-15 | by ( Joshua Zitser | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A Republican state senator voted against a bill to provide free school meals to Minnesota students. Steve Drazkowski said it wasn't needed as he was "yet to meet a person in Minnesota that is hungry." "I have yet to meet a person in Minnesota that is hungry," said Drazkowski. "I have yet to meet a person in Minnesota that says they don't have access to enough food to eat." Though Drazkowski voted against the bill, it passed 38-26 in the Senate.

☆ New Threat to Town, School District Budgets: Rising Rates
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-07 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Rising interest rates are squeezing cash-strapped towns and school systems that use short-term borrowing to keep cash flowing while they wait for property tax dollars to come in. A-rated cities and school districts are paying 3.16% for a one-year loan issued March 3, compared with 0.21% at the beginning of 2022, according to data from Refinitiv MMD. In places where local budgets are already burdened by inflation, rising borrowing costs add to the pressure to raise taxes or cut services.

☆ Rising Rates Squeeze Small Town Borrowers
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-07 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

China has lifted Covid-19 restrictions and pivoted back to focusing on the country’s growth. China’s outsize position in emerging markets has created a dilemma for many investors. For years, as companies from the world’s second-largest economy grew rapidly and became more valuable, China came to make up more than 40% of some major international benchmarks for stocks and corporate bonds. Investment funds with similarly large allocations to Chinese assets did well in 2019 and 2020, when the country’s rise drove gains in emerging markets.

☆ Fed Rate Policy Is Shaking Up the World of Muni Debt
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-24 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Concerns that the Federal Reserve will continue to increase rates have affected municipal fund inflows. The markets’ bumpy start to 2023 is causing whiplash even in the historically placid realm of state and local government debt. Municipal bonds this month have erased nearly all of their January gains after fears of rate increases cooled investor appetites. “It has been a roller coaster,” said Nathan Will , head of municipal credit research at Vanguard Group.

☆ Stocks Edge Higher After Strong Retail Data
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-15 | by ( Joe Wallace | Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Stocks bobbled Wednesday after data showed a rebound in retail sales, a sign of economic strength that could encourage the Federal Reserve to keep raising interest rates. The indexes spent much of the day in the red, then turned higher. The Nasdaq Composite Index climbed 110.45 points, or 0.9%, to 12070.59. The S&P 500 rose 11.47 points, or 0.3%, to 4147.60. The Dow Jones Industrial Average bumped up 38.78 points, or 0.1%, to 34128.05.

☆ Pension Investments in Private Credit Hit Eight-Year High
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-29 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Private credit now amounts to more than $100 billion in the retirement savings of U.S. and Canadian teachers and other public workers, according to an estimate. North American pension-fund investment in private-market loans reached an eight-year high in 2022, even as banks pulled back on lending and default rates inched upward. The average share of these retirement funds parked in the illiquid, typically unrated debt has crept up steadily to 3.8%, the highest on record, according to analytics company Preqin. Though a fraction of the overall portfolio, private credit now amounts to more than $100 billion in the retirement savings of U.S. and Canadian teachers, police and other public workers, according to a Wall Street Journal estimate based on Federal Reserve data and pension financial reports. And the pensions are planning to add more: Their average target allocation is 5.9%.

☆ For Closed-End Fund Investors, Paper Losses Turn Real
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-12 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Six BlackRock municipal-bond funds experienced at least two payout cuts last year. Investors in closed-end funds are feeling a painful consequence of the historic market slump: cuts to their monthly payouts. A Pacific Investment Management Co. California municipal-bond fund slashed dividends by 45% this month, while a Nuveen LLC stock fund endured a 7% cut. Eaton Vance Management in November cut distributions across six stock funds by as much as 24%. Six BlackRock muni funds endured at least two payout cuts last year, with dividends falling by as much as 38% in total.

☆ How 'Real Housewife' Jen Shah's fabulous life came crashing down
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-06 | by ( Stephanie Clifford | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +43 min

The woman wrote to the judge overseeing Shah's case that she'd had to remortgage her house, almost divorced, and "thought about ending my own life." The couple decided that he should get his degree while Jen Shah dropped out of college to work. (Shah told a judge at her 2022 plea hearing that she had been treated for "alcohol and depression" two years prior. Koa Johnson, Jen Shah's former fashion designerWhen Sharrieff Shah did participate in filming, he quickly became a fan favorite, calm and sensible. Once the show aired and Jen Shah developed a fan base, her behavior became more dramatic, Johnson said.

☆ After Muni-Bond ‘Bloodbath,’ Expectations for 2023 Are Muted
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-27 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

State and local government bonds are on track to post their worst yearly performance since 1981, a deep slump for an investment prized for safety and stability. “This year was a bloodbath,” said Nicholos Venditti, a municipal bond fund portfolio manager with Allspring Global Investments. “It was a bloodbath in munis the same way it was across all asset classes.”

☆ Cash Cushions Dwindle at U.S. Pension Funds
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-27 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Cash holdings are the lowest since the financial crisis at U.S. government pension funds and just above last year’s 13-year low for U.S. corporate pensions, heading into a year that many on Wall Street expect to test investors. Cash holdings hit 1.9% of assets at state and local government pension funds and 1.7% of assets at corporate pension funds as of June 30, according to an annual snapshot from Wilshire Trust Universe Comparison Service.

☆ Bond Investors Swap Mutual Funds for ETFs at Record Pace
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-10 | by ( Eric Wallerstein | Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

The aggressive pace of Federal Reserve tightening has led to a difficult year in the bond market. Worn down from record losses, investors have fled bond mutual funds en masse. But many aren’t quitting on bonds—they are just turning to exchange-traded funds. Some investors sell beaten-down positions in bond funds to harvest tax losses. In many cases this year, investors have opted to put cash into similar ETFs to maintain bond exposure in their portfolios.

☆ Biden Administration Awards $36 Billion to Pensions for Truckers, Warehouse Workers
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-09 | by ( Heather Gillers | Catherine Lucey | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

President Biden, joined by labor leaders Thursday, says thousands of union retirees and workers could be reassured that the pensions they worked for would be there when needed. The Biden administration has awarded its biggest pension bailout to date under a 2021 package aimed at shoring up near-insolvent retirement plans. The $36 billion in taxpayer aid announced Thursday will prevent threatened cuts to the pension checks of 350,000 truck drivers, warehouse workers and others, according to a document provided by the White House.

☆ Local Governments, Many on Wall Street Line Up Against Muni-Data Bill
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-26 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A pitched battle over data is under way in the $4 trillion market that finances roads and sewers. At issue is a little noticed measure in proposed federal legislation that would mandate how state and local governments across the country present their financial results to investors. The municipal-bond market in some ways remains stuck in the last century. Municipalities file reports erratically according to different standards, and the files aren’t machine-readable by investors attempting to study city or state finances before they buy or sell. That marks a contrast to corporate disclosures, where standardized data can be extracted by computers.

☆ Yale and Harvard Law Unrank Themselves
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-18 | by ( The Editorial Board | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Yale and Harvard law schools said this week they will no longer participate in the annual law-school rankings published by U.S. News & World Report. Readers may see no one to root for in a showdown between elite schools and the higher-ed ratings complex, but there’s a point to be made about what appears to be a flight from merit and transparency at these schools. Yale Law Dean Heather Gerken in a statement this week called the U.S. News rankings, which have long influenced the perception of prestige, “profoundly flawed.” Yale has “reached a point where the rankings process is undermining the core commitments of the legal profession. As a result, we will no longer participate.” Harvard Law School quickly followed, and on Thursday UC-Berkeley Law pulled out.

Nov 17 (Reuters) - The University of California, Berkeley, School of Law on Thursday joined the law schools at Yale and Harvard in withdrawing from U.S. News & World Report's influential law school rankings. 9 in the law school rankings, made the announcement a day after Yale and Harvard, ranked No. The rankings measure law schools based on reputational surveys, student grades and Law School Admission Test (LSAT) scores, and bar pass and employment rates, among other factors. Stanford Law School and the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School - currently ranked No. "I think every school is at minimum looking at it," law school admission consultant Mike Spivey said of the growing boycott.

☆ Yale and Harvard Law Schools Abandon U.S. News Rankings
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-16 | by ( Melissa Korn | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Yale Law School is known as a training ground for legal scholars and prominent lawyers. Yale Law School and Harvard Law School are pulling out of the U.S. News & World Report law-school ranking that they have dominated for decades, issuing a blow to the credibility and power of the high-profile rankings. “The U.S. News rankings are profoundly flawed,” Yale Law Dean Heather Gerken said. “Its approach not only fails to advance the legal profession, but stands squarely in the way of progress.”

☆ Several Kentucky supreme court justices sound skeptical of state's near-total abortion ban
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-15 | by ( Spencer Kimball | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Attendees march during a rally encouraging voters to vote yes on Amendment 2, which would add a permanent abortion ban to Kentuckys state constitution, on the steps of the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Kentucky, on October 1, 2022. Several Kentucky supreme court justices on Tuesday sounded skeptical of the state's abortion ban, one of the most restrictive in the U.S., during oral arguments in a case that will decide whether women have any access to the procedure in the foreseeable future. Justice Michelle Keller, who once practiced as a registered nurse, said the state constitution protects the right to self-determination. Heather Gatnarek, an ACLU attorney representing the plaintiffs, said Kentucky's abortion ban causes irreparable injury to the patients the state's two abortion clinics serve by forcing them to remain pregnant against their will, subjecting them to physical and mental health risks. If they do block the near-total ban while litigation continues in a lower court, a 15-week abortion ban that's also on the books would remain in effect.

☆ Voters Approve Tens of Billions of Dollars in Muni Projects
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-13 | by ( Heather Gillers | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

U.S. voters said yes to tens of billions of dollars for road-paving, school-building and other local projects last Tuesday, promising a new wave of bonds for eager investors. The voters approved $57 billion out of the $63 billion in ballot measures for which results are available, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence. If that 90% approval rate holds steady, the total amount of new municipal debt authorized Tuesday will come to about $90 billion, the most from any election day in the data, which goes back to 2012.

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