Daily Briefing -118
U.S. Open Golf Championship to Be Held September 14 to September 20 in Mamaroneck
Following the lead of the Council of Industry which will hold its outing August 31st in Newburgh, Governor Cuomo announced Wednesday that the U.S. Open Championship will be held at Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck (Westchester County.) The event will be held from September 14th to September 20th without fans. The USGA will put protocols in place to protect players and staff, including rigorous protocols for testing, cleaning, use of face coverings and social distancing.
“The 2020 U.S. Open will take place at Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck this September. The national championship is a great event. It will be held without fans and the organizers are working with the State Department of Health to ensure everyone’s safety,” Governor Cuomo said.
Get more information on playing in the Council of Industry outing
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Fed Holds Rates Steady – Economic Growth is ‘Well Below’ Pre-Pandemic Level
The Federal Reserve held interest rates steady in a decision announced Wednesday that came along with a tepid outlook on the coronavirus-plagued economy. In a move widely expected, the central bank kept its benchmark overnight lending rate anchored near zero, where it has been since March 15 in the early days of the pandemic.
Along with keeping rates low, the Federal Open Market Committee, which sets monetary policy, expressed its commitment to maintain its bond purchases and the array of lending and liquidity programs also associated with the virus response. “We are committed to using our full range of tools to support our economy in this challenging environment,” Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said.
Surging Virus Cases Threaten to Halt U.S. Manufacturing Sector Momentum
New orders for key U.S.-made capital goods increased by the most in nearly two years in June and shipments accelerated. Orders for non-defense capital goods excluding aircraft, a closely watched proxy for business spending plans, jumped 3.3% last month, the Commerce Department said. That was the biggest increase in these so-called core capital goods orders since July 2018 and followed a 1.6% rise in May. Core capital goods orders remained 3.2% below their pre-pandemic level. Orders last month were boosted by demand for machinery, fabricated metals and primary metals. Orders for electrical equipment, appliances and components increased 1.2%, likely driven by workers setting up home offices.
The budding recovery is threatened by a resurgence in new cases of the coronavirus, which has forced some authorities in the hard-hit South and West regions to either close businesses again or halt reopenings.
HEALS vs CARES vs Heroes Acts: Republican and Democrat Stimulus Packages Compared
Another stimulus package will give Americans some additional financial relief during the onslaught of the coronavirus pandemic and ongoing recession. Like the earlier CARES Act, it’s expected to include a stimulus check worth up to $1,200 per person and benefits like enhanced unemployment and a paycheck protection program to help keep workers employed. That’s where the clarity stops.
The front-runner stimulus package, the Republican-proposed HEALS Act, is under negotiation and hotly contested by Democrats who say that its reduction to enhanced unemployment, among other measures, is unacceptable. To understand what the HEALS Act offers and doesn’t, you have to understand the CARES Act, which it’s based upon — even when it comes to who qualifies for a second stimulus check.
See the side by side comparison at CNET
New York’s Medicaid Enrollment Surges to an All-Time High
New York’s Medicaid program is growing at its fastest rate in six years, with a quarter-million additional enrollees landing in the safety-net health plan during the first three months of the coronavirus pandemic.
Enrollment for May rose to 6,321,246, the highest monthly total recorded on the state Health Department’s main website or through its data portal. The May rolls were up 261,000 or 4.3 percent since February – the fastest rise since early 2014, when the Affordable Care Act took full effect. The trend is likely driven by the pandemic-induced recession, which caused more than 1 million New Yorkers to lose their jobs and, in many cases, the health benefits that went with them.
Read more at the Empire Center
Stewart Passenger Travel Down 94 Percent
At New York Stewart International Airport, only one airline – Allegiant – continues to operate, and at a lesser frequency. Jet Blue, Delta, and American Airlines have all suspended their flights from the Newburgh facility.
Airport business director Michael Torelli told the Stewart Airport Commission, which met on a conference call on Tuesday, that passenger count in May was down 94.2 percent from May 2019. That was the worst month since the pandemic took hold. Passenger count fell by 64 percent in March and by 89 percent in April.
U.S. Department of Labor Issues Revised Rule Concerning OSHA Access to Employee Medical Records
The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has revised the Rules of Agency Practice and Procedure Concerning Occupational Safety and Health Administration Access to Employee Medical Records. The rule describes internal procedures that OSHA personnel must follow when obtaining and using personally-identifiable employee medical information.
OSHA has identified and amended several provisions of the regulation in order to improve efficiency in implementing these internal procedures.
Read the summary of the final rule
NY’s Job Drop as of June was Still Among the Worst in U.S.
While New York’s economy continued to ever-so-slowly recover in June, the Empire State’s year-to-year percentage decline in private employment since the pandemic lockdown remained the worst in the continental U.S., according to the latest payroll establishment data from federal and state agencies.
The June estimate for New York still equated to a private employment decline of 16.8 percent from a year earlier—well above the national average drop of 9.2 percent, indicating New York’s economy was bouncing back more slowly than the nation’s. As shown below, New York’s fall in private employment was the highest of the lower 48 states. Only Hawaii, with a 17.6 percent decline compared to June last year, had a bigger rate of job losses during this period, as shown below.
Read More at the Empire Center
