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New York City’s next comptroller will have to oversee the city’s roughly $100 billion budget as it claws its way out of an economic crisis prompted by the pandemic and ensure that more than $14 billion of federal pandemic aid is used wisely, Bloomberg News reported. A former U.S. Marine, an ex-financial journalist and a municipal-finance expert are among the Democrats competing in a June 22 primary to become the city’s chief financial watchdog; Republicans didn’t field a candidate. This will be the first comptroller race to be decided by ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to rank their top five candidates. The comptroller oversees five public pensions that collectively hold more than $250 billion in assets of 700,000 current and former city employees and retirees. That financial might allows the comptroller to exert influence over the environmental, social and governance investing practices of money managers and the companies the city invests in. Underperformance has consequences: Taxpayers must make up the difference if the pension funds fall short of delivering a 7% assumed annual rate of return. New York is projected to spend $10.3 billion on its pensions next year, or 16% of tax revenue. New York paid its 281 investment managers $880 million last year.

Republican governors in 25 states are in the midst of a giant economic experiment, ceasing enhanced jobless aid for an estimated 4 million people, arguing that the generous benefits are dissuading people from going back to work. But a number of these governors have personal connections to businesses that are trying to find workers and could benefit from the policy change, according to a Washington Post review of financial disclosures from state elected officials. In New Hampshire, the governor’s family invests in a large resort that has many employees. In North Dakota, the governor sits on the board of a family agricultural business that is seeking to fill numerous jobs, including posts for truck drivers and technicians. Mississippi’s governor is a shareholder in his father’s air conditioning and supply firm. These are among the many governors who have taken steps to cut expanded jobless aid in recent weeks. When West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice (R) announced his decision last month to cut federal unemployment benefits for his state’s jobless residents, he pointed to what he said was a plethora of openings for those who needed work. Justice didn’t need to look far for examples of companies struggling to hire workers. The storied West Virginia resort he owns, the Greenbrier, has been looking for dozens of new employees in recent weeks and until recently had received far fewer applications than normal. But after Justice announced his decision, that started to change, said Kathy Miller, vice president of human resources at the luxury hotel.

The consolidation of the Colorado oil and gas industry advanced with a $1.06 billion acquisition, the latest in a wave of mergers in the fragmented shale patch, Bloomberg News reported. Bonanza Creek Energy Inc. and Extraction Oil & Gas Inc. — which announced a merger last month and a plan to rename the combined entity Civitas Resources Inc. — said yesterday that they’re buying closely held Crestone Peak Resources LLC. Crestone investors will get 22.5 million shares of Bonanza, according to a statement. All three companies operate in the Denver-Julesburg Basin. The swift move to scoop up a third company before Bonanza Creek and Extraction closed their own deal is due to investor sentiment more than a heightened thirst for deals in the Colorado market, where more onerous government regulations remain a concern for the industry, Eric Greager, chief executive officer at Bonanza Creek, told analysts and investors yesterday on a conference call. While going through bankruptcy last year, Extraction held talks with Crestone but ultimately couldn’t get a deal done on its own, Ben Dell, chairman of Extraction, said yesterday. Dell, founder and managing partner of Kimmeridge Energy Management Co., will be chairman of Civitas. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board is Crestone’s primary shareholder and will be become Civitas’s biggest investor. It will also get a director on the Civitas board following the closing of the latest deal, which is expected in the fall, immediately after the completion of the Bonanza-Extraction combination.

Fourteen months after the pandemic triggered a national emergency, the final chapter of the U.S. economic recovery may begin this month, with rapid changes starting with the end of enhanced unemployment benefits in half the states and ending in the fall's expected reopening of schools and universities, Reuters reported. Along the way, Major League Baseball stadiums are slated to return to full capacity, and the largest state economy, California, on June 15 will shed its final COVID-era restrictions and give bars, restaurants and other businesses a green light on the road to normal. That same day in Washington, D.C., the U.S. Federal Reserve is expected to open debate about when and how to cut the economy loose from its crisis-fighting monetary policy and shift to managing what is hoped to be a long economic expansion. Since coronavirus vaccines rolled out in December, forecasts have pointed to record-breaking numbers this year, including the fastest annual gross domestic product growth in nearly 40 years. Companies in May added 559,000 jobs, but the total number remains 7.6 million short of early 2020. About 3.6 million more people are unemployed, and the labor force is 3.5 million smaller. Shortages of supplies, workers and raw materials have crimped the recovery with businesses curtailing hours, turning away customers, or delaying filling orders. The Fed's most recent national economic snapshot referenced shortages 44 times, compared with 17 in January and three a year ago. Economists expect that to ease. The pandemic put the economy into what some likened to an induced coma. Shaking off the stupor takes time, and is complicated by some of the programs used to cushion the economy's sharp drop last spring. Stimulus payments and low interest rates, for example, fueled a boom in home sales that spilled into home construction and lumber prices. Yet the costs for wood and some other commodities already have begun easing: lumber futures are down 24% from their peak, with copper and aluminum falling around 5%. Likewise, the splurge on automobiles, appliances and other goods will likely prove a one-time affair; even if demand remains strong, supply will likely catch up.

With just weeks left before the extra $300-a-week federal unemployment checks run out, scores of unemployed Floridians are urging Gov. Ron DeSantis to reconsider a decision to end participation in the federal government’s enhanced unemployment benefits program, the Associated Press reported. Florida is among a growing number of Republican-led states that are withdrawing from the federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation program. The state’s participation is set to end June 26. As Florida’s economy rebounds from the pandemic, some businesses say they can’t find enough people to fill open jobs. Some Republicans assert that the unemployed aren’t actively looking for work because of the federal checks they are still getting. DeSantis has said the economic rebound means there are jobs to be had, and that withdrawing from the program would “incentivize people to go back to work.” Rich Templin, the legislative policy director with AFL-CIO Florida, said during a video news conference that withdrawing from the program would “prove disastrous for the workers currently relying on these benefits.” “We’re being told that workers are not seeking employment because they want to sit at home eating bonbons for less than the minimum wage,” Templin said. “This is a completely false mean-spirited narrative, not based in reality and certainly not based on any sound policy consideration.” Templin and others acknowledged that the last-ditch effort to extend the benefits is likely futile, considering the political and ideological divides over the issue.

Half of U.S. states, all of them led by Republican governors, are cutting off billions of dollars in unemployment benefits for residents, rebuffing a key part of President Joe Biden’s response to the coronavirus recession, Reuters reported. Maryland on Tuesday became the 25th state to announce it would stop the extra $300-per-week benefits on July 1 before the federal program lapses in September. Governor Larry Hogan (R) said that while the program gave "important temporary relief" during the pandemic, it was no longer needed now that "vaccines and jobs ... are in good supply." Hogan is following 24 other GOP state leaders and business lobbying groups, who say the benefits mean people are turning down good jobs, leaving companies without the workers they need to reopen. The Biden administration, Democrats, workers, activists and some economists argue, however, that a host of ongoing troubles — from lack of childcare to continued fear of infection to low wages — are keeping people out of the labor force. Just over 41% of the United States' 328 million people are fully vaccinated. The United States is about to undergo a real-time test of the issue. The 25 states turning down the federal cash have announced different end dates for the program. Benefits expire June 12 in Alaska, Iowa, Mississippi and Missouri, with the other 21 states falling off through July 10.

Growth in U.S. manufacturing picked up in May, even as supply chain problems persist and businesses continue to struggle to find workers, the Associated Press reported. The Institute for Supply Management, a trade group of purchasing managers, said Tuesday that its index of manufacturing activity rose in May to a reading of 61.2 in May from 60.7 in April. Any reading above 50 indicates manufacturing is expanding. May was the 12th consecutive month manufacturing has grown after contracting in April 2020, when coronavirus fears triggered business shutdowns across the country. With million of Americans vaccinated and most of the U.S. back to business as usual, the manufacturing sector is struggling to keep up with demand, which is generally considered not a bad problem to have. Shortages of raw materials including lumber, metals and plastics, are choking the supply chain, making it difficult for manufacturers to make and deliver products on time. Companies are also having trouble filling positions, causing further delays in production and delivery. “Worker absenteeism, short-term shutdowns due to part shortages, and difficulties in filling open positions continue to be issues that limit manufacturing-growth potential,” said Timothy Fiore, chair of the ISM manufacturing survey committee. An overwhelming majority of businesses surveyed for the report said they are hiring or attempting to hire workers, with more than half of them saying they’ve experienced difficulties in doing so, as the broader employment situation has rapidly improved in the U.S. Layoffs have declined for four straight weeks and with demand at high levels across virtually all industries, those looking for work have more options than they have had in a long time.

Far more Americans are receiving unemployment benefits than the last time the jobless rate was at its current 6.1%, thanks to a major expansion of the federal safety net that has provided aid to millions of people out of work, the Associated Press reported. Yet many businesses and Republican officials say that all jobless aid has contributed to worker shortages in some industries, which is why most GOP-led states are moving to cut off the federal support. About 15.8 million people received unemployment aid through one of several benefit programs during the week of May 8, the latest period for which data is available, according to a Labor Department report Thursday. That’s nearly eight times as many people as received jobless payments in August 2014, when the unemployment rate was where it is now and roughly the same proportion of adults had jobs. The primary reason for the expansion is that the government created two emergency programs in last spring’s pandemic-relief legislation. About three-quarters of all unemployment beneficiaries — nearly 12 million people — are receiving aid through one of those federal programs. One of them provides payments to the self-employed and gig workers, who had never been eligible for jobless aid before. The other program benefits people who have been unemployed for more than six months. Both are scheduled to end Sept. 6. Yet 20 states have announced this month that they will cut off the emergency aid early, beginning as soon as June 12, according to an Associated Press analysis, including Texas, Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina. As a result, about 2.5 million people will lose all their unemployment benefits by early July. Those states are also ending an extra $300 weekly federal payment to the unemployed. Four other states, including Florida and Arizona, are ending the $300 payment only. Collectively, those cutoffs of aid coincide with a steady decline in the number of people applying for jobless benefits. The government on Thursday reported the fourth straight weekly drop, to 404,000, the lowest level since the pandemic erupted in March of last year.