Texas Business reports: The U.S. Census Bureau reported that foreign-born households are, on average, larger than native households, have more children under age 18, and are more likely to be multigenerational.

Texas Business reports: Persistent euro-zone turmoil has kept the world economy on edge, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. Doubts about the ability of many countries in the single-currency region to service their sovereign debt are rising along with the interest rates the affected nations must pay to roll over maturing obligations.

Texas Business reports:  ODESSA—The University of Texas of the Permian Basin plans to offer a $10,000 flat fee undergraduate degree, known as the Texas Science Scholar undergraduate degree program.

Texas Business reports: The employment report, one of the most closely watched economic data releases, was unexpectedly weak in March, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

Texas Business reports:  Regional economic indicators point to stronger job and output growth in the first quarter of the year. Improvement has been pronounced and broad based, although growth slowed in March, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Texas Business reports:  AUSTIN, Texas—The Texas Venture Labs at the McCombs School of Business is now the Jon Brumley Texas Venture Labs, in recognition of a combined gift of more than $6 million from Fort Worth businessman and entrepreneur Jon Brumley to fund the growth of the program at The University of Texas at Austin. 

Texas Business reports:  LUBBOCK—As economies struggle worldwide - including here in the United States - one Texas Tech University professor may have the answer.

Texas Business reports: Regional economic indicators point to stronger job and output growth in the first quarter of the year. Improvement has been pronounced and broad based, although growth slowed in March, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

AUSTIN — For 30 years, community organizations in the city have fought rising land prices to maintain affordable housing in their neighborhoods, often by buying, rehabbing and renting out one house at a time.

Texas Business reports: Texas factory activity increased in April, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey. The production index, a key measure of state manufacturing conditions, fell from 11.1 to 5.6, suggesting growth continued but at a slower pace than last month. 

Texas Business reports:  FORT WORTH—The Fort Worth Chamber and Dallas Regional Chamber – the two largest chambers in the region, oppose the proposed takeover of American Airlines by U.S. Airways, stating it would damage the DFW economy.

Texas Business reports: AUSTIN— The state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped to 7.0 percent in March, marking the seventh consecutive month of decline. March’s unemployment rate was down from 7.1 percent in February, and from 8.0 percent a year ago. Texas’ unemployment rate is significantly below the national unemployment rate of 8.2 percent.

Texas Business reports:  The state of Texas plans to invest $1 million in a a chemical giant’s Gulf Coast plant.

Texas Business reports: COLLEGE STATION--Both sellers and buyers can find good news in the most recent outlook for the Texas housing market. For sellers, the good news is that 2011 Texas home prices increased for the second consecutive year and are likely to do so again this year. For buyers, the good news is that prices went up only modestly, and the 2012 home appreciation rate is expected to be less than the historical norm.

Texas Business reports:  In the aftermath of the Great Recession, it is critical to reexamine the definition of what is affordable to a homebuyer and how the measures of housing affordability play out for average households in Texas and the United States, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

By the time most students have left campus for the day, Maria Guzman’s job has barely begun. 

At 5:30 p.m., Guzman gathers her 15-person custodial crew for daily stretching exercises in the Neural Molecular Science building at the University of Texas at Austin

Texas Business reports: Fueled by a hefty increase in the price of gasoline, the headline PCE price index increased at an annualized rate of 3.8 percent in February, its largest one-month gain since July of last year. Gasoline alone accounted for about 2.5 of the 3.8 percentage points, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Texas Business reports: Texas factory activity continued to increase in March, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey. The production index, a key measure of state manufacturing conditions, held steady at 11.1, suggesting growth continued at about the same pace as last month. 

Texas Business reports:  COLLEGE STATION—Existing home sales across the state surged in February, reflecting a stronger market, an improving economy and “better weather than February last year,” said Real Estate Center Research Economist Jim Gaines.

Texas Business reports:  HOUSTON—Forty-two teams hailing from some of the world’s top universities will vie for more than $1 million in prizes at the 12th annual Rice Business Plan Competition (RBPC) April 12-14. 

Texas Business reports:  COLLEGE STATION – The fate for cotton prices this year will rely on traditional factors such as supply and demand, but the wild card is the outcome of Texas weather as the effects of the 2011 drought linger, according to a Texas AgriLife Extension Service economist.

Texas Business reports:  Apple will expand its presence in Texas with a $304 million investment in a new campus in Austin that will create more than 3,600 new jobs.

Texas Business reports:  Texas factory activity continued to increase in February, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey, produced by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. The production index, a key measure of state manufacturing conditions, rose from 5.8 to 11.2, suggesting a pickup in the pace of growth.

During the heated debate over bids in Congress to pass Internet-policing legislation earlier this year, such opponents as Google co-founder Sergey Brin branded the bills as attempts at outright censorship that could shove the U.S. Internet toward an experience that looks more like China. Yet others disagree.

Texas Business reports: Texas has been ranked the top exporting state in 2011 for the 10th year in a row, according to data released by the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Texas Business reports: Fitch Ratings says there will be a noticeable impact from the pending American Airlines layoffs on the Dallas-Fort Worth region.

Texas Business reports:  HOUSTON—University General Health System Inc., a diversified, integrated multi-specialty health delivery system, finalized the acquisition of Sybaris Group LLC, a luxury hospitality service provider and facilities management company headquartered in Houston.

Texas Business reports: Recently released indicators suggest that overall economic activity picked up in the fourth quarter of 2011, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Texas Business reports: The Texas economy continues to expand at a moderate pace. Texas employment grew at a 2 percent rate in 2011, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Texas Business reports:  The global economy is expected to slow, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Texas Business reports: Texas factory activity increased in January, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey. The production index, a key measure of state manufacturing conditions, rose from 0.2 to 5.8, suggesting growth resumed this month.

Texas Business reports: Texas is investing $500,000 through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in The Advisory Board Company.

Texas Business reports:  Having to dig deeper to fill up the gas tank? You are not alone as gas prices have steadily risen in the past few weeks, but the possibility of gas hitting $5 a gallon by summer as many analysts are predicting is very unlikely, says a Texas A&M University economist who has studied oil prices for decades.

Texas Business reports:  AUSTIN—The Texas Transportation Commission approved a rule change that will give broader permitting authority to the Brownsville Navigation District of Cameron County (Port of Brownsville), a move that proponents say will significantly increase economic development opportunities for businesses in the district. 

A dam in Central Texas' Blanco State Park, one of 7,500 in the state, the highest total in the U.S. Photo courtesy of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

AUSTIN – Possum Kingdom Lake, northwest of Fort Worth, was created when the Morris Shepard Dam was built in 1938 to harness the Brazos River. It was the first water-supply reservoir in the state. Once a major hydroelectric generating facility, the dam became the first to surrender its operating license in Texas in 2007, when turbines that generated an estimated 22,500 kilowatts of electricity were disabled. There’s no talk of taking down the dam and freeing the river, though. Unlike the United States in general, drought-prone Texas is keeping the dams it has.

Texas Business reports:  IRVING, Texas—Demand for energy will rise through 2040 as global economic output doubles and prosperity expands across a world where population will grow to nearly 9 billion people, Exxon Mobil Corporation states in its The Outlook for Energy: A View to 2040, issued this month.

Texas Business reports:  MCKINNEY—Encore Wire Corporation is building a new 202,000-square-foot manufacturing plant on its McKinney, Texas campus.

Texas Business reports: SANTA BARBARA, Calif—Superconductor Technologies Inc., a developer and producer of high temperature superconducting (HTS) materials and associated technologies, will relocate its corporate headquarters to a new facility in Austin.

Texas Business reports: DALLAS – City Manager Mary Suhm has ordered the initiation of Stage 1 of the city’s Drought Contingency Plan. Mandatory outdoor watering restrictions go into effect on Monday, December 12, 2011 with the goal of reducing overall consumption by five percent.

Texas Business reports:  Export-supported jobs linked to manufacturing account for an estimated 6.5 percent of Texas’ total private-sector employment. Over one-quarter (27.6 percent) of all manufacturing workers in Texas depend on exports for their jobs (2009 data latest available), according to the International Trade Commission. 

Texas Business reports: LAREDO—For 14 years, the City of Laredo has hosted a Paisano Rest Stop to help Mexican citizens returning home from throughout the U.S. have a smoother experience as they head home for the holidays. 

Texas Business reports: Amid reports of the nation’s weak economic recovery, high unemployment and slow job growth, attention has turned to Texas, the only large state on track to surpass its prerecession peak employment by year-end, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

Texas Business Reports:  The U.S. economy entered a financial-market-driven recession in December 2007 from which it has yet to fully recover. The boom of the mid-2000s has been replaced with a stubborn national reality of high unemployment and sluggish output growth, with no clear indication when economic activity will return to more normal levels, according to Jason Saving of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

Texas Business reports: Diversity across banks and other financial firms promotes a resilient financial system because differing risk profiles reduce the likelihood of systemic crises caused by shared economic shocks, according to Jiaqi Chen and Jeffery W. Gunther of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Texas Business reports:  Texas factory activity decreased in November, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

The production index, a key measure of state manufacturing conditions, dipped from 4.1 to –5.1, registering its first negative reading in two years.

Texas Business reports:  With the Hispanic population in the United States expected to nearly triple by 2050, a Baylor University linguist has developed a course tailored to meet the crucial need for medical professionals to cross language and cultural barriers.

Texas Business reports: A slowdown in economic activity has materialized at the global level, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.  

Texas Business reports: Texas economic growth continues at a moderate rate, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. Conditions in the housing market are improving, with increased home sales and lower inventories; house prices, however, are stagnant. Despite recent weakness in oil prices, energy activity remains strong. Concerns regarding the European debt crisis, continued sluggishness in the national economy and prospects of further job losses in the state and local government pose notable downside risks.

Texas Business reports: DALLAS—Many Texas Credit unions had a steady stream of new accounts open on Saturday as "Bank Transfer Day" drew attention online and on the streets across the state.

Texas Business reports:  The recent financial crisis, Europe’s sovereign debt problems and the U.S. political dispute about raising the national debt ceiling have prompted fiscal policy debate about the size of government and the type of tax structure needed to fund public expenditures, according to Anthony Landry of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

Texas Business reports:  Each year, Pleasanton-based W W Wood manufactures and ships nearly 40 million pounds of all-natural, aromatic cooking wood products to retailers internationally. Despite the challenging economy, its business has grown. And that growth has brought forth new challenges.

Texas Business reports:  WACO--Tarleton State University will begin offering a Bachelor of Business Administration degree in Human Resource Management (HRM) in the spring 2012 semester at the University Center at McLennan Community College (MCC) in Waco.

Texas Business reports:  AUSTIN — The federal government has added six Texas species as endangered-species candidates, putting them toward the end of a long line of plants and animals awaiting a final ruling on their status.

Texas Business reports:  AUSTIN— The Texas Transportation Commission took action today to add Interstate 69 to the state highway system, allowing Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) officials to label the first Texas stretch of the nearly 1000-mile interstate since I-69 received federal high-priority route designation more than a decade ago.

Texas Business reports:  Texas is investing $1.8 million through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in CGI Group Inc. for the creation of the company's new U.S. onshore delivery center in Belton.

Texas Business reports:  Texas Tech University researchers are part of a water conservation team that has received $500,000 from the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS). The Conservation Innovation Grant (CIG) provides three years of funding to support a large-scale demonstration effort in the South Plains and northern Panhandle.

Texas Business reports:  AUSTIN—Executive teams from 10 Texas Venture Labs (TVL) portfolio companies will pitch their ideas to investors at the upcoming Venture Expo Oct. 27.

Texas Business reports:  China in the not-too-distant future could well rival Mexico as one of the sources for low-wage workers coming into the United States, contends Dudley L. Poston Jr., a Texas A&M University sociologist who also directs the institution’s Asian studies program.

 Texas Business reports:  Low-interest federal disaster loans are now available to Texas residents and business owners as a result of President Obama's major disaster declaration, U. S. Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Karen G. Mills announced.

Texas Business reports:  SAN ANTONIO—The UTSA Institute for Economic Development recently expanded to office space adjacent to its downtown campus facilities at 215 S. San Saba, known as Washington Place.

Texas Business reports:  AUSTIN—The University of Texas System Board of Regents today approved $105 million in funding for a new building, the Engineering Education and Research Center, on The University of Texas at Austin campus.

Texas Business reports: The University of North Texas announced the largest gift in the history of UNT with a pledge of $22 million from entrepreneur and alumnus Charn Uswachoke.

Texas Business reports:  Regional economic growth continued at a moderate rate in the second quarter, down slightly from the first-quarter pace, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. While supply-chain disruptions from the Japanese disasters and uncertainty about the U.S. economic outlook caused a slowdown in May, evidence suggests conditions in the Eleventh District have since improved and are better than elsewhere in the nation.

Texas Business reports:  In the first half of 2011, the largest exporter by far among the 50 states was Texas with more than $120 billion inmerchandise exports, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Texas Business reports: SAN ANTONIO—St. Mary’s University is offering free assistance in areas such as marketing, business planning, and accounting to local small and nonprofit businesses through a program that gives Bill Greehey School of Business students hands–on learning experiences.

Texas Business reports:  The trimmed mean PCE inflation rate for June was an annualized 1.3 percent. According to the BEA, the overall PCE inflation rate for June was -2 percent, annualized, while the inflation rate for PCE excluding food and energy was 1.4 percent, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

 Texas Business reports: Job growth, sales tax collections – both from business and consumer purchases – as well as automobile sales, signal that the Texas economy has emerged from the recent recession, according to the Texas comptroller’s monthly economic outlook.

Texas Business reports: Although Texas has several state universities (University of Texas, Texas Tech, Texas A&M, and so on), and several of those universities as well as scores of county community colleges are trying to weather a budget crisis in the current economy, the state has created an online university.

Texas Business reports:  What does it mean for a city to achieve "sustainability"?  Rice University's Shell Center for Sustainability has embarked on a wide-ranging project to determine Houston's sustainability through 25 measurable categories, ranging from energy efficiency to public transportation to poverty levels.

Texas Business reports:  Two Baylor University professors use a bottle of Coca-Cola to teach basic business principles to minimally educated entrepreneurs in developing countries.

Texas Business reports:  New York, Los Angeles and Chicago are still America's largest metropolitan areas, but none of the nation’s 366 metropolitan areas added more people during the past decade than Houston.

Texas Business reports:  Oil prices were affected by multiple factors during the second quarter, according to a report by senior research analyst Jackson Thies and research economist Michael Plante at the Research Department at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

After Libyan supplies were disrupted near the end of the first quarter, second-quarter production was virtually nonexistent. Slowing economic growth tempered expectations of oil consumption growth, taking some pressure off prices. OPEC members were unable to come to a consensus during their June meeting, which ended with the official quota unchanged. However, reports indicate Saudi Arabia will unilaterally increase its output. And on June 23, the International Energy Agency (IEA) announced it will release 60 million barrels of oil reserves to counter lost production from Libya.

Texas business reports:  Texas factory activity expanded in June, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey. The production index, a key measure of state manufacturing conditions, remained positive but fell from 12.7 to 5.6, suggesting output growth slowed this month.

Texas Business reports:  Economic growth in Texas picked up in March and April, only to slow abruptly in May. While the Eleventh District has many bright spots—a booming energy sector, growing manufacturing output and rising exports—it is experiencing some headwinds from adverse national and international developments, according to senior economist  Pia Orrenius and research assistant Adam Swadley with the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

Conceptual drawing of University Drive in Prairie View, Texas.

Texas Business reports: In February 2010, community leaders and university officials who were interested in the future of both the city of Prairie View, Texas, and Prairie View A&M University (PVAMU) attended a roundtable discussion hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas’ Houston Branch.

Texas Business reports:  Eight El Paso area businesses were included among the fastest growing Hispanic businesses in the nation. 

Texas Business reports:  The Federal Open Market Committee decided today to keep its target range for the federal funds rate at 0 to1/4 percent, the Federal Reserve Branch of Dallas announced.

Texas Business reports:  Export-supported jobs linked to manufacturing account for an estimated 6.2 percent of Texas’ total private-sector employment.

Texas Business reports: While the service sector activity in Texas increase in May, retail sales weakened, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. 

Texas service sector activity increased in May, according to business executives responding to the Texas Service Sector Outlook Survey. The revenue index, a key measure of state service sector conditions, fell from 12 to 2, which is indicative of slower revenue growth.

Texas Business reports:  The United States uses Mexico as a cushion for both industrial output and employment problems, according to a report released by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.  

Texas Business reports:  College Station—Texas’ economy is not only outperforming the United States, but the state’s nonfarm employment is growing twice as fast. In addition, Odessa had the highest employment growth rate at 4.5 percent, and Abilene had the lowest rate at a negative 2.5 percent. 

Texas Business reports:  Maquiladoras are good for Texas jobs but bad for California, according to a recent paper by the Federal Reserve economists. 

GE Transportation’s Evolution Series locomotive

Texas Business reports:  An investment in an old industry for new technology is expected to create several hundred jobs in Fort Worth. Texas will invest $4.2 million through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in GE Transportation to create a locomotive manufacturing facility in Fort Worth.

Texas Business reports:  At their spring meeting today, Baylor University Regents approved a $428.6 million operating budget for 2011-2012, elected new officers and board members, and approved the establishment of the Robbins Institute for Health Policy and Leadership in Baylor's Hankamer School of Business.

Texas Business reports:  Partners and stakeholders of the U.S.–Mexico Border 2012 National Coordinators announced the initiation of a $13.9 million project, including $4 million from the Global Environmental Facility (GEF), for the joint development of a Regional Framework for Sustainable Use of the Rio Bravo/Rio Grande and to address environmental issues.

Texas Business reports:  San Antonio—Renewable energy. Economic gardening. Broadband communications. Rural entrepreneurship. Innovative lending practices. These are some of the topics at the second annual Texas Rural Challenge conference, June 16 – 17, 2011, at the Embassy Suites San Marcos, Texas. 

Texas Business reports:   For the seventh year in a row, CEOs rate Texas as the number one  state in which to do business and California as the worst.

Texas Business reports:  People living in countries with governments that have a greater number of social services report being more satisfied with life, according to a study by a Baylor University researcher.

Texas Business reports:  Though the economy is growing at a moderate pace, recent data have tempered the near-term outlook.  The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) lowered its 2011 real gross domestic product (GDP) growth forecast to between 3.1 and 3.3 percent from 3.4 to 3.9 percent in January.

Texas Business reports:  Texas is investing $550,000 through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in Coll Materials Exchange for the company's expansion into Waco.

David Gonzales

Texas Business reports:  Citi Community Development and the Greater Dallas Hispanic Chamber of Commerce (GDHCC) will open the Small Business Center of Excellence, which will serve the low-to-moderate income business community of Greater Dallas.

Texas Business reports: The EPA gave a grant to the city of Goliad to improve its sewer infrastructure for compliance with regulations. 

Texas

Texas Business reports:  McAllen—A research and education park for the Rio South Texas Region is becoming a reality now that the master planning process is underway.

Texas Business reports:  Texas and other areas in the Eleventh District did not experience a drastic home appreciation or expansion of exotic mortgages in the lead-up to the recent recession; therefore, the region did not get into a mortgage crisis as severe as in some other parts of the nation, according to Wenhua Di of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.  However, the region has not been immune to the consequences of the financial system turmoil and the economic slowdown.

Texas Business reports:  Texas is investing $1.2 million through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in TD Ameritrade Holding Corporation for the expansion of their Fort Worth facility.

 Texas Business reports:  The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) awarded $305,555 to the City of Petersburg, Texas, to increase diminished water pressure and provide additional water storage capacity. 

Texas Business reports:  The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas is sponsoring a Hispanice research conference with the American Society of Hispanic Economists and the Immigrant Research and Policy Center at the University of North Texas.

 Texas Business reports:  Texas is investing $194,000 through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in 3M Co. for the expansion of their manufacturing facility in Angleton.

Texas Business reports:  Austin—Competition for oil and gas leases on Permanent School Fund lands in West Texas earned more than $108 million for the Permanent School Fund, a total that’s more than twice the previous record set in 1979.

 Texas Business reports:  The state is investing $2.8 million through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in the world’s most successful online auction site to expand its Austin site.

Texas Business reports:  Baylor University president Ken Starr sent a letter today warning that a key state program’s proposed cuts will hurt the private universities of the state.

Texas Business reports:  Later-generation Mexican Americans are making more economic progress than previous studies show, according to new research from The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Colorado, Denver.

Texas Business reports:  The state’s sales revenue in March was $1.60 billion, up 9.9 percent compared to March 2010, according the Texas comptroller's office. 

Texas Business reports:  The Texas Department of Agriculture awarded $143,600 in federal funds to the city of McCamey for infrastructure improvements through the Texas Capital Fund.

Texas Business reports:  When it came to creating jobs, Texas outperformed the rest of the country from February 2010 to February 2011.

Texas Business reports:  In the fourth quarter 2010 issue of Southwest Economy, Dallas Fed researchers introduced new measures of real trade-weighted exchange rates for each of the 50 U.S. states.

Texas Business reports: College Station--Vincente Fox, President of Mexico 2000-2006, and Moises Naím, Venezuela’s former minister of trade, will speak at Texas A&M University on “Globalization Goes South,” April 8 in Rudder Auditorium.

Texas Business reports:  Texas Business reports:  Texas was the top surface trader with Mexico by a factor of almost three times as its nearest competitor, California, according to federal transportation statistics. 

Texas Business reports: Texas led the nation in job creation over the last year, creating 254,000 jobs from February 2010 to February 2011. 

The runnerup among the 50 states was California, which created 60,000 less jobs than Texas. 

Texas Business reports:  Texas total nonfarm employment was up by 22,700 jobs in February, for a total gain of 254,200 jobs from a year ago.

Texas Business reports:  The Energy Management and Innovation Center (EMIC) at The University of Texas at Austin hosts a forum for energy practitioners, policy-makers and academics on Thursday, March 24, to examine the relative costs of electricity generation, including solar, nuclear, coal, gas and wind.

Texas Business reports:  Dallas—Kimberly-Clark Corporation announced that its baby and child care and consumer tissue businesses are notifying customers of plans to raise prices in North America during the second and third quarters of 2011.

 Texas Business reports:  eDoorways International Corporation joined a working partnership led by Create Tech Village, a California-based technology infrastructure creator, and the Ibero American Science and Technology Education Consortium (ISTEC); whose goals include the creation, development and enhancement of technology parks at various locations around the world.

Texas Business reports:  Texas factory activity increased in February, according to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey.

Texas Business reports:  West Texas Intermediate crude oil prices edged up 0.2 percent to $89.58 per barrel in February, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Texas Business reports:  The house price index (purchase only) for Texas published by the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) fell 1.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010 and is down 1.8 percent from the previous year.

Texas Business reports:  The Dallas Fed’s Texas Business-Cycle Index combines movements in employment, the unemployment rate and state real gross domestic product to provide a broader view of the state’s economic health. Periods of negative change in the index indicate recessions in Texas, shown as the shaded areas on the chart.

Texas Business reports:  The Texas Attorney General’s office said in an opinion issued today from its office that cities are prohibited from using radar devices that makes photographs of a vehicle, its license plate or operator.

Texas Business reports:  This update, prepared by Dallas Fed Senior Economist Jim Dolmas, provides an in-depth analysis of the latest personal consumption expenditures (PCE) inflation data. Updates will be posted monthly, following the release of the official PCE data by the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Texas Business reports:  The state of Texas experienced exceptional growth since 2000, with Latinos playing a key role in the record number of residents in the Lone Star State, according to a National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) Educational Fund analysis of newly released Census 2010 data.

Texas Business reports:  The Texas Attorney General’s office has been asked for an opinion on the maximum interest rate that can be charged by a state-chartered credit union.

Texas Business reports:  After more than a decade on the West Coast, a major telecommunications conference is relocating to Austin.

Texas Business notes this "economic letter" by the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank's Jian Wang:  The U.S. current account deficit has deepened significantly since the late 1990s.

Texas Business reports:  Texas total nonfarm employment was up by 20,000 jobs in December, representing the addition of 230,800 jobs since December 2009.

Texas Business reports:  A landmark change involving a federal act may impact property tax coffers across the state.  

Texas Business reports:  The computer and video game industry created more full time jobs in the past two years than any other moving image entertainment sector, according to a new report from the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts.

Jason Saving of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas issues this report on the Southwest Economy for the fourth quarter 2010. 

Texas Business Reports:  The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and the Semiconductor Industry Association are hosting a nanoelectric conference in Austin on December 3.

Texas Business reports:  The Texas economy continues to recover at a moderate pace, according to Anil Kumar and Adam Swadley of the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank.

The headline PCE price index increased at a 1.0 percent annualized rate in September, down from an average annualized 2.4 percent in July and August. As was the case in July and August, rising gasoline prices accounted for much of September's increase in the headline index. Recent weekly data on gas prices predict an even larger boost to the headline PCE rate in October.

The 12-month headline rate held steady at 1.4 percent.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas has released the latest Community Outlook Survey, a tool that measures the financial conditions of low-to moderate-income (LMI) communities and the organizations that serve them in the Eleventh Federal Reserve District.  In this report, the third quarter 2010 Community Outlook Survey indicates that a majority of respondents think the availability of jobs and affordable housing stayed the same or diminished from the second to third quarter of 2010. However, more respondents anticipate jobs and affordable housing to become increasingly available in the fourth quarter of 2010. When asked about the financial well-being and access to credit of LMI households, most respondents said that these households' situations remained the same or worsened from the second to third quarter of 2010, but much fewer respondents thought that these households' financial well-being and access to credit would decrease in the fourth quarter.

Texas Business reports:  DALLAS—While the dollar’s supremacy as a reserve currency isn’t likely to fade soon, the International Monetary Fund’s substantial allocation of special drawing rights in 2009 brought them back into the spotlight, according to the latest issue of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas’ Economic Letter.

Texas Business reports:  Texas factory activity increased in October, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey by the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank.

 Texas Business reports:  A Chicago company hopes to tap more into the Mexico metals market with an El Paso operation. 

Texas Business reports:  As Austin smarts from ISMI relocating to New York, it received a salve from the announcement of a $2 billion airport and corporate green business center. 

Texas Business reports:   El Paso Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Business Leaders & Chamber took center stage at this year’s United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce (USHCC) 31st Annual Convention and Business Expo held last week.   

Texas Business reports:  The Texas economy continues to recover at a moderate pace, but growth appears to have decelerated in August, the Dallas Federal Reserve said Friday in a report. 

Texas Business reports:  Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers , the world's largest industrial auctioneer, will open its new facility at the Company's permanent auction site located at 6050 Azle Avenue in Lake Worth this week. 

Texas Business reports:  WASHINGTON –President Barack Obama named Waco native Austan Goolsbee as the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA), the White House announced today. 

Texas Business notes this story by Joel Thomas of CBS11tv.com:  The Arlington City Council has closed a $10 million dollar gap with relative ease and is prepared to pass its budget for the next fiscal year.

Texas Business notes this story by Jim Landers of the Dallas Morning News:  When the national housing bubble broke, Texas found itself on dry land while much of the nation was swimming in debt. That should give the state room to spend.

Texas Business notes this story by Kiah Collier of the San Angelo Standard-Times: They are often spoken about in the same sentence or even as the same thing — but they aren’t.

Texas Business notes this story by Eva-Marie Ayala of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram: BURLESON -- Lance Campbell knows that every detail matters when opening a new school.

Texas Business notes this story by Steve Brown of the Dallas Morning News:  Real estate investors itching to buy foreclosed commercial properties may have a long wait.

Texas Business notes this story by Stewart M. Powell of the Houston Chronicle:  The White House on Tuesday spelled out $40 million in emergency economic adjustment assistance to help Florida's hard-hit Space Coast recover from the end of space shuttle operations and changes in the moon program, prompting yet more criticism from Texans in Congress about why the Lone Star State got nothing. 

Texas Business recommends this story by Melissa Del Bosque of the Texas Observer:  Reynosa is crumbling under the dark spell of organized crime and narco-traficantes.

Texas Business reports:  Texas is investing $1.56 million through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company), a leading global medical technology company, for the creation of its global professional services headquarters in San Antonio. 

Texas Business recommends this story by Dennis Cauchon of USA Today:  Rapidly rising pay and benefits in the armed forces have lifted many military towns into the ranks of the nation's most affluent communities, a USA TODAY analysis finds.

Texas Business notes this story by Tim Chase of the Houston Chronicle:  In the world of incentives, every community and state unanimously agrees on one thing — we all wish nobody used them.

TexasBusiness.com notes this story by Dmagazine.com: In North Texas and elsewhere, last year was an ugly one for executive compensation at the largest and most scrutinized U.S. companies.

TexasBusiness.com reports:  A $1.1 million investment through the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) in Caterpillar Inc. for the expansion of Caterpillar’s hydraulic excavation manufacturing operations in Victoria, officials announced today. 

TexasBusiness.com notes this story by Ramon Bracamontes of the El Paso Times:  U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, himself a former Border Patrol sector commander, said Wednesday that the U.S. government may be pouring too much money into border security and not enough into port-of-entry crossings that are vital to the economy.

TexasBusiness.com reports:  EDINBURG—Earlier this year, the State of Texas gave the University of Texas – Pan American (UTPA) $3.25 million from its Texas Emerging Technology Fund (TETF) to help the University expand its world-class advanced manufacturing center, the Rapid Response Manufacturing Center.

TexasBusiness.com notes this story by Sara Foley of the Corpus Christi Caller Times: The future of Corpus Christi’s bayfront may be spelled out in a stack of brightly colored papers in the New York office of Projects for Public Spaces, a consulting firm with experience creating destination parks.

TexasBusiness.com reports:  TechAmerica, partnering with the Dallas Regional Chamber and University of North Texas will host the first United States/Mexico Technology Summit. The event will be held Wednesday, Sept. 29 and Thursday, Sept. 30 at the Cityplace Conference and Event Center north of downtown Dallas.  

This update, prepared by Dallas Fed Senior Economist Jim Dolmas, provides an in-depth analysis of the latest personal consumption expenditures (PCE) inflation data. Updates will be posted monthly, following the release of the official PCE data by the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

TexasBusiness.com notes:  The trimmed mean PCE inflation rate for June was an annualized  0.8 percent. According to the BEA, the overall PCE inflation rate for June was -1.7 percent, annualized, while the inflation rate for PCE excluding food and energy was 0.5 percent, reports the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank.

TexasBusiness.com notes:  Oil price shocks are thought to have played a prominent role in U.S. economic activity. Oil price shocks in the 1970s and early 1980s and the 2000s reflect differing mixes of shifts in oil supply and demand, and differing sources of oil price shocks have differing effects on economic activity. We also find that U.S. output fluctuations owe mostly to domestic shocks, with productivity shocks contributing to weakness in the 1970s and 1980s and strength in the 2000s in this paper distributed by the Dallas Federal Reserve and authored by Nathan S. Balke, Stephen P.A. Brown and Mine K. Yucel. 

"I think it would be neat to have more areas I could take her to swim and stuff like that — dog parks," Harris said.

  After a slow start, San Antonio employers this year should hire for all the jobs lost in 2009, while Texas overall must wait until the end of 2011 to replace the 3.4 percent jobs lost statewide last year, economists said Tuesday. San Antonio job growth this year grew at an annual rate of only 1.1 percent the first six months of this year, a slower-than-projected pace, said Steve Nivin, chief economist and director of the SABER Institute, a joint program of the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and St. Mary's University, reports David Hendricks of the San Antonio Express-News. 

 Texas factory activity rebounded slightly in July, according to business executives responding to the Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey, published today by the Dallas Federal Reserve. The production index, a key indicator of state manufacturing conditions, rose from –2 to 5, suggesting output expanded slightly in July after contracting in June.

In a land of McMansions, he limited his Celina house to one story. He widened bathroom doors to fit wheelchairs. He planned a spare bedroom for elderly parents. He designed his kitchen table to hold at least eight hungry grandchildren, reports Jessica Meyers for the Dallas Morning News. 

What can we expect the economy to do in the latter half of 2010? Mark G. Dotzour, chief economist and director of research at the Texas A&M Real Estate Center at Mays Business School has a few ideas. The road ahead is filled with potholes, but Dotzour says there is hope for the future.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers canceled the 50-year lease on the Fort Bliss property with Federal Development, a Washington, D.C., company.

The road was partially reopened on Wednesday, six days after it was closed due to flooding along the Rio Grande.

Pending sales — those listings expected to close within 30 days — fell 17.8 percent from last year to 2,991 for May, according to monthly data released Tuesday from the Houston Association of Realtors.

More than 1,000 junior golfers teed off Tuesday for the 12th annual Starburst Junior Classic.