Business Blog

The head of the Mississippi Airports Association insists the federal budget cutting responsible for closing air control towers at five of Mississippi’s regional airports won’t jeopardize flight safety. On the other hand, the Federal Aviation Administration concluded in a 1990 study that the risk of a mid-air collision is three times greater around airports without [...]

Mississippi airports preparing for a shutdown of control tower operations April 7 received a reprieve to June 15, a move the Federal Aviation Administration made in order to give localities time to determine if they can pay to keep the towers open. The shutdowns are a consequence of the federal budget sequester and affect 149 [...]

It’s election time again — that time when candidates from every political party and persuasion are littering neighborhoods with signs pimping themselves to who ever drives or walks past. The proper word to be used here is litter. Political signs in yards are uglier than Jim Hood’s hair at 5 a.m. — you get the [...]

  The Mississippi Council on Economic Education will observe April as Financial Literacy Month by bringing together high school students from across the state for the state Economics Challenge on Tuesday and the state Financial Literacy Challenge on Tuesday, April 23. Both Challenges will be at Millsaps College in the Leggette Center starting at 10 [...]

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s early March concession that the banking executives who contributed to the nation’s banking collapse are “to big to jail” has brought protests from around the country. Holder, in March 6 testimony to the Senate Banking Committee, said going after leaders of the big banks for illegal activity related to the [...]

Gov. Bill Haslam of Tennessee has rejected expansion of Medicaid in his state over impatience with the Obama administration’s for approval of his proposal to let the state use the money to buy private insurance for the working poor who wold otherwise be covered by Medicaid expansion. In turning down Medicaid expansion, Haslam called for [...]

Customers of Mississippi restaurants will now know whether the catfish on their table is domestically produced or is an imported variety of catfish-like pangasius, also sold as basa, tra and swai. Mississippi producers persuaded legislators this month to amend the state’s catfish Country of Origin Labeling law to require restaurants to also identify the origin [...]

  With a 20-year-lease offer of $48.5 million on the table, downtown Jackson’s Landmark Center held a clear lead in the competition to become the new headquarters of the Mississippi Department of Revenue. Rivals South Pointe Business Park in Clinton and Diversified Technologies complex in Ridgeland presented offers of $51.4 million and $53.4 million, respectively. [...]

Aggressive last-minute price cutting did the trick for Clinton’s South Pointe Business Park in the competition to become the new home of the Mississippi Department of Revenue, the state says. The selection came down to price, with representatives of the former WorldCom headquarters presenting a lease offer too attractive to pass up, said Kevin Upchurch, [...]

Ties to military operations have exempted Golden Triangle Regional Airport near Columbus and Key Field in Meridian from closing under a funding cutoff set to begin April 7 under the federal budget sequester. Five other “contract towers” in the state — Tupelo, Greenville, Oliver Branch, Jackson, and Bay St. Louis – failed to gain exemptions [...]