Business & Economics
Government Spending
Senate Republicans Release Their Obamacare Replacement Plan
Senate Republicans on Thursday announced a wide-ranging plan to roll back the Affordable Care Act, with features that include a dramatic reduction in government spending that could mean millions more Americans will be left uninsured. The plan, unveiled by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his team after working on ...
Tracy Seipel
June 22, 2017
Business & Economics
Policymakers Ignore Long-Term Consequences Of California Minimum Wage Hike
They were warned and they knew better but they did it nonetheless. It’s become the California Way. Continually legislate, never bother to contemplate. In 1992, economists David Card and Alan B. Krueger published a National Bureau of Economic Research paper that claimed, “Relative to stores in Pennsylvania, fast food restaurants ...
Kerry Jackson
June 20, 2017
Business & Economics
New PRI Issue Brief Finds Government Policies Have Strangled State’s Housing Market, Made Housing Unaffordable
Big government policies and political constraints are the primary causes for rising California home prices and lack of supply, according to the findings of a new “California Ideas in Action” issue brief released today by the non-partisan Pacific Research Institute. Reforms to open California’s housing market are recommended as the ...
Kerry Jackson
June 14, 2017
Business & Economics
The Best Way To Help Patients Afford Health Care Is To Make Health Care More Affordable
Cultures from biblical times to the ancient Chinese have all expressed some form of the wisdom that the best form of charity is to prevent poverty in the first place. This wisdom is lacking today, particularly with respect to the U.S. health care sector. A recent analysis by investment research ...
Wayne Winegarden
June 13, 2017
Business & Economics
Puerto Rico’s Illness Is Threatening To Become A National Epidemic
10-years of economic stagnation has taken its toll on Puerto Rico. Unemployment is skyrocketing, infrastructure is degrading, and the exodus away from the island is accelerating. Structural reforms that will stabilize the financial crisis in the short-term, and revitalize the economy in the long-term, are necessary. Such reforms will benefit ...
Wayne Winegarden
June 8, 2017
California
Would Single Payer Violate The Gann Limit?
The California Senate voted late on June 1 to create a single-payer health-care system that will cover every resident in the state with no money out of their pockets. But this “free” health care would be anything but. Its costs are going to be steep, painful, probably deadly – and ...
Kerry Jackson
June 7, 2017
Business & Economics
Rising Regulatory Burdens, Declining Health Outcomes
Tweaks do not turn bad regulatory proposals into good ones. Yet, with only minor modifications, Congress is once again considering the CREATES Act (Creating and Restoring Equal Access to Equivalent Samples Act of 2017), and its close cousin, the FAST Act (Fair Access for Safe and Timely Generics Act of ...
Wayne Winegarden
June 6, 2017
Business & Economics
Step One: Recognize The Public Pension Crisis
As Milton Friedman famously noted, there are four ways to spend money; the fourth being spending somebody else’s money on somebody else. And, when people spend money this way, they tend to disregard both the costs and the outcomes. Simply put, people spend such money unwisely. Not only, as Milton ...
Wayne Winegarden
May 30, 2017
Business & Economics
Pensions: The Case For Defined Contribution Retirement Plans
Three problems, exemplified by the crises afflicting the public pension systems in Houston and Dallas, plague state and local pension systems across the country. First, state and local governments have only contributed 88 percent of the required annual contributions into their public pension funds between 2001 and 2015. In total, ...
Wayne Winegarden
May 26, 2017
Business & Economics
Lack Of Transparency In Public Contract Negotiations Would Lead To Higher Taxpayer Costs
No state needs to reform the relationship that governments have with public-employee unions more than California. Yet lawmakers keep going in the wrong direction. Contract negotiations between government and the labor unions who represent the public employees should be transparent. Too often, both sides are working toward a common goal ...
Kerry Jackson
May 24, 2017
Senate Republicans Release Their Obamacare Replacement Plan
Senate Republicans on Thursday announced a wide-ranging plan to roll back the Affordable Care Act, with features that include a dramatic reduction in government spending that could mean millions more Americans will be left uninsured. The plan, unveiled by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his team after working on ...
Policymakers Ignore Long-Term Consequences Of California Minimum Wage Hike
They were warned and they knew better but they did it nonetheless. It’s become the California Way. Continually legislate, never bother to contemplate. In 1992, economists David Card and Alan B. Krueger published a National Bureau of Economic Research paper that claimed, “Relative to stores in Pennsylvania, fast food restaurants ...
New PRI Issue Brief Finds Government Policies Have Strangled State’s Housing Market, Made Housing Unaffordable
Big government policies and political constraints are the primary causes for rising California home prices and lack of supply, according to the findings of a new “California Ideas in Action” issue brief released today by the non-partisan Pacific Research Institute. Reforms to open California’s housing market are recommended as the ...
The Best Way To Help Patients Afford Health Care Is To Make Health Care More Affordable
Cultures from biblical times to the ancient Chinese have all expressed some form of the wisdom that the best form of charity is to prevent poverty in the first place. This wisdom is lacking today, particularly with respect to the U.S. health care sector. A recent analysis by investment research ...
Puerto Rico’s Illness Is Threatening To Become A National Epidemic
10-years of economic stagnation has taken its toll on Puerto Rico. Unemployment is skyrocketing, infrastructure is degrading, and the exodus away from the island is accelerating. Structural reforms that will stabilize the financial crisis in the short-term, and revitalize the economy in the long-term, are necessary. Such reforms will benefit ...
Would Single Payer Violate The Gann Limit?
The California Senate voted late on June 1 to create a single-payer health-care system that will cover every resident in the state with no money out of their pockets. But this “free” health care would be anything but. Its costs are going to be steep, painful, probably deadly – and ...
Rising Regulatory Burdens, Declining Health Outcomes
Tweaks do not turn bad regulatory proposals into good ones. Yet, with only minor modifications, Congress is once again considering the CREATES Act (Creating and Restoring Equal Access to Equivalent Samples Act of 2017), and its close cousin, the FAST Act (Fair Access for Safe and Timely Generics Act of ...
Step One: Recognize The Public Pension Crisis
As Milton Friedman famously noted, there are four ways to spend money; the fourth being spending somebody else’s money on somebody else. And, when people spend money this way, they tend to disregard both the costs and the outcomes. Simply put, people spend such money unwisely. Not only, as Milton ...
Pensions: The Case For Defined Contribution Retirement Plans
Three problems, exemplified by the crises afflicting the public pension systems in Houston and Dallas, plague state and local pension systems across the country. First, state and local governments have only contributed 88 percent of the required annual contributions into their public pension funds between 2001 and 2015. In total, ...
Lack Of Transparency In Public Contract Negotiations Would Lead To Higher Taxpayer Costs
No state needs to reform the relationship that governments have with public-employee unions more than California. Yet lawmakers keep going in the wrong direction. Contract negotiations between government and the labor unions who represent the public employees should be transparent. Too often, both sides are working toward a common goal ...