Water
Business & Economics
State budget mess a comedy, or tragedy?
SACRAMENTO – As entertainment goes, the final regular-season episode of the Budget Show in the Capitol was shoddy. The actors – the Assembly members and senators – are B-rate. The speeches, despite their strained attempts to sound Kennedy-esque, were pretentious. Those of us in the audience sometimes rolled our eyes ...
Commentary
Ratios condemn patients to inferior care
In 1999, Gray Davis signed a law mandating a statewide ratio of one nurse to five patients in surgical wards, one to six in psychiatric wards, one to four in pediatric wards, one to three in maternity wards, and one to two in intensive care. The law was strong-armed to ...
Environment
Should the Federal Government Stick Its Nozzle in Your Shower?
Vol.4 No.8: August 17, 2010 Should the Federal Government Stick Its Nozzle in Your Shower? By Amy Kaleita, Ph.D., Senior Fellow in Environmental Studies, Pacific Research Institute oned, the same result could be obtained by effective pricing of water, instead of intrusive regulation. In May, the DOE announced a new ...
Commentary
How to make shopping more annoying
SACRAMENTO – While walking though the supermarket the other day, my wife and I began playing a game I call Unintended Consequences. We tried to guess how things will really work after some new law is put in place. Our governments continually pass legislation that promises to fix every problem ...
Business & Economics
More regulators is the wrong fix
The BP oil spill has prompted calls for more federal regulatory power. Yet the behavior of the federal bureaucrats who were supposed to prevent this type of disaster provides no reason to expect better outcomes with more bureaucracy. The Minerals Management Service was the Interior Department agency responsible for regulation ...
Commentary
Less bang for education bucks
California’s public education establishment continually argues that the state ranks near the bottom in funding K-12 education. A just-released study by the U.S. Census Bureau pokes a giant hole in these claims. Those trying to portray California as miserly when it comes to education funding often cite figures put out ...
Climate Change
Why the Going is Tough for High-Cost Legislation on Climate Change
Vol.4 No.7: July 19, 2010 Why the Going is Tough for High-Cost Legislation on Climate Change By Amy Kaleita, Ph.D., Senior Fellow in Environmental Studies, Pacific Research Institute For those favoring legislation on climate change, these should be the best of times. The Democrats, typically the party of the greens, ...
California
Pensions are S.F.’s other golden gate
SACRAMENTO – I’d been starting to wonder about whether there are any true progressives left in California, until I heard about Jeff Adachi, San Francisco’s public defender. Many people describe themselves as progressive, mind you, but few seem to embody the core principles of a movement that is supposed to ...
California
Should The State Decide How Many Nurses a Hospital Must Hire?
Under ObamaCare, those who believe the government should decide how much medical care you deserve, and how it should be delivered, are eager to impose their preferences nationwide. Nurses’ unions lead the charge, armed with a recent study that could use more examination than it is getting from politicians and ...
Business & Economics
Oil Producers’ Liability Should Not Be Unlimited
Everyone loves a villain. And with the Deepwater Horizon disaster at the two-month mark, the love knows no bounds, uniting much of the political-media complex in a sticky goo of opportunism, finger-pointing and phony demands for apologies. That BP–having schmoozed the environmental left for years while compiling a dreadful safety ...
State budget mess a comedy, or tragedy?
SACRAMENTO – As entertainment goes, the final regular-season episode of the Budget Show in the Capitol was shoddy. The actors – the Assembly members and senators – are B-rate. The speeches, despite their strained attempts to sound Kennedy-esque, were pretentious. Those of us in the audience sometimes rolled our eyes ...
Ratios condemn patients to inferior care
In 1999, Gray Davis signed a law mandating a statewide ratio of one nurse to five patients in surgical wards, one to six in psychiatric wards, one to four in pediatric wards, one to three in maternity wards, and one to two in intensive care. The law was strong-armed to ...
Should the Federal Government Stick Its Nozzle in Your Shower?
Vol.4 No.8: August 17, 2010 Should the Federal Government Stick Its Nozzle in Your Shower? By Amy Kaleita, Ph.D., Senior Fellow in Environmental Studies, Pacific Research Institute oned, the same result could be obtained by effective pricing of water, instead of intrusive regulation. In May, the DOE announced a new ...
How to make shopping more annoying
SACRAMENTO – While walking though the supermarket the other day, my wife and I began playing a game I call Unintended Consequences. We tried to guess how things will really work after some new law is put in place. Our governments continually pass legislation that promises to fix every problem ...
More regulators is the wrong fix
The BP oil spill has prompted calls for more federal regulatory power. Yet the behavior of the federal bureaucrats who were supposed to prevent this type of disaster provides no reason to expect better outcomes with more bureaucracy. The Minerals Management Service was the Interior Department agency responsible for regulation ...
Less bang for education bucks
California’s public education establishment continually argues that the state ranks near the bottom in funding K-12 education. A just-released study by the U.S. Census Bureau pokes a giant hole in these claims. Those trying to portray California as miserly when it comes to education funding often cite figures put out ...
Why the Going is Tough for High-Cost Legislation on Climate Change
Vol.4 No.7: July 19, 2010 Why the Going is Tough for High-Cost Legislation on Climate Change By Amy Kaleita, Ph.D., Senior Fellow in Environmental Studies, Pacific Research Institute For those favoring legislation on climate change, these should be the best of times. The Democrats, typically the party of the greens, ...
Pensions are S.F.’s other golden gate
SACRAMENTO – I’d been starting to wonder about whether there are any true progressives left in California, until I heard about Jeff Adachi, San Francisco’s public defender. Many people describe themselves as progressive, mind you, but few seem to embody the core principles of a movement that is supposed to ...
Should The State Decide How Many Nurses a Hospital Must Hire?
Under ObamaCare, those who believe the government should decide how much medical care you deserve, and how it should be delivered, are eager to impose their preferences nationwide. Nurses’ unions lead the charge, armed with a recent study that could use more examination than it is getting from politicians and ...
Oil Producers’ Liability Should Not Be Unlimited
Everyone loves a villain. And with the Deepwater Horizon disaster at the two-month mark, the love knows no bounds, uniting much of the political-media complex in a sticky goo of opportunism, finger-pointing and phony demands for apologies. That BP–having schmoozed the environmental left for years while compiling a dreadful safety ...
