Transportation
Blog
Is It A Bad Thing for State Workers to Save Taxpayers on Work Travel?
As the sharing economy has grown in California, we’re changing how we approach many common life transactions. When we’re looking for a repair person to fix a broken toilet, now we might look to Thumbtack to bid out of the job when before we would have called a traditional plumber ...
Commentary
States Can’t Afford Medicaid Expansion — Neither Can Patients
This fall’s midterm election ballot just got a little longer in Utah. In mid-April, progressive activists announced that they’d gathered enough signatures to force a November referendum on Medicaid expansion. Utah isn’t the only red state flirting with extending free government health insurance to able-bodied, childless adults. Within weeks, activists in Idaho ...
California
Mass Transit Ridership is Falling in Southern California, Study Finds
By Kenneth Artz A new study finds commuters are increasingly choosing to use cars over mass transit in Southern California. Mass transit use in six southern California counties declined significantly during the past decade, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) ...
Blog
Politicians Want to “Wet Their Beaks” in Taxing Uber and Lyft
Uber and Lyft have generated billions in gross revenue in California. It’s a dazzling data point that has caught the eyes of some politicians who are unable to resist the covetous urges that arise when they watch commercial enterprises thrive. Elected officials regard Uber, Lyft, and other ridesharing companies — ...
Blog
An entitlement for… moi?
If you think this is going to be one of those hard-hitting policy pieces that you get from the likes of Anaya and Jackson, or one of those brainy blogs from Winegarden. It’s not. It’s all about me, and my yearning for that fabulous, subsidized Tesla. I’m in the market ...
Business & Economics
Government Should Leave Sharing Economy Alone
Governments tend to target innovative industries that are too new to be regulated and single them out for punitive taxes and nasty abuse. As Art Laffer once put it, governments aren’t happy when business pioneers enjoy “success without the benevolent, guiding wisdom of” of the regulatory state. This was the ...
Business & Economics
By Killing Off Ride-Sharing, Austin Puts It In Reverse
“Keep Austin Weird” is a slogan dreamed up by the Texas city’s independent business alliance to promote local businesses and to keep national corporations out of the city. By recently regulating ride-sharing companies out of business, Austin became more than just weird — it’s now perfectly unique. The supposed tech ...
Business & Economics
California’s Regulations are Harming Small Businesses
The regulatory burden in California continues to grow. Minimum wage increases—which simultaneously raise costs on businesses and harms many low-wage workers and consumers—have passed in Los Angeles and San Francisco. California is also pursuing regulations that would reduce the viability of Uber and Lyft, the popular ride-for-hire services revolutionizing how ...
Business & Economics
States Where Regulations Harm Small Businesses The Most
The federal and state governments continue to impose ever-more burdensome regulations on businesses across the country. Overall, in 2014 alone, the Obama Administration imposed an estimated $181.5 billion in proposed and final regulatory costs on the U.S. economy according to a study by the American Action Forum. And, the federal ...
California
California’s costly green subsidies
If there was any doubt about the economic success of state-mandated green programs, it was erased this week after a state Senate hearing about the future of alternate fuels. By the end of the four-hour session, it was clear that environmental special interests are thriving in California. At the hearing, ...
Is It A Bad Thing for State Workers to Save Taxpayers on Work Travel?
As the sharing economy has grown in California, we’re changing how we approach many common life transactions. When we’re looking for a repair person to fix a broken toilet, now we might look to Thumbtack to bid out of the job when before we would have called a traditional plumber ...
States Can’t Afford Medicaid Expansion — Neither Can Patients
This fall’s midterm election ballot just got a little longer in Utah. In mid-April, progressive activists announced that they’d gathered enough signatures to force a November referendum on Medicaid expansion. Utah isn’t the only red state flirting with extending free government health insurance to able-bodied, childless adults. Within weeks, activists in Idaho ...
Mass Transit Ridership is Falling in Southern California, Study Finds
By Kenneth Artz A new study finds commuters are increasingly choosing to use cars over mass transit in Southern California. Mass transit use in six southern California counties declined significantly during the past decade, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) ...
Politicians Want to “Wet Their Beaks” in Taxing Uber and Lyft
Uber and Lyft have generated billions in gross revenue in California. It’s a dazzling data point that has caught the eyes of some politicians who are unable to resist the covetous urges that arise when they watch commercial enterprises thrive. Elected officials regard Uber, Lyft, and other ridesharing companies — ...
An entitlement for… moi?
If you think this is going to be one of those hard-hitting policy pieces that you get from the likes of Anaya and Jackson, or one of those brainy blogs from Winegarden. It’s not. It’s all about me, and my yearning for that fabulous, subsidized Tesla. I’m in the market ...
Government Should Leave Sharing Economy Alone
Governments tend to target innovative industries that are too new to be regulated and single them out for punitive taxes and nasty abuse. As Art Laffer once put it, governments aren’t happy when business pioneers enjoy “success without the benevolent, guiding wisdom of” of the regulatory state. This was the ...
By Killing Off Ride-Sharing, Austin Puts It In Reverse
“Keep Austin Weird” is a slogan dreamed up by the Texas city’s independent business alliance to promote local businesses and to keep national corporations out of the city. By recently regulating ride-sharing companies out of business, Austin became more than just weird — it’s now perfectly unique. The supposed tech ...
California’s Regulations are Harming Small Businesses
The regulatory burden in California continues to grow. Minimum wage increases—which simultaneously raise costs on businesses and harms many low-wage workers and consumers—have passed in Los Angeles and San Francisco. California is also pursuing regulations that would reduce the viability of Uber and Lyft, the popular ride-for-hire services revolutionizing how ...
States Where Regulations Harm Small Businesses The Most
The federal and state governments continue to impose ever-more burdensome regulations on businesses across the country. Overall, in 2014 alone, the Obama Administration imposed an estimated $181.5 billion in proposed and final regulatory costs on the U.S. economy according to a study by the American Action Forum. And, the federal ...
California’s costly green subsidies
If there was any doubt about the economic success of state-mandated green programs, it was erased this week after a state Senate hearing about the future of alternate fuels. By the end of the four-hour session, it was clear that environmental special interests are thriving in California. At the hearing, ...
