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Read about California's $68 billion budget crisis

State Budget Update: The Calm Before the Budget Storm

Christmastime is always the busiest time of the year at the Department of Finance. With the state budget due to be released on January 10, department leadership is making the final decisions about spending priorities with the governor. However, recent bad news about the state of California’s finances means that ...
Blog

Read how Biden plan would hurt medical innovation

The Biden Administration Abuses Inflation to Attack Medical Innovation

It is theoretically bankrupt because price changes for individual goods and services reflect unique market factors in addition to broad-based inflation trends. There is no reason to expect any good’s price changes to always equal the average of all price changes (e.g., measured inflation). For instance, a deep frost that ...
Blog

Despite obvious signs, liberals continue to defend Prop. 47

The Coming 2024 Crime Policy Lollapalooza

One of the best words in the English language is “lollapalooza”.  It’s so unique and mellifluous that it could almost be an example of onomatopoeia like clap, boom, bark, or bang.  It’s also a popular musical festival and honestly, it’s just fun to say. The word nerd in me was ...
Blog

Shutting a homeless camp that resembled ‘Lord of the Flies’ – Part Two

Shutting a homeless camp that resembled ‘Lord of the Flies’ Part Two Political polarization shaped the battle over Spokane’s misnamed ‘Camp Hope’ Jeremy Lott | December 15, 2023 Jeffrey Finer is a lawyer who represented Jewels Helping Hands, one of the charities that was involved in bringing services to Spokane, ...
Blog

Learn how homelessness is now hurting California pro teams

How Homelessness, Taxes Impacted Deal for Baseball’s Top Free Agent

In fact, San Francisco’s status these days as a not very desirable place to live, work, or play also played a major factor in the deal. Giants legend and future hall of famer Buster Posey, who is now a member of the team’s executive board and was involved in the ...
Blog

How did Newsom fare against DeSantis?

Grading Gavin Newsom’s Big Debate

Misleading Accounts When asked to defend his record as the only California governor to have lost population for three straight years, Newsom argued that “per capita, more Floridians move to California than Californians move to Florida.” The U.S. Census Bureau shows that in 2021 and 2022, 88,165 Californians moved to ...
Blog

Read latest on electric vehicles

The Wreck of The Electric Vehicles

Newsom led the stampede to outlaw automobiles that burn gasoline and diesel when in 2020 he issued an executive order “requiring sales of all new passenger vehicles to be zero-emission by 2035.” Other governors, all of them as blind as Newsom, followed, including Lamont, who copied the California plan. But ...
Blog

Reason for hope or despair? Part 1

PART ONE Reason for hope or despair? Lessons from the battle over Spokane’s ‘Camp Hope’ homeless encampment Jeremy Lott | December 11, 2023 Camp Hope was, for a time, the largest homeless encampment in the state of Washington, but it was much more than that as well. The encampment regularly ...
Blog

Read latest from PRI's Free Cities Center

Portland overrules bureaucrats and streamlines permitting

Back in March 2021, city auditors issued a blunt assessment of the city’s permitting system. “Getting a building permit in Portland can be a frustratingly slow process,” the auditors concluded, noting the city had for years missed its own timeliness goals. “Delays can affect the economy and motivate property owners ...
Blog

Prop 47 Never Stood a Chance

Nine years ago, Californians overwhelmingly passed Proposition 47 – The “Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act” – and in so doing affirmed and then reaffirmed in later elections their desire that California both reduce crime and rates of incarceration.   This is a tall order for any bureaucracy – and one ...
Blog

Read about California's $68 billion budget crisis

State Budget Update: The Calm Before the Budget Storm

Christmastime is always the busiest time of the year at the Department of Finance. With the state budget due to be released on January 10, department leadership is making the final decisions about spending priorities with the governor. However, recent bad news about the state of California’s finances means that ...
Blog

Read how Biden plan would hurt medical innovation

The Biden Administration Abuses Inflation to Attack Medical Innovation

It is theoretically bankrupt because price changes for individual goods and services reflect unique market factors in addition to broad-based inflation trends. There is no reason to expect any good’s price changes to always equal the average of all price changes (e.g., measured inflation). For instance, a deep frost that ...
Blog

Despite obvious signs, liberals continue to defend Prop. 47

The Coming 2024 Crime Policy Lollapalooza

One of the best words in the English language is “lollapalooza”.  It’s so unique and mellifluous that it could almost be an example of onomatopoeia like clap, boom, bark, or bang.  It’s also a popular musical festival and honestly, it’s just fun to say. The word nerd in me was ...
Blog

Shutting a homeless camp that resembled ‘Lord of the Flies’ – Part Two

Shutting a homeless camp that resembled ‘Lord of the Flies’ Part Two Political polarization shaped the battle over Spokane’s misnamed ‘Camp Hope’ Jeremy Lott | December 15, 2023 Jeffrey Finer is a lawyer who represented Jewels Helping Hands, one of the charities that was involved in bringing services to Spokane, ...
Blog

Learn how homelessness is now hurting California pro teams

How Homelessness, Taxes Impacted Deal for Baseball’s Top Free Agent

In fact, San Francisco’s status these days as a not very desirable place to live, work, or play also played a major factor in the deal. Giants legend and future hall of famer Buster Posey, who is now a member of the team’s executive board and was involved in the ...
Blog

How did Newsom fare against DeSantis?

Grading Gavin Newsom’s Big Debate

Misleading Accounts When asked to defend his record as the only California governor to have lost population for three straight years, Newsom argued that “per capita, more Floridians move to California than Californians move to Florida.” The U.S. Census Bureau shows that in 2021 and 2022, 88,165 Californians moved to ...
Blog

Read latest on electric vehicles

The Wreck of The Electric Vehicles

Newsom led the stampede to outlaw automobiles that burn gasoline and diesel when in 2020 he issued an executive order “requiring sales of all new passenger vehicles to be zero-emission by 2035.” Other governors, all of them as blind as Newsom, followed, including Lamont, who copied the California plan. But ...
Blog

Reason for hope or despair? Part 1

PART ONE Reason for hope or despair? Lessons from the battle over Spokane’s ‘Camp Hope’ homeless encampment Jeremy Lott | December 11, 2023 Camp Hope was, for a time, the largest homeless encampment in the state of Washington, but it was much more than that as well. The encampment regularly ...
Blog

Read latest from PRI's Free Cities Center

Portland overrules bureaucrats and streamlines permitting

Back in March 2021, city auditors issued a blunt assessment of the city’s permitting system. “Getting a building permit in Portland can be a frustratingly slow process,” the auditors concluded, noting the city had for years missed its own timeliness goals. “Delays can affect the economy and motivate property owners ...
Blog

Prop 47 Never Stood a Chance

Nine years ago, Californians overwhelmingly passed Proposition 47 – The “Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act” – and in so doing affirmed and then reaffirmed in later elections their desire that California both reduce crime and rates of incarceration.   This is a tall order for any bureaucracy – and one ...
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