Opinion
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Tax Threats Surface in California
Opinion -Despite emphatic anti-tax election results in 2004, tax-hike proposals are surfacing for the 2005-06 session of the California legislature. -
Proposed Law Would Put California’s Public Pensions on Private-Sector Footing
Opinion -A California assemblyman has proposed scrapping the state's public employee pension system for new employees, instead putting them under the same type of 401(k) pension system offered to most private-sector employees. -
Ten Years of GOP Tax Policy: Good News and Bad
Opinion -Managing Editor’s note: This article is excerpted with permission from a chapter in The Republican Revolution 10 Years Later: Smaller Government or Business as Usual? to be published by the Cato Institute in March 2005. -
D.C. Councilwoman Stands against Taxpayer-Funded Stadium–For a While
Opinion -Major League Baseball (MLB) was thrown a curveball on December 15 as District of Columbia Councilwoman Linda Cropp (D) tried to help local taxpayers by changing the financing rules for a proposed new stadium. -
Chicago Stadiums Fail to Deliver Promised Benefits
Opinion -Chicago has two taxpayer-subsidized sports stadiums, neither of which appears to be living up to the promises made by supporters of taxpayer funding. -
Consumers Confident in Prescription Drugs, AP Study Says
Opinion -An end-of-year Associated Press poll showed that, despite recent product withdrawals and reported health risks of popular medicines, U.S. consumer confidence in the safety of prescription drugs remains high. -
Health Care Info Tech Trade Show Highlights Innovation
Opinion -When Toward an Electronic Patient Record (TEPR), a leading health care technology trade show, takes place in Salt Lake City this May, the event will be celebrating its twenty-first year. -
PISA Results Cast Doubt on Heavy Use of Computers in the Classroom
Opinion -Researchers Thomas Fuchs and Ludger Woessmann of the CESifo Economic Research Organization in Munich, a joint project of the University of Munich’s Center for Economic Studies (CES) and the Ifo Institute for Economic Research, analyzed test performance -
Legal Jujitsu
Opinion -According to Sol Stern, one of New York state’s most powerful arguments against the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit was that New York City’s public education system was “so dysfunctional ... -
Organization Provides Model School Choice Bills for State Legislators
Opinion -The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), with which the author is affiliated, released on January 7 a collection of model legislation intended to help state legislators create workable school reform bills that have the best possible chance of -
The FCC Backslides on Unbundling
Opinion -When I was growing up, when someone would get religion and profess faith, but then fall away from religious practice and slip back into his former way of life, it was called “backsliding. -
Building Unwanted Schools in Illinois
Opinion -While taxpayers in Florida’s Miami-Dade School District aren’t getting the new schools they want and need, taxpayers in Jersey County, Illinois, are getting new schools they don’t want and don’t need, despite rejecting --by a 71-29 percent vote--a 1999 -
February 2005 Friedman Report Profile: Donayle Whitmore
Opinion -As a mother of two, president and interim director of the Missouri Coalition for School Choice, and founder of the Ptah Academy, Donayle Whitmore is heavily involved in school reform. -
Achievement Data Show Positive Impact of Charter Schools, Study Finds
Opinion -Parents, teachers, and other school reformers who want to make full use of public charter schools to help students who are struggling in regular public schools received reinforcement from a new national study by Harvard University education researcher -
Congress Bails Out Universal Service Fund–For Now
Opinion -As one its last acts of 2004, the U.S. Senate on December 8 passed legislation that keeps alive a long-distance telephone fee subsidizing telecommunications service for low-income residents and rural areas. -
California Law Provides Lessons for Private Transportation
Opinion -Private toll roads are in much wider use in some parts of Europe and Asia than in the United States, but private funding to help solve traffic congestion may soon become more common here, according to University of California, Irvine professors Marlon G. -
Environmental Activists Exploit Catastrophic Tsunami
Opinion -Two days after the December 25 tsunami that killed more than 100,000 people in Southeast Asia, the executive director of Greenpeace UK told the British newspaper The Independent, "No one can ignore the relentless increase in extreme weather events and -
States’ Drug Import Program Draws Little Interest from Public
Opinion -After three months of operation, only about 1,900 persons have signed up for the I-SaveRx drug import program, which offers low-cost imported drugs to residents of Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, and Wisconsin. The program went into operation last October. -
Amtrak: On Time for Yesterday
Opinion -On-time performance has long been Amtrak’s principal strength ... not the trains, but the financial crises. -
California Charters Show Above-Average Gains
Opinion -Students attending California charter schools were 8.5 percent more likely to be proficient at reading and 5. -
Crichton Strikes Devastating Blow to Alarmists
Opinion -Michael Crichton, author of best-selling books and blockbuster movies such as The Andromeda Strain and Jurassic Park, has published a new best-selling book. That much is hardly noteworthy, given his track record of literary success. -
Detroit Schools Face Default
Opinion -In order to comply with state and federal laws, Detroit Public Schools issued a comprehensive financial report for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2004. -
Different Technology, Similar Service
Opinion -In the absence of competition, regulations serve to protect consumers against monopoly market power. This is, in theory, the reason why the telecommunications local exchange market is so heavily regulated. -
Dr. King’s Practical View on Education
Opinion -I monitor quarterly educational reports on the achievement of black students. While there is some progress, we’re moving at a slow pace when it comes to closing the educational gap between black and white students.