Daily Must Reads for the week of March 5
Must Reads for March 5
Must Reads for March 9
Forbes: When bad things happen to (supposedly) good legislation
What I have decided to do this year is to discuss why bad things happen to well-intentioned legislation. Specifically, I offer these 10 economics traps that legislators frequently fall into.
Freedom Politics: Warning: Obama proposes tripling dividend tax rate
Higher dividend taxation will impede the investment that fuels long-run growth, depress stock prices, and weaken incentives for good corporate governance.
Washington Times: Government sets record deficit in February
The nonpartisan agency projected the government will run a deficit of $229 billion in February, the highest monthly figure ever. The previous high was $223 billion a year ago, in February 2011.
Featured Letter to the Editor: Job one: Stop Obamacare
If we Americans allow our government to take over one-sixth of the economy, we are following the model of European socialism, and we have given up on American exceptionalism.
Must Reads for March 8
Featured Letter to the Editor: There is more to money funds than meets the eye
Sallie Krawcheck’s “Money-Market Funds Aren’t What You Think” (op-ed, Feb. 29) is, I hope, the start of a well-deserved dissection of this misunderstood and dangerous industry.
Washington Post: The influence industry: Obama gives administration jobs to some big fundraisers
More than half of Obama’s 47 biggest fundraisers, those who collected at least $500,000 for his campaign, have been given administration jobs. Nine more have been appointed to presidential boards and committees.
Yahoo! Finance: Illinois State Board of Education selects Charter School as 2011 spotlight school
Alain Locke Charter School students have achieved the greatest test score gains in the history of the Illinois ISAT test, growing for nine consecutive years from 12% to 91% of students meeting or exceeding Illinois state standards in reading and math combined.
Washington Times: Ending Medicaid’s Washington Tour
“People in Kansas know better what Kansans need than a bunch of bureaucrats at [the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services] in Baltimore.” This bill would let states decide how the money is spent to provide health care, including provider reimbursement, benefits and eligibility.
Must Reads for March 7
Examiner: Quinn surrogate wilts during pension debate
In what can only be described as an embarrassment for the Governor’s office, budget spokeswoman Kelly Kraft appeared incapable of expanding on her scripted talking points or answering pointed questions posed by Varney.
Daily American News: Illinois pensions worse than numbers show
A report by U.S. Government Accountability Office released late last week says Illinois could face unforeseen payment hikes because of how the state has handled its public pensions.
Journal and Courier: Luring jobs to Indiana? It’s starting to work
Campaign has helped entice more than a dozen companies to cross the state line.
Featured Letter to the Editor: State tax
By increasing state tax rate by 60%, legislators have put an added burden on constituents who can’t afford it. My personal frustration comes from living in other, more reasonable, states and having a mathematical background that shows me the Illinois rate has gone up without the deductions allowed in the federal return.
Must Reads for March 6
The American: Ten disasters America will face if Obama gets a second term
The damage of a second Obama term could be potentially irrevocable. I asked a number of conservative thinkers what they feared most from a second term, and compiled this list of the top ten disasters that would befall America if Obama were re-elected this fall.
Reason: Recovery leaves 99 percent poorer
President Obama and his economic brain trust have signally failed to deliver for the 99 Percent. Then again, only the 52.9 Percent voted for Obama, so what were the other 46.1 percent expecting?
Washington Examiner: Obama corporate tax reform will harm U.S. firms
Beyond the fact that the president continues the Washington tradition of picking winners and losers, the plan won’t do much to fix our horribly inefficient system.
Featured Letter to the Editor: School discipline
If families experience hardship due to detention fees, the simple solution would be to work with that student to stop earning detentions, not attack the system that was designed to help students succeed when the vast majority of public high schools in Chicago do not offer the same promise of success.
Must Reads for March 5
Forbes: The constitutional issue in Obamacare isn’t cost, but control
The White House wants to control health insurance because it believes it has both the right and the wisdom to micromanage the economy—and you. And that’s the issue going before the Supreme Court.
Quad-Cities Online: Illinois struggling to meet per-student funding needs
The uncertainty over state education funding makes it hard for districts to plan ahead, said Robin Steans, executive director of Advance Illinois, an education advocacy group.
Chicago Tribune: Grading teachers
A value-added system will help Illinois educators do a better job identifying and rewarding the most highly effective teachers with, we can hope, markedly higher salaries. The information also can help schools replace educators who simply aren’t advancing their students’ academic performance.
Reason: Milton and Rose Friedman’s legacy of school reform
Since 1970, direct per-pupil spending on K-12 public schools has more than doubled in inflation-adjusted dollars while educational outcomes for graduation high school seniors have remained flat at best.
Featured Letter to the Editor: Quinn’s budget should focus on business development
In his budget he addresses education very heavily but does not address what will happen with all the “brain power” if there aren’t any jobs for all these edu-cated people to go to.