Washington

Want basic information on the state’s workforce?

By Mark Cavers
03/30/2012
On Thursday, the Illinois Senate passedAi??a bill sponsored by Senator Brady that would compile information on employee characteristics, compensation and mobility. Cheap compazine side This is an important piece of legislation because approximately one-third of the stateai??i??s budget goes towards compensation. Yet, simple top-line data on the labor forceAi??is very difficult and in some instances...

Tax Transparency Wins!

08/17/2011
by Mark Cavers Last week, Governor Quinn signed into law the Tax Disclosure Act, which instructs the Department of Revenue to provide information on all state and local taxes in a single, central online database. Under this law, citizens will be able to see every tax they pay with just a few clicks of the mouse....

My Nominee for Pay Czar: David Stern

By Chris Andriesen
11/02/2010
by Dan Proft I do not think government functionaries should set private sector salaries or that U.S. policymakers should be adorned with the appellation properly reserved for Russian autocrats. But, if I did not believe in free markets and free minds, NBA Commissioner David Stern would be my choice for “Pay Czar.” Stern is in the...

Who Brings Home the Pork from Washington?

10/12/2010
by Wesley Fox With the release of the 2010 Capital Bill Piglet Book highlighting wasteful spending by the state, I was curious to see what kind of wasteful spending was taking place at the federal level on behalf of Illinois. This information was gathered from the Citizens Against Government Waste Pork Database and includes their sponsored earmarks for the...

Is Bill Gates Sr. smarter than a 5th Grader?

10/05/2010
Apparently Bill Gates, Sr. is not smarter than a 5th grader because he seems to think the correct answer is 74.  Mr. Gates is advocating for a progressive income tax increase in Washington state.  He has put $500,000 of his own money into the initiative campaign to impose this tax on the people of Washington. That data...

Jobs Errors

07/22/2010
by Kate Piercy Last year, the White House told us the stimulus bill would cut unemployment, estimating it would be down to 7.5 percent today. As Dan Mitchell writes in today’s New York Post, “something obviously went wrong.” Today we’re at 9.5 percent unemployment. What happened? Part of the problem, according to Mitchell, was the faith in...