I often get into debates with folks over policy issues. Though I definitely have my own opinions, I try very hard to find some legitimacy on all sides of these debates. I also know that when it comes to the abortion debate, the emotions involved are often very high, and some of the situations women…
Category: Texas Politics
Rick Perry for President?
Yesterday morning, the Wall Street Journal ran an article, New Whispers of Perry 2012 Bid: But over the past two weeks, political advisers and friends say, Mr. Perry has changed his tune on a possible presidential campaign. In private conversations, they say, the three-term governor said he worries that the current GOP contenders have yet…
Subsidies Anyone?
According to the Cato Institute, federal subsidy programs topped the 2,000 mark for the first time last week. Almost half of those have been created in the last 20 years: the number of federal subsidy programs soared 21 percent during the 1990s and 40 percent during the 2000s. As Chris Edwards, Cato’s director of tax…
Jobs, Jobs, Jobs
There are a lot of ways to measure how the economy is doing. But employment, or jobs, is probably the measure that means the most to us. On a macro level, we understand that it means something good when we read that two million new jobs were created and unemployment fell to 4.2%. On the…
Plano Lowers the Cost of Living
It is not often that governments voluntarily reduces fees or taxes. So when one does, it is worth taking a closer look. Last month, Plano voted to eliminate impact fees on developers building new homes and businesses. The fees were charged based on the size of the water meter for the project, and typically ran…
Consumer Protection Usually Doesn’t Live Up to its Name
It seems as if the folks in Washington don’t have enough to do with taking over the American financial, automobile, and health care industries. The talk now is about creating a new consumer protection agency to “protect … the financial well-being of American consumers.” While this may sound like a good cause, a review of…
TX Legislature in Review: Financial Regulation
It is not high finance, but short-term lending helps a lot of consumers out of tight places. This session, multiple bills would have significantly reduced or banned short-term lending. Banks and credit unions generally won’t make short-term loans, so people in need of quick access to funds have to turn higher cost alternatives. While critics…
TX Legislature in Review: Telecommunications
The good news about telecom taxes is that they won’t be going up this session. The bad news is that they won’t be going down. Texas has some of the highest telecommunications taxes in the nation. We’ve made progress recently in reducing those taxes, but there is still plenty of room for improvement. Our recent…
TX Legislature in Review: Tort Reform
There were numerous attempts this session to reverse the achievements of the last ten years or so that have reduced abuse of Texas’ civil justice system, reduced excessive litigation costs, and increased access to the courts for those who are truly injured. These included: reducing access to workers compensation (the Entergy bill); lessening causation standards…
TX Legislature in Review: Electricity and Renewable Energy
Most of the electricity bills this session had one thing in common—they were going to make electricity more expensive for Texas consumers or taxpayers. Fortunately, most of them didn’t pass. The major bill that did pass provided incentives, i.e. subsidies, for electricity generation plants equipped with carbon capture technology. But it may not wind up…