(Originally posted at Sound Politics) Seattle Mayor Ed Murray unveiled his universal preschool plan for the city yesterday. Families making twice the poverty level would receive free preschool valued at $11,000 and all other families would receive subsidies, including the extremely wealthy or “1 percent”. Naturally, the costs of this $58 million plan will be paid […]
Business leadership needed on policies please
While there was some business representation on Mayor Ed Murray’s Income Inequality Advisory Committee (IIAC), business leaders in general were conspicuously absent in making the case against raising the minimum wage. (For my position on it go here.) Reports on how Murray’s deal came about suggest that some employers made an effort to push back […]
Universal preschool – a universally bad idea
As with so many ideas for government expansion into areas of the economy, the concept of universal preschool seems appealing. However, once you consider whether government should have a role educating children below school-age and think about the policy implications of it doing so, it immediately becomes clear that this idea fails every test. As […]
Global warming: a review and how to respond
People on both sides of the global warming debate often seem to talk at cross purposes and frequently in emotional tones. While climate science is incredibly complex, the policy implications seem to me to be relatively straightforward, yet get lost amongst the shrill clamor of the academics, politicians and media pundits. In this piece, I’ll […]
The (relative) unimportance of inequality
The topic of income inequality has received a lot of media attention, primarily because it has been a feature of president Obama’s recent speeches, including this week’s State of the Union. It’s a shame, because as a metric it’s pretty lousy for both determining sound policy prescriptions and measuring their success. It’s easy to illustrate […]