Something happened last week that hasn’t happened in a long time—for the first time in a decade, Texas voters said “NO” to most school district bonds. Here’s more from The Texan: “Last week, a majority of proposed bonds on the November ballot failed for the first time since 2011, when only 17 of the 37...
Prices are rising at the fastest pace in 30 years, according to Wednesday’s report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) on the consumer price index for October. The report showed a rapid 6.2% increase over the last 12 months, a pace which, if continued, would see prices double in fewer than 12 years....
The October job report showed solid growth in the U.S. labor market, with 531,000 nonfarm jobs added last month, but earnings increases are not keeping up with inflation. The unemployment rate fell 0.2 percentage points to 4.6%, but the labor force participation rate remained at 61.6%, the same rate as a year ago, and well...
Thank you for your service. It’s a five-word sentence that sounds so simple, and to the person saying it, it is. But to the person on the receiving end of the compliment, there is just never the right response. I knew I wanted to be a Marine when I was 7 years old. After 9/11,...
Local governments appealed to Texas voters seeking lots of new debt this election cycle. According to The Texan: “Eighty-one localities have placed 149 different bond issues before their constituents on ballots across Texas, totaling nearly $11 billion.” For better or worse, voters approved a great deal of it. But not every bond proposition passed. In...
The Democrats are obsessed with forcing one-size fits all health care on to the country – no matter who it hurts. Despite overwhelming evidence that Medicaid is a poorly performing program for people already on it and expansion would blow up state budgets, Democrats are intent on making states bow to their demand to put...
The sudden energy crisis unfolding across Europe and Asia has taken many by surprise. With continued ripple effects from the COVID-19 pandemic and unprecedented supply chain interruptions already causing havoc in economies around the world, how could yet another crisis have happened so quickly? How could 21st Century power plants run out of fuel? How...
Eleven-year-old Eva Riha shifted under the false floor of the delivery truck as, inches away, Soviet soldiers bayonetted the vegetable crates above her. She and her family were escaping across the southern border of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. Eva and her family left everything behind to escape the menace of communism, eventually ending up in the United States to pursue their...
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi set Halloween as the deadline for passing multiple reckless budget increases. The latest new framework announced recently by President Biden has a claimed cost of $1.75 trillion ($1.85 trillion when you include $100 billion for “immigration”). That number may sound frightful, but the monster under the mask is ghastlier—the real figure...
It started with the nonrenewal of Chapter 313 during the 87th Texas Legislature, which signaled concerns from a broadening coalition about government—in that case school districts—picking winners and losers by granting property tax breaks to select businesses. Now it seems hesitation is growing at the local level to handing out property tax breaks under Chapter...
Today, after nearly three months of taking input from electric market participants, the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUC) is now past the midway point of a lightning-fast effort (by the PUC’s historical standards) to come up with a market redesign plan by the end of this year. The open meeting held last week and...
Gas prices in many parts of the country today look like high GPA numbers. People are angry that a gallon of gas costs more dollars than they have cylinders in their car. Do not expect any answers from the White House, however; “I don’t have a near-term answer,” said President Joe Biden at a recent...