A few years back, children’s book author Kari Anne Roy was visited by both the Austin police and Child Protective Services for allowing her son Isaac, then 6, to do the unthinkable: play outside, up her street, unsupervised. Though eventually the charges were dropped, it wasn’t before Child Protective Services interviewed all three of...
When Colin Kaepernick took a knee last fall during the singing of the National Anthem, it sparked an intense debate over race-based police brutality. Since then, some have defended Kaepernick by arguing that, in addition to the police brutality issue, the National Anthem is racist. This defense then escalated into a larger conflict over the status of ...
Is Washington’s plan to gut the Affordable Care Act’s navigator program a proper cost-cutting measure, or a politically motivated attack on ObamaCare? Probably both. ObamaCare is monumentally, incomprehensibly complex. The ACA organizational chart makes the Los Angeles freeway system look simple. With more than 10 million words in the first round of regulations, and thousands of changes since then, understanding...
Remember when President Barack Obama said that passage of the Affordable Care Act would save middle class families $2,500 a year on their health insurance premiums? Obama claimed much of that savings would come from taxing so-called “Cadillac plans” that gave the rich “overly generous” benefits, and using that windfall to help fund Obamacare....
Deane Waldman, M.D., M.B.A., is director of the Center for Health Care Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. As Republican senators look to scrape together the votes for a deal on health care, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., is pushing his own proposal. He calls it “Medicare for All,” and it has already...
Once again, California has the highest poverty rate in the nation, according to a new U.S. Census Bureau report. A little more than 1 in 5 Californians—20.4 percent—live in poverty. The national average is 14.7 percent according to the Supplemental Poverty Measure which accounts for regional cost-of-living differences, out-of-pocket medical expenses and other items, unlike...
Owners and guests of short-term and vacation rentals in Texas recently racked up another win at the 3rd Texas Court of Appeals. On August 22, the Austin court joined a growing list of state appellate courts to hold that renting your home out for short periods of time does not magically transform it into a commercial enterprise...
Though not perfect, NAFTA has increased prosperity and improved the lives of millions of Americans through greater competition, affordable products, and wealth and job creation. Potential renegotiations of NAFTA could deter these gains if the deal doesn’t include reducing both trade barriers and government favoritism for certain industries. Consider that Mexico has long maintained...
Liberal California and conservative Texas are different in many ways – including their poverty rates. California’s poverty rate is 20.4 percent and the Texas rate is only 14.7 percent, based on the Supplemental Poverty Measure, which accounts for the regional cost of living, out-of-pocket medical expenses and other items. Why the dramatic difference in poverty...
History suggests that, when citizens come to deeply distrust their country’s institutions, the cancer of political degeneration may be taking hold. In America, cynicism appears to have metastasized to such an extent that it is now afflicting high schools. At least that’s the conclusion suggested by Jessica Contrera’s recent Washington Post piece. Contrera reports that, in...
Hurricane Harvey recovery, especially for the families of the 70 Texans who lost their lives, will take years. The economic impact is also staggering. Early estimates show this storm could cost $190 billion in lost economic output, according to AccuWeather, roughly 14 percent of the state’s personal income and 1 percent of the nation’s total gross domestic product. In addition,...
If you ask anyone, regardless of their political views, who they would rather have behind bars awaiting trial: Someone who poses a threat to society but can afford to pay their way out of jail, or someone who poses little to no threat to society but can’t afford to get out jail? It’d likely...