President Obama’s claim that he imposed fewer regulations is technically correct. It is also misleading, and obfuscates the vast expansion of the regulatory state under his watch. As a measure of the regulatory burden on economic activity, the sheer number of any and all regulations is highly deceptive. The better measure is the number of regulations with significant economic impact and the magnitude of that impact. (The federal government labels a regulation “major” or “economically significant,” when the issuing agencies’ (invariably low-ball) estimate of annual cost of compliance is $100 million or more.)

Now compare the tally of economically significant regulations adopted in the first three years of the Obama and G.W. Bush administrations. President Bush approved 30 economically significant regulations in his first three years as chief executive. In the same period, President Obama has approved 953 such regulations. And the Obamanauts issued 257 economically significant regulations on small business while the federal agencies under the Bush team issued only 16 during the first three years in office.

Thanks to Wayne Crews of the Competitive Enterprise Institute for highlighting these numbers in the Daily Caller and for posting the data (shown below) on his Ten Thousand Commandments site. No further comment is needed to determine which president imposed the greatest shackle on the private economy and individual liberty.

The current administration’s aggressive expansion of regulatory control can be measured in any number of ways. Not only has the volume of major regulations increased but the compliance costs have grown exponentially. Most of EPA’s new rules carry costs far exceeding the $100 million threshold for classification, and supposedly for increased procedural scrutiny, as an economically significant regulation. Federal rules promulgated over the last three years typically carry compliance costs in the billions. Of the total $26 billion cost of federal rules in 2010, new EPA regulation amounted to $23 billion.

A few examples. EPA estimates that the proposed new federal ozone standard will cost approximately $90 billion to implement. Adoption of a new national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) is not considered a regulatory action so estimation of economic impact is not required. And the national standard must be formulated to protect public health without any consideration of the cost. Then there is the mercury finalized mercury rule. EPA acknowledges that the regulation - with a cost of $11 billion -is the most expensive in the agency’s history. The Edison Electric Institute concludes the compliance cost is more like $100 billion. Regulators devise innumerable ways to elude full accounting of the direct and indirect costs to the private sector.

EPA’s non-regulatory Endangerment Finding that greenhouse gases are subject to regulation under the existing Clean Air Act has far greater economic implications than all previous EPA regulations combined. EPA, however, devised a way to get around any economic impact analyses of the initial ghg rules! The agency classified its first regulation of greenhouse gases from private business –called the Tailoring Rule- as a “deregulatory action” and thus exempt from estimation of costs. How in the world could any exercise of this all-encompassing regulatory federal authority to control carbon dioxide- the most ubiquitous by product of all natural and human activity- be construed as deregulatory?

In EPA’s view, because the Tailoring Rule reduced the number of industries which would be subject to regulation by law, the action was deregulatory in that it could have been a lot worse. EPA did reveal the absurdly staggering costs of regulating carbon dioxide in its justification for tailoring –or re-writing – the law. EPA noted that regulation under the literal terms of the law would increase a current permitting universe of now 12,000 businesses to over six million, add purely administrative costs of over $20 billion and require 230,000 additional EPA employees. This ”Tailoring Rule,” however, is not among those new federal regulations listed as “economically significant.”

The numbers, scope and economic burden of federal regulations have been steadily growing for decades under chief executives from both parties. The first three years of the Obama administration, however, has unquestionably been a period of dramatic escalation of the regulatory drag on the private economy. Unless restrained by Congress, the courts or the national elections, the worst is yet to come.

-Kathleen Hartnett White]]>PublicationThu, 02 Feb 2012 00:00:00 MSTreport this week with promising news for the state. According to research conducted by the reserve bank, “Texas employment grew at a 2 percent rate in 2011, government employment rose in November and December following four months of sharp declines, and housing indicators suggest that the sector continues to heal.”

With the Job market expected to expand “at about a 2 percent pace in 2012,” Texas seems to be on the path to continued prosperity. The most promising news of all comes in the housing market. The Fed states that “Texas existing-home sales rose by 2.2 percent in December and were up 8.7 percent from a year ago.” Meanwhile, home prices increased by 0.8 percent in the third quarter but are still down 3.1 percent from their peak in first quarter 2009, according to the FHFA House Price Index.”

It is comforting to see renewed strength in the sector that precipitated the 2007 recession. A recovery in the housing market could be a signal of renewed confidence returning to the American economy as a whole. Whether or not these trends continue depends, in part, on the monetary and fiscal policy choices of the powers that be.

-Robert McDowall]]>PublicationMon, 30 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTwww.TheTexasEconomy.org, is designed to help “Texas residents, business owners and policymakers connect with economic data in a comprehensive yet easy-to-understand format.”

The site allows users to browse through a variety of economic reports and articles pertaining to Texas’ public policies and future growth. In addition, the site reports historical and recent data on various key economic indicators such as the consumer price index, unemployment rate, and gasoline retail prices.

The hope is that this site will serve as an educational tool, while at the same time providing a more transparent medium through which users can track the economic performance of the state over time. It also provides information regarding “business and industry, education and training, people and places, natural resources, health care, and revenue and spending.” In other words, the site strives to become a one-stop-shop when it comes to Texas’ markets and prosperity.

-Robert McDowall ]]>PublicationFri, 27 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTNational School Choice Week is almost over, but Texas lawmakers needs to keep this important piece of the state’s education reform agenda in mind throughout the year as we prepare for the 83rd Texas Legislature in 2013. We have a long way to go before our state’s choice laws are on par with national leaders like Indiana (statewide voucher program), Arizona (multiple education scholarship programs), and Florida (the best virtual education system in the country).

There are a number of reasons for bringing more school choice to Texas, not least of which is demand. There are 56,000 students on wait lists for charter schools, a list that has grown steadily over the last 5 years, yet we still have a hard cap of 215 open enrollment in the state. We don’t have any form of education scholarship or voucher program at the K-12 level in Texas, despite the successes of San Antonio’s Edgewood voucher program, which ran from 1998 to 2008. During that stretch, participating schools saw their academic performance improve, and the district as a whole saw home values in the area rise substantially. As for virtual education, the Texas Virtual School Network maintains a monopoly on the state’s digital learning; Texas does not allow for qualified, competitive private online providers to operate freely in the state.

However, with four school finance lawsuits currently working their way through the state’s courts, perhaps the most compelling reasons to bring more choice into the mix are fiscal ones. What Texas is constitutionally obligated to provide its students is an efficient system of public education. What school choice provides is competition for our public schools, and as former Texas Supreme Court Justice Scott Brister stated in 2005, “Today, we know that one thing above all else makes service providers efficient: competition.”

There’s still a year to go before the next Texas Legislature, but National School Choice Week is as good a time as any to start thinking about reforms our state still desperately needs to make, both for the sake of our students and the fiscal future of Texas education.

For more on school choice issues in Texas, please view our panel on the subject, entitled “Choosing Your Child’s Educational Future”, from TPPF’s 2012 Policy Orientation here.

-James Golsan ]]>PublicationThu, 26 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTreport from the Tax Foundation (TF) ranks Texas among the top ten best states in the nation when it comes to business tax climates. This year, Texas ranked ninth, finishing four places higher than last year thanks, in part, to absence of a state income tax.

For those unfamiliar with TF’s annual ranking, it’s based on the State Business Tax Climate Index which “accounts for dozens of state tax provisions, creating a single easy-to-use score that measures each state against the tax climates of every other state…The Index enable business leaders, government policymakers, and taxpayers to gauge how their states’ tax systems compare.”

Among the other states to rank highly on the list are: Wyoming (1); South Dakota (2); Nevada (3); Alaska (4); Florida (5); New Hampshire (6); Washington (7); Montana (8); and Utah (10).

Populating this year’s list of worst business tax climates are: Iowa (41); Maryland (42); Wisconsin (43); North Carolina (44); Minnesota (45); Rhode Island (46); Vermont (47); California (48); New York (49); and New Jersey (50).

To read the Tax Foundation’s study in full, click here.

-James Quintero]]>PublicationFri, 20 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTTexas Workforce Commission: Texas’ unemployment rate continues to trend in the right direction, dropping from 8.1 percent in November 2011 to 7.8 percent in December 2011. This marks the first time since July 2009 that the state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate has tracked at such a reduced level.

In addition, the Commission also reported that the state’s economy added over 20,000 net new jobs for the month of December, bringing this year’s job creation grand total to over 200,000 net new jobs. This job growth occurred in 8 of the 11 major industries in Texas.

Texas’ economy has now seen positive job creation territory for the past twenty consecutive months.

* Bonus: An interesting statistic not mentioned in the Commission’s latest press release—this month’s unemployment figure means that Texas’ seasonally adjusted unemployment rate has been at or below the national average for 60 consecutive months or five years! Clearly, there is something special happening in the Lone Star State.

-James Quintero]]>PublicationFri, 20 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTCongressional Budget Office (CBO) released its January Issue Brief this week. The brief was an evaluation of Medicare demonstration projects on disease management, care coordination, and value-based payment. These projects aimed to find ways to bend the cost curve down in Medicare by realigning incentives to encourage the system and all participants to seek better outcomes rather than just more health care. Their conclusion is important in evaluating our entitlement programs,

“The evaluations show that most programs have not reduced Medicare spending: In nearly every program involving disease management and care coordination, spending was either unchanged or increased relative to the spending that would have occurred in the absence of the program, when the fees paid to participating organizations were considered…Demonstrations aimed at reducing spending and increasing quality of care face significant challenges in overcoming the incentives inherent in Medicare’s fee-for-service payment system…” (emphasis added)

Texas utilizes managed care in its Medicaid program which has been successful at reducing costs, but it has not been successful in bending the health care cost curve down. The incentives in Medicaid are perverse. With no skin in the game for clients, they are incentivized to consume as much health care as they wish and often do so in inappropriate ways. With the provider rate cuts that were driven by the lack of state flexibility to reform the program, providers are incentivized to call for extra tests and procedures to offset losses from low rates.

The CBO report makes clear that trying to institute free market principles in the current Medicare/Medicaid is like trying to start a fire in a rainstorm. Medicaid, especially, is so poorly designed that the only solution is fundamental reform. This reform must re-engage the patient as a consumer in order to realign incentivizes to maximize value and quality. The future of Medicaid and health care does not lie in fee-for-service, pay-for-performance, or managed care government programs. The future of Medicaid and health care lies in patients making value based decisions on their own health care.

-Spencer Harris]]>PublicationThu, 19 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MST An excerpt from an e-mail sent earlier this morning from the Texas Comptroller states: “Total sales tax collections for December jumped 9.5 percent compared with December 2010, marking the 21st consecutive month of year-to-year gains. Texas Comptroller Susan Combs attributed the gains to improvement in all major economic sectors including oil and natural gas production, retail trade and restaurants.” [Emphasis mine]

Another solid indication that Texas has emerged from the Great Recession and is headed in the right direction.

-James Quintero ]]>PublicationThu, 19 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MST One of these provisions is section 201 of the bill, which states that “[a]ny person who willfully infringes a copyright shall be punished as provided under section 2319 of title 18.” Section 2319 of title 18 allows for individuals to be imprisoned for up to five years for a first offense and up to ten years for a second offense. (A link to this section of the bill can be found here, and a link to section 2319 of title 18 here).

The bill also goes on to add large penalties in Section 202 for an individual who:

(i) intentionally traffics or attempts to traffic in goods or services and knowingly uses a counterfeit mark on or in connection with such goods or services, `(ii) intentionally traffics or attempts to traffic in labels, patches, stickers, wrappers, badges, emblems, medallions, charms, boxes, containers, cans, cases, hangtags, documentation, or packaging of any type or nature, knowing that a counterfeit mark has been applied thereto, the use of which is likely to cause confusion, to cause mistake, or to deceive, or `(iii) intentionally imports, exports, or traffics in counterfeit drugs or intentionally participates in or knowingly aids drug counterfeiting,

Penalties for this type of offense could include fines of up to two million dollars and ten years imprisonment.

Provisions like these are the reason many conservative groups such as The Heritage Foundation, and those on the left such as Nancy Pelosi are opposing the bill and its counterpart, the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA), in the Senate. Critics fear that under the currently proposed language (especially the criminal penalties under the streaming provisions), an individual could be prosecuted for merely uploading a video of himself singing a copyrighted song on Youtube. Under a strict application of the law, Justin Bieber could land in prison.

While online piracy is indeed a serious problem and intellectual property should be reasonably safeguarded, there are free market solutions. For example, companies are developing software that will enable the private sector to better detect websites that engage in serial piracy of copyrighted content. These serial pirates can ultimately be put out of business through civil litigation or arbitration with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

Right On Crime would also suggest that legislatures look to our checklist to analyze key factors before expanding federal criminal law that has already grown excessively to encompass more than 4,500 statutory offenses. Right On Crime encourages legislatures to use our checklist when drafting any anti-piracy statutes to: 1) ensure that new laws are truly necessary; 2) identify conduct that is better addressed in the civil law system; and 3) include an appropriate culpable mental state if a criminal penalty is truly necessary.

-Timothy Cook & Marc Levin]]>PublicationTue, 17 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MST A new report authored by the investor news site 24/7 Wall Street and highlighted by the Texas Comptroller ranks Texas’ economy as one of the fastest-growing state economies in the nation over the past decade.

According to the report, Texas’ Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew by an estimated 52.1 percent between 2000 and 2010, ranking it sixth in the nation in terms of total economic growth. Only Utah (+52.1 percent); South Dakota (+57 percent); Alaska (+66.6 percent); North Dakota (+76.1 percent); and Wyoming (+98.5 percent) ranked better in the comparison.

It’s worth noting that Texas’ appearance on the list of fastest-growing state economies is somewhat unique because the Lone Star State is the “only one of the 10 largest states to register in the top 10 for GDP growth.”

It’s getting harder and harder to deny the Texas Model works, and it works well.

-James Quintero]]>PublicationTue, 17 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MST The paramountcy of this query becomes evident when we look at the national data regarding the growth in adminstration in higher education over the last few decades. In his 2011 book, published by Oxford University Press, The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All-Administrative University and Why it Matters, Benjamin Ginsberg writes, “Forty years ago . . . the efforts of 446,830 professors were supported by 268,952 administrators and staffers. Over the past four decades, though, as the number of full-time professors increased slightly more than 50 percent . . . the number of administrators and administrative staffers employed by those schools increased by an astonishing 85 percent and 240 percent, respectively.”

While this transformation has occurred at both private and public institutions, the lion’s share of the growth has taken place in the former. “Between 1975 and 2000, the number of administrators and managers employed by public institutions increased by 66 percent. During the same time period, though, the number of administrators employed by private colleges and universities grew by 135 percent.”

What do these increases in staff amount to in dollars? Adjusting for inflation, from 1947 to 1995, “overall university spending increased 148 percent. Administrative spending, though, increased by a whopping 235 percent. Instructional spending, by contrast, increased only 128 percent, 20 points less than the overall rate of spending increase.”

Ginsberg finds that senior administrators have done particularly well under the new regime. From 1998 to 2003, deans and vice presidents saw their salaries increase as much as 50 percent. “By 2007, the median salary paid to a president of a doctoral degree-granting institution was $325,000. Eighty-one presidents earned more than $500,000 and twelve earned over $1 million.” Surveying these increases, a Chronicle of Higher Education piece (“Presidents Defend Their Pay as Public Colleges Slash Budgets,” April 2011) observes that university CEOs must take a careful path when arguing that their “budgets have been cut to the bone . . . while at the same time acknowledging their rarified personal financial circumstances in states where layoffs, program closures, and pay reductions have been all too common.”

Could it be that Texas public higher education has remained immune to this decades-long trend? I am currently doing the research in search of an answer, which I shall report in a later edition of “Speaking Freely.”

-Thomas K. Lindsay, Ph.D. ]]>PublicationTue, 17 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTpiece by the Texanomics blog serves to bring clarity to that very question.

The research, originally conducted by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, shows that “if US employment had grown at the same rate as Texas’ since January 2009,” the country, overall, would currently “have 5% unemployment.” It should be noted that over the same period of time, while the “US labor force has shrunk” Texas\' “has grown nearly 5%.”

Workers have undoubtedly emigrated from states around the country and flooded the Lone Star State’s labor market with both educated and skilled prospective employees. This increase in the supply of labor has put a slight downward pressure on wages in Texas - a force offset slightly by Texas’ lower costs of living.

The overall picture here is that while Texas has seen astounding growth in employment, in comparison to other states, it has also seen a similar expansion of its labor supply. In order to see a net decrease in unemployment Texas must meet increases in labor supply with even greater increases in employment opportunities.

Unemployment numbers by themselves do not tell the whole story. Texas has obviously fared well in recent years in comparison to many other states, but until a national recovery takes hold- one that will relieve Texas of some of the pressure to remain a prime job creator in a highly flexible labor market- the state will have to continue to fight to meet those increases in the demand for jobs with a greater supply of them.

-James Quintero]]>PublicationTue, 10 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTreport, Texas is living up to these expectations.

Kurt Badenhausen of Forbes writes that, “Total employment in Texas is forecasted to expand 2.9 percent annually through 2015.” That’s a total of “1.6 million new net jobs” for the Lone Star State over the next few years. What’s the reason for this impressive growth in the labor market? Badenhausen argues that it is due to “a low tax, business friendly climate with a surging population that offers a nearly unlimited supply of young labor.”

It is those free market principles that have allowed Texas to outperform other states in the nation during this prolonged period of economic recovery. The marketing of Texas as a pro-business state has convinced many companies to relocate from what Badenhausen refers to as “union-shop states.” This movement has fueled Texas’ ongoing economic growth.

People and businesses vote with their feet. The recent taxpayer exodus from Illinois and the relocation or expansion of companies such as General Electric, eBay, Electronic Arts, and 3M make the choice clear. There is no better argument for free market principles than those choices made by citizens to live and work in a state that practices those very fundamental ideas. ]]>PublicationThu, 05 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MST According to a new report from the Liberty Bullhorn, “estimates for 2011 show that South Carolina got $12.8 billion from the federal government. At the same time, the General Fund spending was $5.1 billion and Other Funds amounted to $7.7 billion.”

In fairness, some of South Carolina’s dependency on federal funds can be traced back to the stimulus; however, it’s important to note that while the stimulus served as a catalyst for this particular event, the state has trended toward becoming a ward of the federal government for quite some time and, arguably, would have reached this point soon enough. Consider that in 2008, the share of federal funds in the state’s budget totaled 32 percent; by 2009, that percentage increased to 34 percent; in 2010, it jumped to 37 percent; and finally in 2011, it crossed the 50 percent mark.

South Carolina’s heavy dependence on federal funds raises serious concerns about state sovereignty and the proper role of the federal government. For instance, whose interests will come first in South Carolina: those of the federal government, who’s now bankrolling half of the state’s operations, or the state’s own taxpayers? And just how much power and control has the state legislature ceded in exchange for “free” federal money?

This is definitely an issue that all those concerned about states’ rights should be watching closely.

-James Quintero]]>PublicationWed, 04 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MSTReuters calls attention once again to one of the many problems resulting from the current Medicaid program – fraud. The headline was “Actavis Group has reached an $84 million settlement with Texas to resolve civil claims that it defrauded the state\'s Medicaid program by artificially inflating prices for its generic drugs.”

The case is more than 10 years old and originated with a whistleblower lawsuit and was on appeal from a trial court. To be clear, this was a settlement, and Actavis admitted no wrongdoing. But, the price tag of the settlement for Actavis was half the original verdict. Attorney General Abbott is to be commended for his work in prosecuting Medicaid fraud that, according to his press release, has recouped $450 million in drug pricing lawsuits. But as successful as he has been, the underlying flaw in Medicaid’s structure still has millions of dollars going out for fraud that the state then spends huge sums detecting, investigating, and prosecuting.

Contrast that effort with the results of Robert Wood Johnson studies conducted by Mathematica and others of a Medicaid pilot program in Florida. The program was called Cash and Counseling and provided a fixed amount of “cash” made available to a disabled person to purchase their own services rather than the one-size-fits-all Medicaid services. Counseling was available for those who needed it. Not only was the program a cost saver for the state, but also the studies found that the clients were highly satisfied with the service and that there was zero fraud.

The by-product of a free market again proves superior to that of central planning. When people make their own value decisions and make the payment themselves, the only ones who lose are the bad guys.

- Arlene Wohlgemuth]]>PublicationWed, 04 Jan 2012 00:00:00 MST The alternative is merit pay, and it is gaining traction nationwide. This New York Times article highlights the successes that merit pay has had in quality teacher retention in several major urban areas, with a focus on Washington D.C.:

WASHINGTON — During her first six years of teaching in this city’s struggling schools, Tiffany Johnson got a series of small raises that brought her annual salary to $63,000, from about $50,000. This year, her seventh, Ms. Johnson earns $87,000.

That latest 38 percent jump, unheard of in public education, came after Ms. Johnson was rated “highly effective” two years in a row under Washington’s new teacher evaluation system. Those ratings also netted her back-to-back bonuses totaling $30,000.

“Lots of teachers leave the profession, but this has kept me invested to stay,” said Ms. Johnson, 29, who is a special-education teacher at the Ron H. Brown Middle School in Northeast Washington. “I know they value me.”

The fact of the matter is, the bedrock of a great education is great teaching. If Texas wants to draw strong young professionals into the field, it must stop simply rewarding longevity, and begin giving our best teachers the potential to earn what they deserve.

- James Golsan]]>PublicationThu, 29 Dec 2011 00:00:00 MST To set the report in context, I will share the recent experience of a friend. Marci is the mother of four, ranging in age from 10 to 20, who started having problems serious enough for her husband to take her to the doctor on a Monday morning. She was sent for tests that day and discovered that she had a tumor deep in her brain. By Thursday, she had a surgical biopsy and a diagnosis of an inoperable, but treatable, fast-growing lymphoma. The next Tuesday, they began chemotherapy. Speech therapy and occupational therapy were also started right away. Though the treatment will continue for several weeks, Marci was home for Christmas, walking and talking.

The Fraser Institute report paints an entirely different picture had Marci been a Canadian. Canada’s socialized medicine portends the state of healthcare in the United States under ObamaCare. In 2011, the median wait time from a referral from a general practitioner to surgery increased to an all-time high of 19 weeks. The nationwide data on specialists is “…the shortest total waits (between referral from a GP and treatment) are for medical oncology (4.2 weeks), radiation oncology (4.6 weeks), and elective cardiovascular surgery (10.3 weeks). Conversely, patients waited longest between a GP referral and plastic surgery (41.6 weeks), orthopedic surgery (39.1 weeks), and neurosurgery (38.3 weeks).”

Government control and regulatory interference in the marketplace has created the problem of healthcare costs spiraling out of control in the United States. The solution is certainly not in more government control but rather lies in freeing the marketplace to control costs through competition and individual choice.

Would you want your Marci – your wife, mother, or daughter – waiting even the shortest time of 4.2 weeks for treatment? Or do you want the wait to be measured in days instead of weeks?

When given the opportunity to reverse ObamaCare, we should not only do so, but we should also demand that the other layers of healthcare regulations be repealed so that Americans can enjoy reduced health insurance costs, improved quality, and increased access to the healthcare the we ourselves choose.

- Arlene Wohlgemuth]]>PublicationWed, 28 Dec 2011 00:00:00 MSTMatt Yglesias:

[C]oastal California is one of the most ecologically sustainable places on the planet for a person to live. California\'s sources of electricity are fairly green and California\'s weather is amazing so people who live there burn way less fossil fuels heating and cooling their homes, shops, and offices than do people in most of the country. . . . The average California resident emits a bit over half the national average in CO2 emissions. Under the circumstances, we should be trying to make it as easy and affordable for as large share of the American population as possible to move to California.

Yglesias’ broader point, which is perfectly correct, is that environmental restrictions can’t be evaluated in a vacuum. When the EPA clamps down mercury emissions from U.S. cement manufacturers, the result is that you get more cement imported from China, where less efficient kilns tend to emit larger amounts of mercury. Similarly, when the City of San Francisco restricts the development of new housing, the resulting high home prices can lead to something equally horrifying to the liberal mind: “When people can\'t afford to live in the Bay Area, they move to Houston instead.”

I was in Los Angeles a few months ago, and despite being a proud Texan I have to admit the weather is better there than in Houston. And yet, every year tens of thousands are fleeing the beautiful weather of southern California for the Texas heat. According to Census Bureau data, 68,959 people moved from California to Texas in 2010 (roughly double the 36,582 moving from Texas to California). Texas has consistently gained several hundred thousand new residents a year over the last decade, whereas California has lost 3.6 million in net migration since 1990. Businesses, in particular, have been eager to relocate, citing California’s high taxes and burdensome regulatory environment as factors.

Stopping this outflow will require California to get its fiscal house in order. Reform pubic pensions, lower taxes, keep spending in line with revenues, and eliminate regulations that harass business and restrict development. In short, it needs to become more like Texas. If liberals find this distasteful, they can always console themselves with the thought that they aren’t just saving a state, they are helping to save the planet.

- Josiah Neeley]]>PublicationTue, 27 Dec 2011 00:00:00 MSTreport from the Illinois Policy Institute (IPI) finds that people are fleeing Illinois en masse, driven out by the state’s high taxation and other “poor public policies.” The place that many Illinoisians are going—low-tax, limited government Texas.

According to the report, Texas is the leading beneficiary of Illinois’ mass exodus. In 2009, the state suffered a net population loss of 40,969. Of those exiting Illinois, 7,615 people relocated to Texas, nearly double that of the next highest state, Indiana, who netted 4,458 new residents.

Texas isn’t just benefitting from the additional people either. These new residents are, of course, bringing their money with them—to the tune of “more than $188 million” in 2009.

While this new report shouldn’t surprise many Texans, who have consistently shown their favor of limited government through the ballot box, this is a good reminder that people in general prefer smaller government, and they’re willing to pick up and move to get it.

- James Quintero]]>PublicationWed, 21 Dec 2011 00:00:00 MST That’s because on January 1st the Environmental Protection Agency’s Cross-State Air Pollution Rule is scheduled to go into effect. Officially, the rule is supposed to account for the fact that emissions from one state can drift downwind into other states, imperiling the latters’ ability to meet EPA air quality standards. That sounds sensible, but the reality is that EPA’s new rules are based not on what is happening today, but on what its computer models predict may happen in the future.

Instead, the Cross-State Rule is part of a concerted effort to destroy America’s coal industry. During the 2008 campaign, then-candidate Obama told the San Francisco Chronicle that under his Cap-and-trade proposal, “if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can; it’s just that it will bankrupt them because they’re going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.” Once it became clear that Cap-and-trade could not pass Congress, Obama shifted ground, telling reporters after the November 2010 elections that “Cap-and-trade was just one way of skinning the cat; it was not the only way.”

The Cross-State Rule is one of four new EPA regulations targeting coal-powered generation. Together, the rules will lead to the closing of between 32 and 58 coal-fired power plants in a dozen states, according to a recent analysis by the Associated Press. This is horrible news for the communities that are often built around these plants, but it also has worrying implications for the public at large. Coal provides half of America’s baseload electrical generation, and as much as 80% in some areas. The sudden shuttering of dozens of coal plants could take as much as 8% of the country’s electrical generation offline, imperiling basic reliability. Both NERC (the federal North American Electric Reliability Corporation) and ERCOT (the Electric Reliability Council of Texas) have warned that the anti-coal rules could force rolling blackouts. EPA, however, has suggested that any problems with electrical reliability can be dealt with once they arise, at which point it may be too late.

The Texas power company Luminant filed suit in September challenging the validity of the Cross-State Rule and seeking a stay (similar challenges have also been filed by several state governments). The stay motion is currently pending before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and a ruling is expected imminently.

- Josiah Neeley]]>Publication