Recent Policy Studies

• Health Care
  

  Do Aid Agencies Want to Know When Their Medicines Go Missing?

  By Roger Bate, American Enterprise Institute
  
  Health Policy Outlook, 12/03/2010
  

  Many lifesaving drugs are being stolen before they reach their intended recipients. Most donors, including Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria, are reluctant to admit that this is a problem. The U.S. government should push for an independent review of practices at GFATM to ensure that drugs are used by those intended, rather than facilitating illegal parallel drug-distribution systems in recipient countries. The lack of measurement means we are largely relying on guesswork, and although that is fine for most aid-industry insiders, it perpetuates the dysfunctional status quo.

  
  
  
• Elections, Transparency, & Accountability
  

  Don’t Get Your Hopes Up About Chinese Political Reform

  By Dean Cheng, The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 12/03/2010
  

  In recent weeks, there has been growing discussion about China’s internal political situation. Most tantalizing to the American press was Premier Wen Jiabao’s comments about the desirability of Chinese political reform. What both this and speculation over the course of China’s 2012 leadership transition highlight is the growing belief among Western analysts that China’s political situation is in flux. Some even hold forth the hope that this will lead to changes in its political model. Don’t get your hopes up. Unfortunately, too many Western observers equate Chinese jockeying for political advantage and factional politics with real political reform or even democratization.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  How Many Jobs Will Congress Choose to Lose? The Economic Effects of Various Legislative Options for Addressing Expiring 2001 and 2003 Tax Policy

  By William Beach, et al., The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 12/03/2010
  

  There is near-universal agreement among economists that raising marginal tax rates during slow economic times only makes the economy weaker. Higher tax rates reduce employment, cut investment activity, and soften household demand for goods and services. Even so, Congress is considering right now a number of tax proposals, most of which raise tax rates starting on January 1, 2011. All but one of these legislative options would result in higher unemployment.

  
  
  
• Health Care
  

  The Future of Health Care Reform: Paul Ryan’s “Roadmap” and Its Critics

  By Robert Moffit, Kathryn Nix, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Backgrounder, 12/03/2010
  

  The future of health care in America looks grim—but it does not have to be. Representative Paul Ryan (R–WI) has proposed “A Roadmap for America’s Future”—the only comprehensive plan in Washington that deals with the looming fiscal and economic crisis, driven by ever-increasing government spending on health care. Ryan’s Roadmap would reduce the deficit, allow Medicare to become truly sustainable, establish equity and efficiency in the federal tax treatment of health insurance, and improve access to health care for middle-class and low-income families.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Fiscal Commission Report: Too Much Taxes, Not Enough Spending Cuts

  By Brian Riedl, The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 12/03/2010
  

  The National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform deserves credit for taking on the large structural deficits that risk eventual economic calamity. Over the next decade, runaway spending is set to double the national debt, which would risk higher interest rates, slower growth, and steeply higher tax rates. Unfortunately, however, the commission’s report involves a tax-heavy solution to a spending problem. Expanding spending—not declining revenues—drives America’s long-term deficits.

  
  
  
• Monetary Policy/Financial Regulation
  

  Can the Euro Survive?

  By Desmond Lachman, Legatum Institute
  
  Papers and Studies, 12/03/2010
  

  Until very recently, the idea of the Euro not surviving in its present form was regarded as a fringe idea mainly entertained by a small group of supposedly ill-informed and biased US academic economists. Yet today, markets are pricing in a considerable probability that at least one of the Eurozone’s peripheral member countries will default on its sovereign debt within the next three years. And markets are increasingly coming to connect the dots from a sovereign debt default to a break-up of the Euro in its present form.

  
  
  
• Health Care
  

  Reducing the Cost of Health Care: A Case Study on Health Savings Accounts

  By Spencer Harris, Texas Public Policy Foundation
  
  Policy Perspective, 12/03/2010
  

  The debate over health care reform has sparked many new ideas over the future of the American health care industry, some good and some bad. However, there is widespread agreement that something needs to be done to rein in the rising costs of health care for Americans. Individuals and small businesses have particular concerns in this arena as their lack of market share affords them very little bargaining power. One relatively new method of cost containment has proven successful for our organization, the Texas Public Policy Foundation: Health Savings Accounts.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  The Economic Impact of a 25 Percent Corporate Income Tax Rate

  By Karen Campbell, John Ligon, The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 12/03/2010
  

  Because the economy is a complex system based on specialization and trade, those who incur a tax liability are not necessarily the ones who bear the burden of the tax. Theoretical and empirical studies show that the corporate income tax is particularly harmful to economic growth, because the burden falls on all of the economy’s productive resources (workers, capital, and entrepreneurs). This is due to the fact that corporations do not pay taxes—individuals do. Corporations are merely an organizing mechanism for productive resources. The Center for Data Analysis simulation shows the powerful effects that lessening this burden can have on the U.S. economy.

  
  
  
• Crime, Justice & the Law
  

  Smart on Crime

  By Marc A. Levin, Buckeye Institute for Public Policy Solutions
  
  Report, 12/02/2010
  

  Ohio faces significant criminal justice challenges against the backdrop of a total budget shortfall estimated at more than $8 billion. While the state has implemented innovative criminal justice initiatives in areas such as risk assessment and state funding for community corrections programs that enabled the state to better prioritize prison capacity, further reforms can help the state both control costs and improve public safety.

  
  
  
• Family, Culture & Community
  

  Breaking Up is Hard on You: A Look at the Effects of Divorce

  By John R. Hill, Alabama Policy Institute
  
  Report, 12/02/2010
  

  Divorce continues to play a significant and negative role in the collapse of American families. The overwhelming majority of research conducted on the effects of divorce in America and abroad shows an indisputable association between the disruption of families and negative outcomes for both the divorcees and any children that may be involved. This report examines some of the most recent articles regarding divorce effects as they have attempted to establish causal relationships between family disruption and the negative outcomes with which they are traditionally associated.

  
  
  
• Education
  

  The Promise of Special Needs Scholarships

  By Alliance for School Choice, Alliance for School Choice
  
  Policy Report, 12/02/2010
  

  By definition, children with special needs require a customized education for them to reach their potential. Thankfully, over the last twenty years, we have seen a dramatic improvement in the education offered to children with special needs in public schools. Yet, no single public school, no matter how extraordinary its programs, can be expected to offer the best possible special education for every child. The challenge is simply too great for any single school.

  
  
  
• Economic Growth
  

  A Review of Cross-Country Evidence on Government Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth

  By Shawn Ni, Show-Me Institute
  
  Policy Study, 12/02/2010
  

  It is widely believed that fiscal policy plays an important role in determining economic growth, but the specific policies that would best foster growth are hotly debated. This study provides a review of the recent economic literature that examines the effect of government fiscal policy actions on economic growth. Because the effect of changes in tax and spending programs may take a long period of time to become evident, the findings of the studies reviewed here are based on data taken from across a large sample of countries.

  
  
  
• Philanthropy
  

  The Obama Administration’s Social Innovation Fund

  By Neil Maghami, Capital Research Center
  
  Foundation Watch, 12/02/2010
  

  In May 2009, the Obama administration announced that its newly created Social Innovation Fund would make $50 million in grants to innovative social service nonprofits. The president said his initiative aimed to uncover new solutions to some of America’s most difficult social problems. It was a tiny sum for a great undertaking, but it generated instant controversy in the nonprofit world, and for good reason. Who would decide who gets the money? And how will it be spent?

  
  
  
• Elections, Transparency, & Accountability
  

  The States Fight Back: Scholars and Grassroots Groups Promote Statehouse Revolt

  By Elias Crim, Capital Research Center
  
  Organization Trends, 12/02/2010
  

  Spurred by the specter of fiscal collapse and mounting federal mandates, Tea Party activists and legal scholars are mounting a movement to restore power to state legislatures. They are sponsoring a wave of controversial new legislative proposals aimed at restoring state sovereignty. Some of the ideas may seem far-fetched, but without political imagination there is no political reform. The U.S. Constitution is the movement’s yardstick.

  
  
  
• Economic and Political Thought
  

  Pathology Of The Elites: How the Arrogant Classes Plan to Run Your Life

  By Michael Knox Beran, Manhattan Institute
  
  Book, 12/02/2010
  

  Through readings of such inspired critics of the social imagination as Hannah Arendt, Isaiah Berlin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Abraham Lincoln, Mr. Beran exposes the romance of dominion that underlies the philosophy of social benevolence, a philosophy that has steadily undermined the older and more valuable tradition that Edmund Burke associated with the moral imagination. In seeking to depose this moral impulse in the pantheon of culture, and enshrine the social imagination in its place, today’s elites have weakened not only liberalism but also conservatism—indeed, society as a whole.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Tax Competition: A Curse or a Blessing?

  By Dalibor Rohác, Istituto Bruno Leoni
  
  Working Paper, 12/02/2010
  

  This paper discusses the nature and significance of tax competition. Recent decades in Central and Eastern Europe have been marked by a widespread adoption of flat tax rates on both personal and corporate income. These fiscal reforms were in general viewed as beneficial since they have eliminated loopholes and have made tax systems more transparent. Paradoxically, at the same time the process that has led to these particular fiscal outcomes – tax competition – is often labeled as harmful and distorting. The aim of this paper is to show that this is a deep misunderstanding.

  
  
  
• Economic Growth
  

  The Monti Report: A Critical Appraisal

  By Filippo Cavazzoni, et al., Istituto Bruno Leoni
  
  Policy Report, 12/02/2010
  

  It is widely remarked that the recession adversely impacted the European building process. The main impact was due to the abrupt transition from a moderately positive growth rate to a markedly negative one, which thoroughly disrupted priorities, both at the European Union level and at the member States’. Moreover the crisis—which erupted in 2007 when the subprime bubble deflated in the U.S., infected the rest of the economy in the following year and degenerated into a sovereign debt crisis in Europe in 2010—prompted a deep re-thinking on the paradigms underpinning the EU-building effort, particularly the principle of liberalization and the notion of the single market. To ascribe the present difficulties exclusively to the impact of a single event—however sweeping and dramatic—would be naive.

  
  
  
• The Constitution/Civil Liberties
  

  Who’s Afraid of Original Meaning?

  By George Thomas, Hoover Institution
  
  Policy Review, 12/02/2010
  

  The idea that the Constitution ought to be understood and interpreted based on its original meaning has come to find expression across the liberal-conservative divide. If originalism has been deemed a conservative mode of jurisprudence associated most often with Justice Antonin Scalia, today some of its most intrepid defenders are left-of-center scholars—Akhil Amar of the Yale Law School is a prominent example—who earnestly insist on capturing and adhering to original meaning in constitutional interpretation. It would be going too far to say that we are all originalists now, yet many of the most interesting debates in constitutional law occur within the contours of original meaning.

  
  
  
• Retirement/Social Security
  

  The Social Security Challenge

  By Charles Blahous, Hoover Institution
  
  Policy Review, 12/02/2010
  

  Americans care deeply about Social Security, which is possibly the nation’s most cherished domestic program. One might naively assume that political rewards would accrue to elected officials who accept responsibility—and credit—for strengthening the program’s finances. But policy makers face a further challenge, in that not only are Americans sharply divided about Social Security policy choices, but they are divided even about the underlying facts and the problem to be solved. Despite years of bipartisan efforts to objectively define and quantify the Social Security financing challenge, consensus agreement even on basic factual predicates remains elusive

  
  
  
• Foreign Policy/International Affairs
  

  Pakistan and America

  By Fouad Ajami, Hoover Institution
  
  Policy Review, 12/02/2010
  

  In the summer of 2010, two revelations, of unequal importance and magnitude, illuminated the American-Pakistani relationship and its complications: a public opinion survey released by the Pew Research Center, on July 29, that delved into the attitudes of the Pakistani public on a wide range of issues (their opinion of the United States, their view of the war next door in Afghanistan, their attitude toward extremist groups, their outlook on the prospects of their country). The bigger story was the unprecedented document-dump by Wikileaks of 92,000 reports and documents on the U.S. military effort in Afghanistan spanning two administrations, from January 2004 through December 2009. The role of Pakistan, and its powerful Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, was in the eye of that storm.

  
  
  
• Crime, Justice & the Law
  

  Sullivan v. DB Investments: Are Diamonds Still a Class Action Plaintiff’s Best Friend?

  By J. Brady Dugan, Washington Legal Foundation
  
  Legal Opinion Letter, 12/02/2010
  

  Antitrust class action defendants should take note of a recent decision from a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. In Sullivan v. DB Investments, the court vacated a multi-million dollar settlement with a nationwide class of indirect diamond purchaser plaintiffs. Because of the wide variation in state antitrust law, the panel determined that class treatment was not appropriate. This case follows a series of decisions that take a hard look at whether plaintiffs’ antitrust actions should be allowed to proceed. Whether the decision will have lasting impact is up in the air: the Third Circuit has decided to review the appeal en banc.

  
  
  
• Regulation & Deregulation
  

  On FDA and Food Ingredient Safety: Is the “GRAS” Henhouse at Risk?

  By Ricardo Carvajal, Nisha P. Shah, Washington Legal Foundation
  
  Legal Backgrounder, 12/02/2010
  

  For over 50 years, U.S. food manufacturers and consumers have benefited from a provision of law that enables manufacturers to market a food ingredient without prior government approval – provided that the use of the ingredient is “generally recognized as safe”. The right of manufacturers to engage in independent GRAS determinations (or self-determinations) has served as a useful tool to enable innovations in food technology supported by comprehensive safety reviews to reach the market, without tying up limited government resources. The GRAS exception to pre-market approval can befuddle legal practitioners in other jurisdictions; accustomed to less flexible oversight regimes, those practitioners sometimes misperceive the exception as a shortcut to market or an egregious case of the fox guarding the henhouse.

  
  
  
• Monetary Policy/Financial Regulation
  

  Peer-to-Peer Lending: Innovative Access to Credit and the Consequences of Dodd-Frank

  By Alex Brill, Washington Legal Foundation
  
  Legal Backgrounder, 12/02/2010
  

  Rapid growth in the Peer-to-Peer industry, however, has given rise to concerns over appropriate regulation of this alternative form of lending. In 2008, the Securities and Exchange Commission exercised its oversight authority of the P2P industry based on the agency’s determination that P2P loans are securities. Now, the recently enacted Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act has left the future regulatory structure open to potential modification—a development that increases the industry’s prominence among public policy analysts. Specifically, Dodd-Frank requires that by July 21, 2011, the Government Accountability Office conduct a study of P2P lending and offer recommendations on how federal regulation of the industry should be structured in the future.

  
  
  
• Education
  

  Demography Is Still Not Destiny

  By Vicki E. Murray, Matthew Ladner, Pacific Research Institute
  
  Policy Brief, 12/02/2010
  

  Florida’s example shows that it is possible to improve student performance by instituting a variety of curricular and incentive-based reforms, placing pressure both from the top down and bottom up on schools to improve. Indeed, California cannot achieve global competitiveness through minor tweaks of a largely underperforming system. Florida’s broad efforts and resulting outcomes prove this. Fortune favors the bold, and a brighter future awaits California students if California adults will take strong action.

  
  
  
• Transportation/Infrastructure
  

  The Road to Renewal: Private Investment in U.S. Transportation Infrastructure

  By R. Richard Geddes, American Enterprise Institute
  
  Book, 12/02/2010
  

  In The Road to Renewal: Private Investment in U.S. Transportation Infrastructure, R. Richard Geddes surveys the current state of the American transportation system and finds that, like the roads themselves, the existing policy approach is in desperate need of repair. Drawing on the basic economic principles behind supply, demand, competition, and incentives, Geddes argues that a shift toward increased use of public–private partnerships—contractual agreements between public agencies and private parties that allow private participation in the design, construction, operation, and delivery of transportation facilities—could significantly improve the quality of America’s transportation infrastructure.

  
  
  
• Elections, Transparency, & Accountability
  

  Illinois Foster Grandparents Program: Helping or Hurting Senior Involvement?

  By Illinois Policy Institute, Illinois Policy Institute
  
  Spotlight on Spending, 12/02/2010
  

  Illinois’s communities are strengthened by volunteer efforts from and on behalf of the young and old alike. Many of the Department of Aging’s programs can be organized and promoted via civil society. Volunteer referral efforts like the Illinois Foster Grandparents Program should be reexamined for how they can operate without public funding. Promotion of such opportunities need not be government-centric to be successful.

  
  
  
• Economic Growth
  

  Political Economy of Hurricane Katrina and Community Rebound

  By Emily Chamlee-Wright, Virgil Storr, Mercatus Center
  
  Book, 12/01/2010
  

  In 2005 Hurricane Katrina posed an unprecedented set of challenges to formal and informal systems of disaster response and recovery. Informed by the Virginia School of Political Economy, the contributors to this volume critically examine the public policy environment that led to both successes and failures in the post-Katrina disaster response and long-term recovery. Building from this perspective, this volume lends critical insight into the nature of the social coordination problems disasters present, the potential for public policy to play a positive role, and the inherent limitations policymakers face in overcoming the myriad challenges that are a product of catastrophic disaster.

  
  
  
• Foreign Policy/International Affairs
  

  Five Controversial Treaties to Be Wary of in 2011

  By Steven Groves, The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 12/01/2010
  

  It’s only December 2010, but the Obama Administration, Congress, and the American media are already beginning to look ahead to the next set of elections in November 2012. Due to political considerations, it is unlikely that the Administration and Democrats in the U.S. Senate will push hard for the ratification of any controversial treaty during an election year. Instead, they will have only 2011 in which to champion treaties that have thus far failed to gain the 67 votes necessary for ratification.

  
  
  
• National Security
  

  What Russia’s Stealth Fighter Developments Mean for America

  By Mackenzie Eaglen, Lajos F. Szaszdi, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Backgrounder, 12/01/2010
  

  Russia’s development of the PAK FA fifth-generation stealth fighter could challenge American air supremacy, especially if Russia sells the PAK FA to its usual buyers of military equipment. In the U.S., closure of the F-22 production line has severely limited America’s ability to respond to PAK FA proliferation by building more F-22s and potentially selling them to U.S. allies. The U.S. needs to revise its assessment of U.S. air superiority needs and then explore ways to modernize and strengthen the U.S. tactical fighter force.

  
  
  
• Health Care
  

  Life Expectancy, Health Care, and Economics

  By Kirby R. Cundiff, Independent Institute
  
  Working Paper, 11/30/2010
  

  In this paper I studied life expectancy, health care spending, medical resource availability, and lifestyle issues in the United States relative to other member countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. I find the United States performs very poorly relative to its peers. While the United States spends more per capita by far than any other member country, it has a lower life expectancy and fewer medical resources than most member countries.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Pension Wise: Confronting Employer Pension Underfunding and Sparing Taxpayers the Next Bailout

  By Charles Blahous, Hoover Institution
  
  Book, 11/30/2010
  

  America’s insurance system for single-employer pension plans, operated by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, is under serious financial strain. In America’s Single-Employer Defined-Benefit Pensions: Forestalling the Next Bailout, Charles Blahous – one of the nation’s foremost retirement security experts – explains the origins and dangers of current underfunding in our single-employer defined-benefit pension system and offers principles to underlie a solution.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Maine from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  President Obama has advanced a plan that reverses the long-standing successful policy: The President and his supporters are calling for tax increases, primarily on upper income taxpayers and businesses—including small businesses, the primary job creators in the country. No income earner will be unscathed. Instead of extracting more income from the private economy, Congress should immediately reduce its spending and enact fundamental entitlement reform that supports strong economic growth.

  
  
  
• Monetary Policy/Financial Regulation
  

  How the Government Is Creating Another Housing Bubble

  By Peter Wallison, Edward Pinto, American Enterprise Institute
  
  The American, 11/30/2010
  

  It is hard to believe, but it looks like the government will soon use the taxpayers’ checkbook again to create a vast market for mortgages with low or no down payments and for overstretched borrowers with blemished credit. As in the period leading to the 2008 financial crisis, these loans will again contribute to a housing bubble, which will feed on government funding and grow to enormous size. When it collapses, housing prices will drop and a financial crisis will ensue. And, once again, the taxpayers will have to bear the costs.

  
  
  
• National Security
  

  The Current Threat Level: Ending Color-Coded Terror Alerts

  By James Carafano, Jessica Zuckerman, The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 11/30/2010
  

  This may be the last holiday season where travelers will hear that “the current threat level is orange.” Last week, reports circulated highlighting the intent of the Department of Homeland Security to drop the color-coded threat system. The decision, the result of a review ordered by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano last year, has been hailed by many as long overdue. Indeed, The Heritage Foundation has been calling for the reform of the Homeland Security Advisory System since 2004. Scrapping the color-coded terrorist threat system would finally give DHS a chance to start anew and design a risk communication system that would truly be effective.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Florida from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  President Obama’s tax plan would allow portions of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to expire, resulting in steep tax hikes beginning in January 2011 for small businesses and those earning$250,000 or more. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Florida, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income. No income earner will be unscathed. Instead of extracting more income from the private economy, Congress should immediately reduce its spending and enact fundamental entitlement reform that supports strong economic growth

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Arkansas from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  President Obama’s tax plan would allow portions of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to expire, resulting in steep tax hikes beginning in January 2011 for small businesses and those earning $250,000 or more. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Arkansas, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income. Employment and the economy cannot be made to grow through higher taxes. It is crucial for Congress to recognize this fact.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Wisconsin from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  The President and his supporters are calling for tax increases, primarily on upper income taxpayers and businesses—including small businesses, the primary job creators in the country. President Obama’s tax plan would allow portions of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to expire, resulting in steep tax hikes beginning in January 2011 for small businesses and those earning $250,000 or more. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Wisconsin, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Tennessee from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  The President and his supporters are calling for tax increases, primarily on upper-income taxpayers and businesses—including small businesses, the primary job creators in the country. Those who will be most burdened if this plan becomes law are the millions of Americans just starting their economic lives and the millions more trying to find work after the worst recession in 60 years. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Tennessee, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Missouri from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  President Obama has advanced a plan that reverses the long-standing successful policy: The President and his supporters are calling for tax increases, primarily on upper-income taxpayers and businesses—including small businesses, the primary job creators in the country. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Missouri, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income. No income earner will be unscathed. Instead of extracting more income from the private economy, Congress should immediately reduce its spending and enact fundamental entitlement reform that supports strong economic growth.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Illinois from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  Since 1996, Congress after Congress has voted to lighten the tax burden on Americans. The current Congress will decide this fall whether to continue this policy or to significantly raise personal income taxes. President Obama has advanced a plan that reverses the long-standing successful policy: The President and his supporters are calling for tax increases, primarily on upper income taxpayers and businesses—including small businesses, the primary job creators in the country. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Illinois, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Delaware from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  President Obama’s tax plan would allow portions of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to expire, resulting in steep tax hikes beginning in January 2011 for small businesses and those earning $250,000 or more. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Delaware, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income.

  
  
  
• Monetary Policy/Financial Regulation
  

  What’s Missing from the QE2 Debate

  By John H. Makin, American Enterprise Institute
  
  Economic Outlook, 11/30/2010
  

  Confidence in a sustainable global recovery is fragile. The sovereign-debt crisis continues in Europe, fears of inflation persist in China, and the U.S. economy remains weak. Unprecedented policy risks—both monetary and fiscal—abound as we move toward 2011. Deficit-reduction measures in the new Congress and pressure to scale back the second round of quantitative easing (QE2) could stunt U.S. economic growth and further dampen the global recovery. If that outcome materializes next year, markets, along with today’s numerous Fed critics, will sit up and beg for a QE3 that is even bigger than QE2.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  A Plan to Cut Spending and Balance the Federal Budget

  By Chris Edwards, Cato Institute
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  Federal spending is soaring, and government debt is piling up at more than a trillion dollars a year. Official projections show rivers of red ink for years to come unless policymakers enact major budget reforms. Unless spending is cut, the United States is headed down the road to economic ruin. The results of the 2010 elections made clear that Americans want an end to the spending spree in Washington. People fear that today’s spendthrift policies may lead to major tax increases and a lower standard of living for themselves and the next generation. The public has given Congress marching orders to start cutting spending and to rein in debt.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  100 Ideas for 100 Days

  By Goldwater Institute, Goldwater Institute
  
  Policy Report, 11/30/2010
  

  Over the next year, much attention will focus on balancing budgets and putting Arizonans back to work. 100 Ideas for 100 Days includes a number of innovative ways for elected officials to accomplish both. Every idea in this book can be enacted independently of any other, and each will put our state another step closer to the dynamic citadel of freedom that Arizona’s pioneers expected when they brought our state into the union nearly 100 years ago.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  How Would Expiration of Bush-Era Tax Cuts Affect State and Local Budgets?

  By Mark Robyn, Tax Foundation
  
  Special Report, 11/30/2010
  

  While the U.S. economy continues its slow crawl towards recovery, many states are currently in budget limbo. Last year’s stimulus bill saved state lawmakers from some politically painful fiscal adjustments, but another federal windfall is unlikely. States are wondering where to go for more revenue and what can be cut from outlays. Here we discuss how the major federal tax policy question of the day, the expiring Bush tax cuts, could affect states at this already tight time.

  
  
  
• Budget & Taxation
  

  Job Losses in Arizona from the Obama Tax Hikes

  By The Heritage Foundation, The Heritage Foundation
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  President Obama’s tax plan would allow portions of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to expire, resulting in steep tax hikes beginning in January 2011 for small businesses and those earning $250,000 or more. The tax hikes would significantly affect the economy in Arizona, most notably in the number of jobs and change in personal income.

  
  
  
• Information Technology
  

  Looking Forward: Will Congress Establish Broadband Policy?

  By Randolph J. May, et al., Free State Foundation
  
  Transcript, 11/30/2010
  

  Last year at about this very same time the Federal Communications Commission proposed net neutrality regulations that would incorporate into actual rules the four existing open Internet principles and proposed that a new discrimination prohibition and a transparency obligation be embodied in the rules too. If we jump ahead to April, the D.C. Circuit issued its decision in the Comcast appeal of the FCC’s order sanctioning Comcast in connection with the BitTorrent incident. The Court’s decision cast strong doubt on the Commission’s assertion of ancillary jurisdiction over broadband Internet service providers.

  
  
  
• Retirement/Social Security
  

  Artificially Sweetening the COLA

  By Jason J. Fichtner, Mercatus Center
  
  Mercatus on Policy, 11/30/2010
  

  During tough economic times, everyone can use a few extra dollars, especially those on fixed incomes. But Social Security benefits are doing their job keeping Americans out of poverty and maintaining their purchasing power when prices rise or fall. Though legislation to allow for an automatic cost of-living adjustment based on the CPI-E might be good politics, further improvement to the methodology of the CPI-E is necessary before we know whether it is good policy. For now, any additional legislated Cost of Living Adjustment increase or one-time $250 payment is just artificially sweetening the COLA.

  
  
  
• Health Care
  

  Not Enough Doctors? Too Many? Why States, Not Washington, Must Solve the Problem

  By Roger E. Meyer, The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 11/30/2010
  

  The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act emphasizes a federal agency–based strategy for assessing the needs across the full span of health care disciplines, a strategy that has failed repeatedly to project the physician workforce requirements since the mid-1980s. On the issues related to the health care workforce, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act needlessly adds to the deficit with costly new initiatives that ignore history. It also ignores the vital and creative role of federalism—the proper boundaries of federal and state responsibilities—so brilliantly articulated by America’s Founders.

  
  
  
• Foreign Policy/International Affairs
  

  Current Ballistic Missile Defense Plans Offer No Confidence in New START

  By James Carafano, The Heritage Foundation
  
  WebMemo, 11/30/2010
  

  In a recent Wall Street Journal commentary, Vice President Joe Biden argued that the Senate could ratify the New START nuclear deal with Russia with confidence. He urged Senators to ignore concerns that the treaty would place limits on future missile defenses. The Vice President believes current missile defense plans are more than adequate. Biden glossed over the fact that these plans are far from comprehensive. They are inadequate to respond to unpredicted threat advances. Finally, the treaty could well complicate and limit the ability of the U.S. to develop comprehensive missile defenses.

  
  
  
• Family, Culture & Community
  

  Adoption Works Well: A Synthesis of the Literature

  By Patrick F. Fagan, Family Research Council
  
  Research Synthesis, 11/30/2010
  

  Adopted children benefit significantly from adoption. Many experience a dramatic improvement in socioeconomic status and move into materially advantaged homes and to the care of supportive, educated, adoptive parents who are very interested in all aspects of their child’s development. The majority of adopted children live in small families in early childhood, which is to their advantage. Compared to even long-term fostering, adoption provides a greater sense of permanence and familial belonging, more emotional security, and a more lasting psychosocial foundation for life.

  
  
  
• Crime, Justice & the Law
  

  Forfeiting Justice: How Texas Police and Prosecutors Cash In on Seized Property

  By Scott Bullock, Dick M. Carpenter II, Institute for Justice
  
  Report, 11/30/2010
  

  Texas law gives police and prosecutors generous rewards for seizing people’s property with out even having to prove the owner committed any crime. And the law makes it so hard for owners to fight for the return of their property that many give up without even trying. As this report shows, Texas law enforcement agencies are increasingly profiting from this power of “civil forfeiture.”