Education

Philadelphia School District Faces the Budgetary Music

  • Priya Brannick
  • May 1, 2012

It doesn’t take an advanced degree to figure out that something’s rotten in the school district of Philadelphia—or that school choice is the antidote. More than half of…

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Education

Big Government and the Higher Education Bubble

  • Elizabeth Stelle
  • April 30, 2012

This past weekend I participated with some middleschoolers in a 30 hour famine to raise money for starving families. As we discussed poverty and debt the leader motioned to me…

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Regulation

States Tap Public-Private Partnerships in 2011

  • Elizabeth Stelle
  • April 27, 2012

Public-private partnerships aren’t just for roads anymore. Reason’s Annual Privatization Report, released this week, is packed with diverse examples of states leveraging the private sector to stretch tax dollars. In California,…

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State Budget

GAO Sounds the Fiscal Alarm on State Medicaid Costs

  • Nathan Benefield
  • April 26, 2012

The U.S. Government Accountability Office has a new report on state and local government finances. Of greatest concern are the expected increases in Medicaid spending and health care for…

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Public Union Democracy

Prevailing Wage Pummels Another School District

  • Priya Brannick
  • April 25, 2012

We’ve reported before about how Pennsylvania’s outdated prevailing wage law imposes needless extra construction costs on local governments and school districts across the commonwealth, hurting taxpayers. The law requires…

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Taxes & Economy

Feds Tackling Long-Term Unemployment Georgia Style

  • Elizabeth Stelle
  • April 25, 2012

The Federal Government is taking a page from the Peach State and looking for 10 states to participate in a new unemployment program modeled off of “Georgia Works.” The program…

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Taxes & Economy

What Does the Primary Earthquake Mean?

  • Charles Mitchell
  • April 25, 2012

I’m writing to you from Pittsburgh, which was, in a certain sense, ground zero of last night’s primary earthquake. Last night, I watched Tom Smith—who has made it a matter…

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Criminal Justice Reform

Unprecedented Prison Population Growth

  • April 24, 2012

This is the first installment in a three-part series that will look at Pennsylvania’s correctional system, public policies that have worked in other states, and provide a blueprint to bring…

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Regulation

Wizards of Whine Crying Fowl

  • April 20, 2012

Call me Ostrich, a ruffed grouse or anything you like, Mr. Conti, but don’t call me and nearly 70 percent of Pennsylvanians satisfied with the PLCB’s iron-fisted…

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