Elections and inaugurations are a time for reflection and a recommitment to principles. As Missouri prepares for the new administration of Mike Kehoe, it’s worthwhile to consider the performance of his predecessors—especially on issues relating to fiscal management of taxpayer resources.

The Cato Institute, a libertarian-minded think tank based in Washington, DC, rates the fiscal performance of governors. The good news is that Governor Mike Parson is not the worst governor in the United States, but he’s the worst one who claims to care about limited government.

Cato has issued its report every two years since 1992. The report methodology, available online here, issues a letter grade based on each governor’s success at restraining spending and tax increases. Parson earned a D grade in 2024. Author Chris Edwards wrote, “Parson has been a tax reformer, but he has dropped the ball on spending control. The general fund budget has jumped from $10.5 billion in 2022 to an expected $15.6 billion in 2025, a 49 percent increase in just three years.”

The D grade placed Parson 40th of the 48 governors rated. Florida governor Ron DeSantis was ranked 19th and Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin came in 15th. Parson was closer to Minnesota governor and recent vice-presidential caudate Tim Walz, who came in last. Of Missouri’s neighbors, governors of Iowa, Nebraska, and Arkansas each earned an A grade, ranking 1st, 2nd and 4th respectively. Even Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker and California’s Gavin Newsom outperformed Parson, placing 32nd and 35th respectively.

If one uses Republican party identification to denote a preference for small government and low taxes—and that is arguable these days—Parson’s 40th-place ranking stands out even more. It made him the worst-scoring Republican in the nation. And 2024’s score is not a fluke; Parson scored a D in 2022 and a C in 2020.

Parson doesn’t just compare poorly to other current governors; he scored poorly compared to past Missouri governors. Parson’s letter grades surpass only those of Mel Carnahan (scoring D, D and F) and Robert Holden (F). Parson even seems to score worse than Jay Nixon, whose scores were B, C, D, and D. (If you’re wondering, Matt Blunt was the best scoring governor since 1992, earning Missouri’s only A in 2006 and a B in 2008.)

Note that the report’s methodology changed for the 2008 report but has remained the same since. Previous iterations relied on many more variables, but the outcomes are unlikely to have been much different.

Missouri’s total spending has practically doubled in the last five years, including not just the general fund, but other dedicated state funds and federal money. That total spending jumped from $27 billion in 2019 after Parson’s first year in office to a little more than $50 billion for 2025. It now costs three times as much to run Missouri as it did in the Carnahan and Holden administrations!

Parson’s profligacy stems from the decisions he’s made since the federal government’s COVID relief funds flooded Missouri’s budget with billions of dollars in one-time cash. States were given considerable discretion on how to use much of the relief funding, not to mention the state tax dollars the federal cash freed up for other uses. Unfortunately, Parson, with the help of Missouri’s General Assembly, fell victim to the allure of so-called free money.

Today, Missouri’s budget is littered with what were once temporary initiatives that never ended and now receive permanent funding. Or, perhaps worse, formerly federal obligations that are now borne by state taxpayers.

Key among these includes Parson’s decision to use state funds to maintain the higher childcare subsidies the federal government subsidized during the COVID pandemic, now costing state taxpayers at least $70 million annually. Parson also failed to meaningfully manage Medicaid spending. Missouri’s lackadaisical approach to checking program recipient eligibility, after the federal government lifted its COVID-era ban on the practice, has likely cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars thus far.

In addition, Parson increased state employee pay by 7.5% plus an additional 3.2% cost of living increase last year. These raises were paid for with a temporary influx of state funds, but because the increased pay was not made commensurate with employee reductions, the higher salaries will require new permanent funding sources and will increase the obligations of the already underfunded state pension system.

Governor-elect Kehoe has a difficult job ahead of him administering government and working to attract more families and employers to the Show-Me State. Unfortunately, his predecessor has done him—and the people of Missouri—a great disservice by failing to properly manage taxpayer funds.

The post Missouri Must Do Better at Controlling Spending appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Tied to our love of data is the assumption that government is transparent enough to provide it to us. Citizens of the Show-Me State should expect no less. And in that regard, Missouri is doing okay. In 1973, the state legislature adopted our Sunshine Law, making Missouri one of the first states to adopt such an open meetings law. The law in part reads:

It is the public policy of this state that meetings, records, votes, actions, and deliberations of public governmental bodies be open to the public unless otherwise provided by law.

In 2009 the Blunt administration sought for, and the legislature provided, the implementation of the Missouri Accountability Portal, and the Nixon administration has maintained it. The website allows users “a single point of reference to review how their money is being spent and other pertinent information related to the enforcement of government programs.” Though limited in scope and sometimes difficult to navigate, this site has been good for transparency in Missouri, helping keep citizens informed and the government responsive.

We’ll leave it to others to argue about the intelligence of voters or the political expediency of openness. But here in Missouri we’re grateful for the transparency we have and the data it yields.

The post We Are Thankful for Transparency appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

She says her requests for information initially met resistance: She often was told “Why do you need to know that?” and that her request was “unreasonable.” However, the school was receiving federal money and not spending it, then claiming that because it was not spent, the school was not bound to certain reporting schedules. The federal government disagreed, and thanks to Montero’s leadership, the school administrators resigned.

Montero now hopes to save other parents the hassle of battling the bureaucracy just to learn what is going on inside schools. She believes that simply providing information would go a long way toward improving services. She proposes instituting a Transparency Accountability Portal (TAP), modeled after Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt’s Missouri Accountability Portal (MAP). The MAP portal serves taxpayers as “a single point of reference to review how their money is being spent and other pertinent information related to the enforcement of government programs.” It includes information about state agency expenditures, the distribution of tax credits, state employee pay, and the use of federal stimulus funds.

Montero’s TAP would show how money is collected and spent; and link each expenditure to a specific district goal. The TAP will be similar to the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s Missouri Student Information System and the Missouri Comprehensive Data System, but more detailed and specific to the Kansas City district. Montero wants to include:

* The amount of money a school receives for each program.

* How much the school has set aside in activity funds for field trips, etc.

* General ledger details such as individual employee salary and basic job function — including administrators, teachers, and janitorial staff.

* Contracts the district and schools have entered for things such as lawn care, maintenance, and equipment. Montero said there is no consistency in contracting. “Some contracts can be for three years, others for three months,” she said. There is often no way for outsiders to evaluate the efficiency of some expenditures, i.e., tutoring services. How many kids are participating, and are grades improving?

The database also can help taxpayers appreciate the amount spent on employee benefits and pensions. The board could use this information for public input while renegotiating contracts and cutting budgets. The portal also could reduce the time the district spends responding to open records requests.

Montero believes such a portal would help the board stick to what she identifies as the four Ds: Data Driven Direction and Decisions. Without the portal, Montero said the board risks making decisions based on opinions, not facts.

The post A Window For Kansas City Schools? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

How does Missouri’s 48th worst pay for state workers in the nation contribute to our budget crisis? […] It doesn’t make sense, and it doesn’t position Missouri for future prosperity and economic growth.

So, logically, if Missouri wants to position itself for future prosperity and growth, the first thing we should do is give our state employees a raise? Because taking more from the general public to give more to state employees will result in spending multipliers so grand that we’ll all be living the good life? I guess that is the logic. Thank goodness the governor and the legislature don’t seem to agree.

I truly believe that a large public employment sector is a real threat to our financial stability and our economic freedom. For every police officer, fireman, and teacher doing important work out there, there is a clerk who got hired because they were some connected person’s cousin. Most public employees then become part of a consistent movement for more government and higher taxes, as they are the ones who benefit from that. Unfortunately, it takes a recession to generally see layoffs in the public sector – which many of us would agree is not the best time to lay anyone off. (I do give credit to former Gov. Matt Blunt for reducing the state payroll during good economic times, but that is a rarity.) However, if it has to be done during a recession, then it has to be done. There is nothing special about government jobs. They should be maintained only as long as it takes someone 40 hours a week to perform a needed public service. Once the service becomes unnecessary, the revenues are not there to support it, or it turns out that certain people are not needed for 40 hours (impossible to imagine for bureaucrats, I know) they should be let go.

The post State Government Employee Thinks the Private Sector Exists to Serve Him appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

One category of spending that showed a huge increase was “professional services,” which jumped from $8,000 to $428,000. The main component of this increase is “attorney services,” which cost the office of the governor $401,281. I did a quick Google News search to see if there was any media coverage explaining this increase, but no luck. Attorney services are probably necessary in some capacity, so the question is: What specifically is responsible for this steep escalation in spending?

Another large portion of this budget increase is funding for travel, which grew from $53,000 to $281,000, the largest amount spent on travel since 2000:

According to an article in the Columbia Missourian from last June, state flight records show that Gov. Jay Nixon flew on about 50 days during his first four and half months in office. As the article notes, this adds up to about one flight every three days. I have to wonder whether this amount of travel is really necessary. What’s more, the article in the Columbia Missourian also notes that Nixon has frequently charged the cost of his airplane travel to other government agencies. The governor’s explanation, when asked about this back in June, is that during these particular trips, he spent time highlighting the issues that are handled by those various other departments. Maybe this is justified in certain circumstances, but on one particular occasion, 11 different state offices, including the Departments of Agriculture and Revenue, split a $1,295 bill so that the governor and the first lady could fly to the Missouri-Kansas basketball game on March 1 (their host was Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius). Even if this is deemed to be a necessary expense, which seems unlikely given the current economic climate, why wouldn’t it fall under the governor’s office travel budget?

The almost sevenfold increase in the total budget for the governor’s office is inconsistent with his claims of fiscal responsibility in the State of the State address. And the current governor isn’t the only one who has overseen questionable budget increases; there was a dramatic spike in the 2006 travel budget of former Gov. Matt Blunt, as well. The lesson here is that Missourians should keep a watchful eye on government finances, and that it is important for all Missouri officials to examine their budgets carefully in order to eliminate unnecessary expenses.

The post Fiscal Responsibility? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

KC school district has about 1,000 employees too many, official says

But it’s even better than that, because the new Kansas City public school official quoted in the article didn’t say it by accident. He and the new school administration appear to be very serious about reducing the number of school district employees:

With about 3,300 employees, the district still has about 1,000 more people than most districts with enrollments of about 17,000 students, said Steve Harris, the new assistant superintendent for human resources.

“We’re way out of sync,” Harris said. “We want to try to get as close as we can for the next school year.”

He can’t predict how many cuts will come. A strategic planning process and school closings will determine a lot.

It is rather amazing, and gives me great hope, to see someone in a position to do something about it admit that way too many people are on the public payroll. I am sure that the cut of a few hundred people in KC will be more than offest by the addition of 100,000 new government employees in the USDOMWSEFL (U.S. Dept. of Make-Work Stimulus Employment for Life), but let’s give credit where credit it is due.

It is unfortunate that the only times we reduce local government employment are during budget-hurting recessions. I fully appreciate that this is not the best time to be laying people off. If I had any hope at all that government — at any level — would actually reduce the payroll during the good times, when those who were laid off would not have much trouble finding new work, I would oppose firings during a recession. However, with the rarest of exceptions (former Gov. Matt Blunt did reduce state employment during his recent term), this does not happen. And, because I consider padded public payrolls to be a serious threat to our freedoms, I’ll support any opportunity to reduce local and state government employment — and I say that as someone who knows what it is like to lose a good government job (for political purposes, which comes with the territory).

So, I commend the Kansas City school district for making the tough choices, just as I commended a few city of St. Louis officials when they recently reduced employment. Thanks to Combest for the catch.

The post A Very Forthright Admission About Government Employees in Kansas City appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

This November, Saint Louis County constituents will vote on a new annual tax of one-quarter of a cent (1 cent on every $4.00) to fund programs supporting the mental health and well-being of area youth. The estimated $40 million that would be collected after the passing of Proposition 1 would create a steady stream of funding for emergency shelters, transitional living programs for older youth, outpatient substance abuse treatment, and services to teen mothers. A Saint Louis County needs assessment concluded that the availability and funding of children’s programs should be increased, and while taxation may seem like a logical means to reach this end, there are other options.

Many surrounding counties, such as Lincoln, Saint Charles, and Jefferson — not to mention Saint Louis city — have already passed such measures to fund child and youth programs. Although Saint Louis County has more than three times the youth population of those adjacent counties, this would be the perfect time for the state to exercise other options to solve the issues at hand. Missouri could follow the lead of Michigan, Arizona, and North Carolina — states that have expanded tax credits to non-profit organizations and allowed communities to invest in their children by increasing charitable tax credits. These types of tax credits would revive volunteerism by reminding people that providing for the mental health and well-being of children is the responsibility of individuals in their local communities.

Charitable tax credit programs usually share three goals: increased charitable giving; letting taxpayers determine the effectiveness of charitable services; and supporting programs that address local community needs. Currently, individual taxpayers who itemize deductions on their federal income tax returns are entitled to reduce their taxable incomes by the amount of charitable contributions they’ve made, up to a certain limit. Additionally, at least a dozen states offer tax credits for contributions to certain qualifying charitable organizations that perform public functions. For example, Michigan offers tax credits for homeless shelters, food banks, and contributions to community foundations. Although only a small fraction of the Michigan population claims them, the total value of these credits exceeds $40 million annually.

Back in 2006, Gov. Matt Blunt announced that two Saint Louis not-for-profit organizations — The National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse, and Voices for Children — would be eligible to receive state tax credits to help fund programs aimed at preventing substance abuse and violence among at-risk youth. In this circumstance, private-sector donors could receive tax credits valued at up to 50 percent of contributions to approved projects.  Furthermore, those credits could be applied to the donors’ Missouri tax bills. Also during 2006, Gov. Blunt announced that Kansas City taxpayers could potentially receive tax savings of up to 50 percent of their charitable contributions to the Big Brothers Big Sisters program — which did, in fact, see a sharp rise in donations and charitable giving.  There is no reason why this could not work for other programs in Saint Louis County and across the state.

Another drawback of Proposition 1 is that it would increase government bureaucracy in order to distribute money to existing programs. This makes the giving process less direct and less efficient. Missouri should instead give private-sector charities a chance, by giving taxpayers a choice. Expanding charitable tax credits would give citizens the ability to fund groups that they think are effective. Harnessing this distributed knowledge is a more efficient way to identify organizations that do good work, and shift resources in their direction.

At the end of the day, the question is, “If the government taxes less, will you give more?” Studies have shown that when government spending increases, charitable giving declines. Instead of leaving worthwhile groups to be limited by inadequate funding, charitable tax credits provide an alternative, establishing positive incentives and cultivating a culture of giving. This would expose even more people to the intangible rewards that come from giving to and supporting their own neighborhoods. It really does take a community to raise a child, and no government bureaucracy can substitute for that.

Calvin Harris II is an intern at the Show-Me Institute, a Missouri-based think tank. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in public policy at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University.

The post Charitable Tax Credits Provide Constructive Alternative to Prop. 1 appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

I am going to go out on a limb here, and say that the governor probably has a better understanding of the state budget than the Post-Dispatch editorial board does. To me, it appears that he does an excellent job of explaining the budget and what the numbers actually mean. Particularly, he is right to point out that using 2001 as a base year to explain K–12 education funding is extremely misleading. As most Missourians are aware, former Gov. Bob Holden had just come into office in 2001 — which has nothing to do with current funding for education. Gov. Blunt goes on to explain that since he came in to office, K-12 education funding has actually increased by 17.2 percent.

In this editorial war of words, the Post-Dispatch fired the first shot — but the governor stood his ground and fired right back, explaining the state budget in-depth and providing a level of analysis that the Post-Dispatch was lacking. In my humble opinion, I think Gov. Blunt deserves some credit for what he has been able to do with the the state budget during the past four years. Some people may not agree with me, but, hey — that’s all right. At least people are talking about the budget.

The post Battling the Budget Backlash appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Generally, there are three main sources of revenue for a public school district: Local tax revenues, state funds, and federal funds. Each school district goes to district voters for a property tax levy increase when it needs more money. In the end, voters approve the maximum percentage of assessed land valuation that a school district can collect each year.

But what about rising property values?

If a school district collects a 4-percent tax levy and land values in that district spike 20 percent (maybe someone found oil), do that district’s local tax revenues spike as well? Well, before Senate Bill 711 takes effect on August 28, the answer is sometimes yes.

It’s tricky. But if a school district collects a lower tax levy than approved by voters (say it collects 3 percent, though voters approved 4 percent), then when property values spike, the district can collect the windfall up to the amount it could have collected at the maximum percentage approved (4 percent).

If, however, the school district was collecting the maximum (in this example, 4 percent), then when property values spike, the district is only allowed to collect what it did the previous year, plus inflation.

Blunt and Senate President Pro Tem Michael Gibbons are hoping to protect “Missourians from the threat of rising local property taxes” with the bill, which now states that in neither case can a school district collect a property value spike windfall.

This will affect school districts. A significant amount of each district’s funds comes from the local property tax. On average for the 2004–2005 school year, about 50 percent of Missouri school districts’ funds came from local sources. And that is a very, very conservative estimate.

I can’t tell you at this point exactly how many school districts collect below their voter-approved tax levy maximum. According to Gibbons, about 80 taxing districts in St. Louis do.

School districts that have been counting on collecting property value windfalls will soon have to collect at a higher property tax levy — the maximum their voters approved in the first place, which will just make things less confusing.

As part of my research, I’m looking at the success rate of proposed school tax levies and bond issues. If you have any questions about this post or that research, leave a comment below or email me.

The post Property, Properly appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Shocking. You know who else stands to benefit? Me, probably you, and just about everyone else.

Who actually owns AB? The Busch family? Its employees? The city of St. Louis?

Let’s take a quick look at AB’s latest financial statements. The largest individual shareholder of Anheuser-Busch (owning about 5 percent of total shares) is Warren Buffet. Well, he’s from Nebraska, so obviously he’s an outsider. But what about institutional investors? Well, a British conglomerate owns about 6 percent. And Mr. August Busch? A whopping 0.2 percent (though I believe he has about 4 percent of the voting power)!

And you know who else owns AB? Me, along with several hundred thousand of my closest friends at Vanguard. And probably Barack Obama, Francis Slay, and Matt Blunt, too.

Saint Louis has no “right” to AB when only one percent of the entire company is owned by AB insiders. And more than that, how do Missouri governmental officials have a right to have any say in a shareholder decision whatsoever?

One comment in the Post-Dispatch article is particularly misguided:

[H]ow ridiculous to say that Barack Obama wants the brewery to remain American while Republicans want it to go. Hello!?! Republican (Ex Chief of Staff to Matt Blunt) Ed Martin is behind the “SaveAB.com” along with SEVERAL other Republican operatives.

I don’t see all of these Democrats in the city doing much to stop the deal.

As well they shouldn’t, because it’s none of their business. This is a decision for the 99 percent of the company owned by outside investors. That’s how a free-market economy works. As voting shareholders, we can each choose to vote however we please. But what we cannot do is ask our government to step in and force a decision on our behalf. There is nothing less American than that.

The post More Lunacy Regarding Anheuser-Busch appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

“Missouri is a leader in the use of alternative fuels, and this change benefits Missouri’s consumers, economy, environment and farmers,” Gov. Blunt said. “Filling our gasoline tanks with E-10 will improve our air quality and reduce our dependency on foreign oil.  Missouri corn fields have now become the oil fields of the 21st Century.”

Except that they haven’t. A new study in the journal Science (not known for taking up right-wing causes) finds that greenhouse-gas emissions from corn ethanol during the next 30 years will be twice as high as they would be from regular gasoline. The cost discrepancy comes from previous estimates that failed to account for the carbon dioxide emissions that have arisen from the clearing of forests and grassland for biofuel production. About 2.7 times more carbon is stored in terrestrial soils and plant material than in the atmosphere, and this carbon is released when land is cleared for ethanol production.

So, while ethanol may be a boon for corn farmers, it will be a huge detriment to everybody else (I’m not talking about the CO₂ issue, but the impact on commodity prices).

So much for the government’s success at picking industry winners. The most recent estimates suggest it will take 167 years before the reduction in carbon emissions from ethanol “pays back” the carbon used by land-use change.

Good thing Missouri is one of only three states that have adopted such strict(ly stupid) industry standards.

The post Whoops appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

In my family, dinners in January and October have long been interrupted by calls from news organizations or interest groups seeking to test the opinions of white, middle-class, Midwestern America. Traditionally, these calls are met with a stern rebuke by one of my parents, angry that family time is being interrupted, but last night, en route to a biscuit, I got to the phone first.

Most of the six questions were fairly straightforward inquiries relating to the upcoming November election between Gov. Matt Blunt and Attorney General Jay Nixon, but one in particular caught my fancy (emphasis added):

"Do you support the right of law-abiding Missourians to purchase and carry concealed weapons?"

I asked the pollster to rephrase the question and she repeated it directly off her sheet. Shame. Such a question, immediately following the questions that asked about my party affiliation and opinion on abortion, couldn’t possibly have had the intention of pushing me towards one particular response. After all, what if I say no? Am I supporting the rights of non-law-abiding Missourians to carry concealed weapons? Because I don’t think anybody is such a big fan of that.

It would be stupid of me to believe that every opinion poll provides an accurate description of how the electorate feels about any issue. I just hope that everybody else who was up getting a biscuit at the same time recognizes where their responses go, and where those numbers end up.

The post Could You Repeat the Question? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Wow, that escalated quickly.

Now, I really have no problem with the establishment of criminal statutes for the prevention of obviously criminal activity. What I have a problem with is this (emphasis added):

"A trade group for bankers has said that most of the state’s regulated
financial institutions — such as neighborhood banks and credit unions ?
aren’t deeply involved in sub-prime loans. But the leader of a trade
group for mortgage bankers warned that going too far with penalties on
lenders could make it more difficult to get credit in Missouri."

Ignoring the obvious criticism of a mortgage banker protesting actions targeted specifically against members of his industry, do we really think that a state response to a national credit crisis is going to be the biggest threat against the financial security of Missourians?

Heck, I’d probably be more worried about this guy.

The post The Bandwagon Just Got Fangs appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

On the surface, federal disaster relief sounds like a wonderful idea. Shouldn’t the federal government (with its deep pockets), be called upon to help communities affected, through no fault of their own, by natural disasters? Surely no one would object to such a magnanimous act of charity, particularly not in the richest country in the world.

Yet it always reminds me of an old Davy Crockett story (forget about George Washington and his cherry tree — growing up in Texas, we learn stories about the "real" Founding Fathers, who all died at the Alamo).

When Davy Crockett was a congressman from Tennessee, he voted for a bill which appropriated $20,000 to assist with a rebuilding effort in Georgetown after a fire. Two years later, while campaigning for reelection in Tennessee, a farmer criticized him for his charitable appropriation, to which Davy Crocket responded:

"Certainly nobody will complain that a great and rich country like ours should give the insignificant sum of $20,000 to relieve its suffering women and children, particularly with a full and overflowing treasury, and I am sure, if you had been there, you would have done just the same as I did."

To which the farmer replied:

"It is not the amount, Colonel, that I complain of; it is the principle. … The power of collecting and disbursing money at pleasure is the most dangerous power that can be entrusted to man, particularly under our system of collecting revenue by a [tax], which reaches every man in the country, no matter how poor he may be. … So you see, that while you are contributing to relieve one, you are drawing it from thousands who are even worse off than he.

"If you had the right to give anything, the amount was simply a matter of discretion with you, and you had as much right to give $20,000,000 as $20,000. … You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism, on the one hand, and for robbing the people on the other.

"The people have delegated to Congress, by the Constitution, the power to do certain things. To do these, it is authorized to collect and pay moneys, and for nothing else. Everything beyond this is usurpation, and a violation of the Constitution."

So maybe you think the government should have the power to assist with disaster relief; that’s fine, and I don’t necessarily disagree. But I’ve always liked this story because I think it illustrates an important point about the proper role of government. All too often, we turn to the government to fix our problems. A dollar here, a dollar there — who is it hurting if it’s for a "noble" cause?

But who decides what’s noble and what’s not? And how much should be spent on such acts of "charity"?

The power to spend other people’s money is one of the most dangerous powers a government is entrusted with. Missouri’s request for $28 million is just one example of the flippant attitude we take toward our tax dollars. How many jobs could that $28 million have created? How many people could it have helped it if was donated to charity instead? And how many struggling families’ pockets did we tap so that we could relieve the suffering of others?

At the very least, we should be asking ourselves those questions with every tax dollar spent.

The post Not Yours to Give appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Gov. Matt Blunt’s new low-income health care plan, “Insure Missouri,” may cover more than 100,000 people by the middle of 2008 by subsidizing insurance policies for working families. The plan includes some worrisome details that warrant careful study, but if the government is going to subsidize health care, the best way to do it is through direct subsidies to low-income recipients. Here’s why.

In any society, scarce resources will be allocated by a system of rationing. In ordinary retail markets, rationing is determined by price, ensuring that whomever most values a good will be the one who receives it. However, if government policy mandates that everybody is supposed to receive a share of some scarce resource, rationing will usually take a form that we don’t measure directly in dollars and cents. This might include waiting in a queue, bribing officials, nepotism, or some other form of competing for political favors.

If the scarce resource in question is health care, rationing is a matter of life and death. In a consumer-based market, people who can’t afford health care may succumb to untreated illness. Under universally mandated health coverage, which tends to bring lengthy waits for treatment, those who get stuck on the wrong side of a queue may be treated with insufficient haste. There’s a reason that cancer patients have a much higher survival rate if they happen to live in the United States: Treatments may be expensive, but they’re timely.

The United States has the highest quality of care available to those who can afford it because we have at least some semblance of a market pricing mechanism at work. Greater incentives exist for the health care industry to innovate and perform well, because more cash is at stake. It’s true, though, that this system doesn’t serve everyone.

Calls for universal health coverage are growing ever-louder. While reasonable people can debate the role of government, and the scope of its powers, it may well reach the point when society demands that government ensure a basic level of health coverage. Then the question becomes: How do we maintain health care quality and innovation when the government intervenes to make sure fewer people suffer from price-based rationing?

Universal health care subsidizes everybody, but also destroys the price-based system of incentives that both encourages greater quality and innovation, and discourages frivolous doctor visits. If the government instead offered direct subsidies to those who can’t afford service, the feedback loops that prices and markets provide would remain relatively intact.

Although such a subsidy — akin to a health care “voucher” — would raise all health-care prices, it would be more efficient than universal insurance. It’s easier to tell who needs the subsidy, and provide it, than it is to figure out who’s at the wrong place in a queue, desperately waiting for critical care. The system would have to be continually adjusted to give special favors to the right people at the right time, without a consistent method of figuring out who the right people are. This isn’t something bureaucracies do well.

Some argue that queues would disappear under universal care with adequate funding. But there will always be funding shortages. Even the oft-touted Canadian system is limited to a relatively small percentage of Canada’s GDP. The most generous taxpayers in the world will insist that universalized expenditures be balanced with other priorities.

One primary problem with “Insure Missouri” is that it treats routine medical care as an insurance matter. But insurance is designed to be a hedge against unforeseen problems, not a mechanism for paying ordinary health care costs. This is why the health insurance law passed this summer, HB 818, is so important. It makes pretax health savings accounts widely available to Missourians — especially those working for small businesses. The eventual goal of any health care entitlement program should be to move people from government-funded care to an HSA that can be used both to pay for routine care out of pocket, and to purchase a portable insurance policy.

Health care will always be subject to scarcity, and when government is involved there’s no avoiding some effects of the tragedy of the commons — people at the margin have a greater incentive to free-ride, commit fraud, and use resources capriciously. But, ultimately, direct subsidies that facilitate low-income participation in a market-based health care system would keep more people alive and well than universal insurance would. The devil is in the details, but if the goal is to cover more low-income citizens while staving off calls for a disastrous universal care system, “Insure Missouri” may be a successful — though fundamentally flawed — strategy.

Eric D. Dixon is the editor for the Show-Me Institute, a Missouri-based think tank.

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Missourians amended our state constitution in 1940 to change the ways judges were selected for the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals and the circuit courts of Jackson County and Saint Louis City. This was done in response to public concerns about the power of political machines in electing judges under the previous system. Dubbed “The Missouri Plan,” it has been expanded to include circuit judges in Saint Louis, Clay, and Platte Counties. The amendment’s provisions replaced elections with a judicial commission, which reviews applicants for open positions and narrows the list down to three choices. The governor then selects a new judge from that panel. The system has worked very well for Missourians, taking some of the politics out of judgeships and efficiently filling vacancies. However, a few important changes could make the plan work even better.

The recent Supreme Court opening has raised to new prominence the simmering dispute over the true non-partisanship of the Missouri Plan. Allies of Governor Matt Blunt feel that the current appellate judicial commission has not fairly recognized the fact that he, not the commission, is the elected leader of Missouri. The current make-up of both the commission and its recently selected panel, which many conservatives feel is tilted toward the left, seem to substantiate this charge. This has led to calls from some legislators to do away with the Missouri Plan. While changes need to be made, doing away with the plan entirely would be going too far.

The most important change for the Missouri Plan is the elimination of six-year, staggered terms for governor-appointed positions. In theory, staggered terms might allow for more independence and less partisanship, but in reality they have served to allow outgoing governors to load up commissions with their supporters beyond their terms in office. For example, former governor Bob Holden made six appointments to various judicial commissions during the time between when Governor Blunt was elected and took office two months later. Stacking the deck with supporters of your own party is, I am confident to say, not what the framers of the Missouri Plan had in mind. Making the appointed positions’ term coincide with the governor’s own term would serve to respect the wishes of voters and whatever candidate they choose to elect.

The second change I recommend is to add one appointed position to each commission, making the number of appointments equal to the number of judges and attorneys on the commission. Currently, the appellate commission is made up of the chief justice of the Supreme Court, three lawyers elected by the bar association, and three gubernatorial appointments. Each of the county commissions is made up of that circuit’s chief judge, two elected lawyers, and two gubernatorial appointments. Adding an additional appointment to each commission would make the landscape for selection more balanced. Let us not delude ourselves about the goals of the lawyers who run for judicial commissions via bar association elections. They, particularly the activists within the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys, are not always looking for the most qualified people to elevate to judgeships. Many of them are looking to support candidates who agree with their legal opinions.

Supporters of the Missouri Plan can point out that the retention votes appointed judges will face in the future act as a check and balance for the system. The retention vote is a good practice, but electoral history has shown it is almost impossible to get enough people to focus on the issue. Last year in Saint Louis County, a judge was handily retained by voters when an overwhelming number of lawyers, in a bar association survey, had advised against retaining her — a recommendation echoed by area newspapers. Perhaps we could improve the retention vote system by taking a page from Illinois and mandating a 60-percent vote in favor of retention in order for a judge to remain in office. I believe that is an idea worth debating.

Finally, the Legislature should take steps to make it clear to all that the various judicial commissions’ actions are covered by the state’s sunshine law. It astounds me that an appointed commission thinks it does not have to comply with Missouri citizens’ basic right to know what their government officials are doing. With these changes, I believe we can reach a fair compromise and retain the best parts of the Missouri Plan for judicial selections, without returning to the electoral problems that led us to create the plan in the first place.

David Stokes is a policy analyst for the Show-Me Institute.

The post The Missouri Plan, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Lawyers appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The proposed Rogersville ethanol plant, just a few miles east of Ozark,
if built will use 1.3 million gallons of water a day! As will each new
subsidized plant built in Missouri.Hundreds of reliable Internet sources condemn ethanol production: for
its toxic emissions and effluents; as an ineffective gasoline
alternative; for dramatically raising food prices; but most
frightening, for its contamination and horrific waste of ground water.

Some politicians seem as though they’ve been led to believe that ethanol is the cure-all solution to our energy crisis. In reality, ethanol is more costly than gasoline; it takes more fuel to make a gallon of ethanol than that gallon produces for consumers. Also, ethanol’s environmental repercussions, as pointed out in the op-ed, make ethanol production a poor strategy for solving our foreign oil dependency. Instead of wasting tax dollars on a fuel that does more harm than good, let’s use it to conserve a substance we all need in order to live … water.

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The SCHIP program provided health coverage for 6 million kids in 2006. Under the new bill, an additional 5 million children will be eligible for coverage, for a total of 11 million kids. 121,000 children in Missouri lack health insurance today, ironically in part because Rep. Blunt’s son, Gov. Matt Blunt, has stuck to family tradition and cut 1,903 in Greene County from Medicaid since 2005. A disturbing trend, which begs the question: What does the Blunt family have against children?

It’s a mistake to focus on insurance when what really matters is how many children receive medical care. Some parents who could afford insurance choose to pay for their children’s health care out-of-pocket instead. And for those who can’t afford insurance, there are ways to provide medical services directly, such as public clinics or vouchers for preventative care.

Worrying about providing health insurance for all kids is like worrying about providing car insurance for all kids. Some parents can afford cars and car insurance, and they drive their kids to school. Other kids take the bus.

We want all kids to have health care, but not everyone needs to go through insurance. And we certainly don’t need everyone to go through one government insurance program.

The post What Should We Do About Uninsured Kids? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

A highly publicized Social Security tax cut for Missourians that Gov. Matt Blunt recently signed into law also nixed a real-estate tax deduction for non-residents — essentially increasing Missouri taxes for people who work here but live out of state.

Because of this, Kansas lawmakers might launch a counterattack by passing a law that would restrict Kansas non-residents from the same benefit. Yet, all of this hullabaloo really results in not much of a tax increase at all for the average Kansans who works in Missouri:

[T]he more than 1,400 neighboring Kansas residents who commute to Buchanan County may pay more taxes to the state of Missouri next year, but they should break even after paying their Kansas taxes, explained Gerald Williams, a certified public accountant with Sumner, Carter, Hardy, Rich and Co. in St. Joseph.

Mr. Williams on Tuesday provided to the News-Press calculations from multiple mock filing scenarios for Kansas he figured under the new law.

"In most instances, it makes no difference," he said. "You may pay more to Missouri and less to Kansas, but when you add them together, it’s the same amount, out of pocket."

Kansas has a higher tax rate, but also provides a credit to Kansans for income taxes they pay out of state, which offsets the higher taxes in Missouri, he explained.

Kansas residents who don’t itemize their deductions will see no difference, while other filers can expect little or no change. In rare instances, he found filers could pay between $40 to $50 more than in prior years.

So Kansans will not really be affected by the ending of these tax breaks. The Kansas politicians who are making this an issue sound like the residents of Shelbyville, getting upset at Springfield for getting the upper hand, preventing them from having the lemon tree they desire.

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The face of public education in Saint Louis is changing. Although court challenges continue, the city’s school board has become superseded by a new transitional board appointed by Gov. Matt Blunt, Mayor Francis Slay, and Lewis Reed, president of the Board of Aldermen. It’s a change that makes sense: During the past four years, the city’s school board has devolved into a group where members attack both each other and those who criticize them for failing to do the job they were elected to do. This bickering has taken focus off of the school district’s worsening financial situation and declining student achievement. The new transitional school board should keep a few things in mind if it wants to avoid the same problems created by the elected board.

First: Do the job you were created to do. The transitional school board’s primary focus is to stabilize the district’s governance and finances. The elected board had tried to micromanage the day-to-day operations of the school district — a job that should be left to the superintendent, who is responsible for implementing district policies and regulations, and developing the educational plans of the district. This role is filled better by one person than by a panel filled with people who have conflicting goals, and who can’t be present every day to make sure the district is running smoothly. When elected officials misunderstand the school board’s proper place in public education, a power struggle can form between the board and the district administrators — with both groups trying to maintain a greater amount of control over the district. If the transitional school board wants to succeed where past boards have failed, it should leave education to the superintendent and the administration, focusing instead on the finances.

Two: Be more open. The previous school board made many decisions behind closed doors, ranging from firing Creg Williams and hiring Diana Bourisaw to making decisions that have damaged the financial integrity of the district. Saint Louisans are tired of decisions being made in this fashion, with little involvement from the general community. The transitional board must be open to the public, reaching out to parties who will work together to find solutions to the problems facing the district. This would help to allay the suspicion many people in the district feel toward the transitional team.

Three: Work with people. The previous school board chose who it would deal with based on individual support for its measures. In this process, it ignored or disparaged people who stood opposed to measures the board supported. The transitional board will need to bring together a fragmented community filled with people who have turned against each other because of the actions of the last school board. In turn, people angered by the state takeover will need to work with the transitional board to get things accomplished. All segments of the community have valuable insights to contribute, and during the last four years the school board has not often listened to them.

Instead of demonizing the new board, the community should see this as a truly clean slate. Now is the time to put aside grudges and work on a plan to put this district back on track. As every Saint Louis Public Schools superintendent and board member has said for the past four years, we need to make the best decision for the children.

Maurice Harris is an intern at the Show-Me Institute, a free-market think tank based in Clayton. He is currently studying political science and history at Knox College.

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