We travel from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, where President Mitch Daniels has embarked on an ambitious program to keep costs down and design new majors and programs that allow students to progress at their own pace, to Texas, where then-Governor Rick Perry’s call to create a $10,000 degree spurred innovation statewide. Finally, we conclude at one of the finest universities in our nation, the University of Chicago, to show what it means to have a commitment to free speech and the open exchange of ideas.

Click on the link below to read more.

The post Moving Mizzou Forward: Reform Ideas from around the Nation appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The tumult in Columbia has caused people around the state to ask “What can we do?” The Missouri legislature even went so far as to create its own independent review commission to examine the workings of Mizzou and the rest of the University of Missouri system.

We’re here to help.

In a new case study released today, Michael Highsmith and I present three case studies of different universities and university systems from around the country tackling the very problems that are facing Mizzou today: namely, how do we make college more affordable, relevant, and rigorous?

We travel from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, where President Mitch Daniels has embarked on an ambitious program to keep costs down and design new majors and programs that allow students to progress at their own pace, to Texas, where then-Governor Rick Perry’s call to create a $10,000 degree spurred innovation statewide. Finally, we conclude at one of the finest universities in our nation, the University of Chicago, to show what it means to have a commitment to free speech and the open exchange of ideas.

We don’t present these stories as a paint-by-numbers guide to exactly what Mizzou should do to improve its standing in the state and region. Rather, we hope to spark a conversation about how to make Mizzou, and higher education in Missouri, stronger. We hope you’ll join us in that conversation in the coming months.

Click here to read more.

The post New Paper Offers Guidance for Improving Mizzou appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

“The basic assumption of your draft regulations appears to be that top down, Washington driven standardization is best…. You are funding teaching interventions or changes to the learning environment that promise to make public education better, i.e. greater mastery of what it takes to become an effective citizen and a productive member of society. In the draft you have circulated, I sense a pervasive technocratic bias and an uncritical faith in the power of social science.”

Was it:

(A)   Then Kansas Senator (now Governor) Sam Brownback

(B)   Then Texas Governor Rick Perry

(C)   Then California Attorney General  (now Governor ) Jerry Brown

(D)   Missouri Governor Jay Nixon

If you guessed Sam Brownback, you would be wrong. It was actually Democrat Jerry Brown.  Yes, that Jerry Brown.

This quote resurfaced in an interesting piece by Matt Barnum of education website The 74 about California’s long-running opposition to federal education policy. Brown’s riposte was a harbinger of the showdown that California ultimately had with the Department of Education in 2013, when California suspended its standardized testing and school rating system. The feds said they couldn’t do it and threatened to withhold funding. Brown responded more like a Texan than a Californian and dared them to come and take it.  The feds backed down.

I think there are two interesting lessons to take away from this story (which is worth reading in full).

First, states can stand up to the federal government. It obviously helped California that it is the most populous state in the union and is one that will reliably deliver Democratic votes, but even with that said, it is clear that the federal government is loathe to pull funding that overwhelmingly benefits poor students and students with special needs. That is not to say that they wouldn’t, but states are probably in a stronger bargaining position than they realize.

Second, the issue itself matters. California picked a smart issue on which to go toe to toe with the Department of Education. Had the feds been opposing standardized tests and the states supporting them, the calculus would probably be much different. A hardline stance might not work with an issue with more divided opinion or one where the federal government has the majority opinion on its side.

I don’t know if what California is doing is right or wrong. I’m by no means a technocrat, but I think they probably swung too far in the opposite direction on testing and school accountability. That said, part of respecting local control of education is realizing that not everyone is going to make the decisions that you would have made had you been part of the process. Agree or not, we can learn from California about what states can do when they feel they have been pushed too far, and we can recognize the need for states to have a game plan in place in case they are asked (or ordered) to do things expressly against the will of their citizens.

The post They Fought the Feds, and the Feds Lost! appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Debate in Missouri about Medicaid, education, and taxation is filled with anecdotes that give an either incomplete or misleading picture of policy proposals. That is why we here at the Show-Me Institute love data. Spreadsheets may not make for an impressive photo opportunity, but data analysis is necessary if we are going to improve the lives of Missourians.

Should you be locked in a political discussion this holiday with that irascible brother-in-law, visit Show-Me Data for some valuable context. We’re all grateful for the stories of America’s greatness, now we have the data to back it up.

The post We Are Thankful For Data appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

If “stealing jobs” were as bad as — and essentially no different than — stealing cars or stealing horses, Texas Gov. Rick Perry might expect to wind up at the end of a rope — the traditional fate in cowboy movies for horse thieves and cattle rustlers in the Lone Star State.

While that is not about to happen, the Texas governor has clearly been having a fun time infuriating some of his fellow governors in going to their states to pitch CEOs on the idea of relocating their businesses to Texas — one of only nine states (the others being Alaska, Florida, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Washington and Wyoming) with no state income tax on personal income. In venturing into California, Illinois, New York and several other high-spending, high-tax blue states, Perry has made a lot of speeches and spent some $2 million in TV ads singing the virtues of “limited government, low taxes and a fair legal system.”

Perry also made two visits to Missouri — in August and again in late September. In the earlier trip, he took Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon, a Democrat, to task for promising to veto the first tax cut in Missouri’s income tax in many years. As it turned out, even with heavy majorities in both houses of the Missouri legislature, Republicans were unable to override Nixon’s veto.

“Vetoing a tax cut is the same thing as raising your taxes,” Perry said in the commercials aired in several Missouri cities. “But there is a state where businesses flourish and jobs are created — Texas.”

That brought out the usual charges of “stealing jobs” in the two big-city, liberal dailies — the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the Kansas City Star.

But if someone is guilty of “stealing” a job, someone else must own the job. But who?

How about no one? As Harry Stonecipher, the outspoken former CEO of Boeing, liked to say, “Only the customer can guarantee your job.”

In a competitive marketplace, no one really owns a job — not the jobholder, not the company providing the job and certainly not the governor of any state. Companies naturally gravitate to — and create employment within — the jurisdictions that provide the lowest costs of production, and taxes are an important part of the cost of production.

At the end of the day, there is no such thing as “stealing” a job. Like it or not, the states are in competition with one another in trying to attract and retain businesses focused on creating the greatest value for their customers, shareholders and employees. One of the keys to doing that is keeping the “tax price” in your location below that of competing jurisdictions.

Missouri should be focused on lowering the tax burden for all businesses. The best way to promote growth (and compete for jobs) is to get rid of all income taxes on business. Let the people who have earned the money put it back to work in their own businesses.

Andrew B. Wilson is a resident fellow and senior writer at the Show-Me Institute, which promotes market solutions for Missouri public policy.

The post Is Texas Gov. Rick Perry Guilty of “Stealing” Missouri Jobs? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

It’s true that Texas faced a serious budget shortfall after a recession hit. So did many states. However, Texas has managed to climb out of the hole it was in. Now, according to the Texas comptroller, Texas is looking at an $8.8 billion surplus. Even after making up for much of the cuts imposed by earlier budgets, Texas is still looking at a surplus. Texas also has significant assets in its “Rainy Day” fund. According to the Tax Foundation, Texas’ “Rainy Day” fund is 18.58 percent of general spending compared to 3.28 percent for Missouri.

Nixon and liberal advocacy groups such as the Missouri Budget Project worry about effects an income tax cut will have on education. Yet Texas, without an income tax, performs just as well as Missouri on a variety of education metrics.

Income taxes are among the most economically damaging taxes a state can impose. The Show-Me Institute has published research on how Missouri could eliminate the state income tax, or for the less bold, eliminate just the corporate income tax. Maybe instead of letters, Missouri can try real reform.

The post Texas And Taxes: Time To Set The Record Straight appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

• Ted Dabrowski, vice president of Policy, Illinois Policy Institute
• Jonathan Williams, director of the Tax and Fiscal Policy Task Force, American Legislative Exchange Council
• The Honorable Larry Parman, Oklahoma Secretary of State
• Travis Brown, author of How Money Walks, who will also serve as our moderator

Our talk is tentatively scheduled to begin at 11:45 a.m., following speeches from former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum and current Texas Gov. Rick Perry. Suffice to say, if you want to get a good seat . . . you may want to arrive early. And if the formal schedule changes between now and then, I will update this post with the new details.

It should be a fantastic event. I would be utterly delighted to meet our readers, so if you have time that day, I’d encourage you to register and attend our event. You can sign up for the conference here.

The post Meet Me In Saint Louie, Louie! Meet Me At CPAC (on Sept. 28) appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is at it again.

Next week, he’ll travel to Missouri to tout Texas’ low taxes, less regulation and high job creation rate.

Starting today, a 30-second television advertisement is running in the St. Louis, Springfield and Columbia-Jefferson City markets in Missouri. The ads feature small and immigrant business owners and women talking about what Texas offers, such as no state income tax. [Emphasis mine.]

And when it comes to job growth, he’ll have plenty to discuss.

While in Missouri, Perry plans to meet with employers, business leaders and the Missouri Chamber of Commerce to talk about things like Texas being a top job producer. Texas added 19,900 jobs in July, ranking No. 5 nationally, but it created 293,000 jobs in the last 12 months, more than any other state.

Now, you can love it or hate it, but to derisively call visits like this “poaching” is like calling the best looking guy in the room a girlfriend poacher: it’s an excuse for failure. Of course we lost, they’ll say. Texas is poaching. And there’s no mystery about what Perry’s objective is on his trip — it’s to get Missouri’s businesses.

But if we all know the score, the question is, will Missouri just let Texas take our businesses and jobs without a fight? Missouri entrepreneurs may have come here with the Show-Me State, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be leaving with it at the end of this economic dance. Is Missouri just going to sit there and take it as Texas continues to walk off with the state’s wealth?

The post Blitz: Gov. Rick Perry To Visit Missouri And Run Ads Promoting Texas’ Business Climate appeared first on Show-Me Institute.