Susan Pendergrass speaks with Josh Bandoch, author of “How to Get What You Want: Mastering the Art and Science of Persuasion,” about why leading with data and logic is often the wrong approach to changing minds. Drawing on more than a decade of research across psychology, neuroscience, economics, and political science, and experience writing speeches for senior government officials and advising executives, Bandoch explains how the human brain feels before it reasons, why persuasion is about shared action rather than winning, and what policy advocates get wrong when trying to move legislators. They also discuss the Granny Test, how to frame arguments around your audience’s moral values, the role of storytelling, and more.

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 Episode Transcript

Susan Pendergrass (00:00): So excited today to talk to Josh Bandoch, author of the soon to be out — or maybe by the time this airs, out — book “How to Get What You Want: Mastering the Art and Science of Persuasion.” I want to say it correctly, which is awesome. I was thinking about this topic — we were talking about this a little bit before we started recording — because we’re both right in the middle of legislative sessions. And in addition to being an author, you work in the policy advocacy space. Is this book meant to sort of address that space, or is it for a more general audience? Because we all want to get what we want, right?

Josh Bandoch (00:37): Absolutely. The book is written for a general audience. It will help folks in the policy space, but also in business, sales, or marketing. The goal of the book is to help people get what they want through persuasion. And for me, persuasion is the difference between having a good idea — whether it’s a good policy idea or a good product idea — and having others embrace that idea.

Susan Pendergrass (01:02): Yeah, I think that’s so important because oftentimes — well, speaking for myself — I come up with policy ideas that I think are great ideas, but I come from data, evidence, research. Let me write a 20-page paper on it and do a statistical model to convince you. And I think that based on what I’ve read in your book, you would say that might not be my strongest approach.

Josh Bandoch (01:24): Well, those things are necessary. Data is necessary, and folks who work at think tanks are paid to do research. I work at a think tank — the Platte Institute — and that is what we’re paid to do. But when I think about persuasion, I start by trying to understand the contours of how the human brain actually operates.

The challenging reality for a lot of folks in the think tank space who are paid to think — maybe you’re a consultant or whatever — is that since we’re paid to think, we think that means logic, data, and reasoning are the way to get what we want. The most challenging reality I’ve encountered is that this is how the human brain is wired — not just my brain or your brain, Susan, but all 8 billion of us on this planet. We feel first, then reason. Sometimes it’s feel, and we never even get to the reasoning. We’ve all been there. That means persuasion actually starts with feelings.

I know the folks in your audience who love the work you do — and you guys do great work — and love the research are going to say, no, that can’t be true. Well, it’s what all the neuroscience says. So it actually means that the logic-first approach to persuasion, whether in policy and think tank land or in sales or anything, is actually illogical — because that’s not how the brain works. The brain works feel first, then reason. We do reason. It’s just that we have to start with feelings.

Susan Pendergrass (03:06): So give me an example. We’ve been working for several years on a policy in Missouri that would allow parents to choose where their kids go to public school — just public school, open enrollment. And we get so much pushback from legislators and others who say this is going to lead to basically the destruction of the public education system. That’s their feeling. And I can provide a lot of evidence from other states that have done it for decades — even our neighbors in Kansas, not so much Illinois — and say it hasn’t happened, but they still believe it. I feel like I can’t put the words in the right order to make them understand what I’m trying to do. So what do I need to do differently?

Josh Bandoch (03:47): Yeah, so there are two parts here. First, you just observe what somebody’s feeling. Because if somebody’s feeling great and they’re inclined to do what you want to do, it’s easy, right? In this case — this is a perfect example — they have negative feelings towards the policy you want to advance. So the first thing you have to do is observe, understand, and address those feelings directly. When you’re in these conversations, what is an example of a raw, visceral negative feeling that somebody expresses?

Susan Pendergrass (04:19): They’ll say in our small rural communities, the high school is the center of it — it’s the heart and soul of the community. And if we let kids out — even though it’s the heart and soul — they’ll all want to leave. And if that happens, not only will the school close, but that will kill the community. That’s what they believe. It’s not reality, but I struggle when I go to testify at a legislative hearing to not sound like I’m just putting facts in front of them and ignoring what they feel. I don’t know how to counter that with reassurance and say, that’s just not true.

Josh Bandoch (05:09): So let me briefly walk you through the process so your audience can follow along. Start with feelings — and what you have to do is generate persuasive feelings. What feelings are persuasive? Ultimately, I think it’s positive feelings. Every time I ask an audience who the most persuasive people they can think of are, a couple of people come to mind: Ronald Reagan, Martin Luther King Jr., JFK. They generated positive feelings. And you do that especially by appealing to your audience’s moral values, which in this case might be different from yours. And then the most effective way to wrap it all up is a story.

So how do you start this process? When you’re talking to folks in the community, or to lawmakers, or to local elected officials who you’d like to see change their stance, start by asking them how they feel. It just unlocks a totally different pathway in the brain.

Susan Pendergrass (06:05): But when you’re saying this — and when I was looking through your book — I was wondering: in today’s political environment, I feel like persuasion is being used a lot less, and people are just making statements and not really defending them, just saying that’s the fact because I said it. Especially with how vitriolic our politics has become in the last decade since you started this research, do you think there’s still a good solid place for the art of persuasion? Or are we just going to stand with our arms crossed and agree to disagree?

Josh Bandoch (06:35): So at one level, the answer is absolutely yes, because humans haven’t evolved radically over the last 10 years. Everything in the book is backed by a tremendous amount of research, largely based on how the human brain works, and then lots of practice. At another level, we do have real reason to be concerned, which is what you just pointed to — is persuasion still possible in today’s political environment?

Look, there are only two paths forward. One is that we continue to relish in all the negativity, toxicity, and polarization, or we step back from it. I don’t think, aside from a couple of folks who spend their lives on X, that anybody is really going to say our politics are healthy. So it’s incumbent on us to have better methods to walk back from that, as opposed to just running down that toxic lane even further.

Susan Pendergrass (07:41): So in addition to what happens in state and federal legislative bodies, where I spend a lot of my brain power, how does somebody take the principles of your book and apply them in their personal life? Is this about manifesting goals, or how do they apply those same principles?

Josh Bandoch (08:00): Well, maybe I can sketch out briefly what some of the principles are so we can talk about them. The first step for persuasion — well, I guess two things. One is understanding what persuasion actually is, and I think even this is a mindset issue. We oftentimes think persuasion is about winning. And Susan, if I win against you, what does that make you?

Susan Pendergrass (08:17): A loser.

Josh Bandoch (08:18): That’s terrible, right? You’re a loser and you don’t want to work with me. So persuasion isn’t about winning. It’s not just about launching your logic at people — we’ve discussed that already. It’s not simply about convincing somebody. The Latin root of the word “convince” means to vanquish or to conquer, and conquest is barbaric. So what is persuasion? It’s about shared action — something we voluntarily do with others. That’s the shared part, and it’s action — it’s about getting things done. That’s already a much different understanding of persuasion.

When you bring that approach to your personal and professional endeavors, it’s different because you’re really trying to work with people and figure out how to move forward together. The first step of persuasion for me is adopting what I call the persuader’s mindset — it’s about them, not you. That’s why when we talked about school choice in the community, it’s like, okay, what are their concerns? Take their concerns seriously. That applies in your personal life too — maybe you’re having a debate at home with your spouse or a friend or a child. You have to understand who they are and what they care about, and to the extent possible, proceed on their grounds, because they’re much more comfortable there. This applies to any situation you’re in, no matter what it is.

Susan Pendergrass (09:32): That’s awesome. And you mentioned professionally — sales. I feel like there are a lot of books on how to sell. How does your book differentiate from what’s come before?

Josh Bandoch (09:47): Well, a lot of folks — keeping it in the policy space — are trying to corner people into saying yes to something they otherwise wouldn’t say yes to. What I’m really trying to understand is what would motivate and excite somebody to work with me on something. And that requires generating the positive feelings I talked about, appealing to their morals, telling great stories, and some of the other things I get into in the book. But those are some of the big ones. And it all has to happen simply.

Susan Pendergrass (10:31): In a simple way, right? I’m not going to hold this against you, but I am a grandmother. And I did see the Granny Principle in the book — so explain what that is, because I want to remind myself of this principle a lot. I have a PhD in public policy. I’ve put a lot of years into studying what’s good and bad public policy. And every single year in the halls of Jefferson City, I just see bad public policy happen in the hallway. They’ll say, well, we’ll just give that part up and add this part. And I’m like, no, no, no — you basically just blew up the quality of what you were trying to do. And I see that if I’m coming from up here and things are happening on a completely different level, I’m spinning my wheels. I’m not furthering my goals of getting good public policy passed — which I believe, no matter who’s in the governor’s mansion or the White House, good policy is good policy. And I struggle to make it happen in Missouri. I think the Granny Principle could be part of my problem, so would you please explain what that is?

Josh Bandoch (11:32): Totally. The last chapter of the book — in some ways the least exciting but the most important — is called “Ace the Granny Test.” And what’s the Granny Test? Would your granny understand what you’re saying? You assume granny is a smart lady who is not an expert in any particular thing. So you have to explain things with clarity, simplicity, and precision.

One of the troubles we encounter in think tank land is that we love to dump tons of data and logic and reasoning and examples on people, and it’s overwhelming. We also encounter the curse of knowledge — we know so much that we kind of assume our audience does too. And we oftentimes think, well, they just don’t understand me, that’s their fault and their problem. No, no, no, no. It’s your fault and your problem, because they don’t understand you and they just move on with life.

When you talk to an elected official, you have about 60 seconds to capture their attention. Maximum. So if you’re not crystal clear and simple in how you explain things, they say in that typical apologetic way, well, thank you so much, I’ll take that into account — and then they move on. Clarity and simplicity are premium virtues in communications, and they require a lot of hard work to achieve. Can you distill your 30-page white paper into 30 seconds?

Susan Pendergrass (13:01): Yeah. I’m trying to do cards now — the most simple four-by-six with colors. And in their defense, I’m not coming down hard on legislators — they’re not specialists, they’re generalists. It might be education committee and transportation committee and appropriations, whatever. They have to know a lot of different areas, and even though Missouri and Illinois have long sessions — like five or six months a year — they have other lives much of the time. It is hard for them to grasp things in a short amount of time. I’ve had some back and forth with my colleagues who say we should still write high-level academic papers. I’m like, I’m doing four-by-six cards now. I’m sure there’s a middle ground there, but it’s hard to find.

Josh Bandoch (13:59): Well, the four-by-six is a great place to start. What’s your thesis? What are you trying to say? Can you get that into one sentence? Do you have a couple of key points you’d like to make? But then how do you turn that into something compelling? I would say you do at least one of two things. Ideally, you would have a story. If you’ve got 30 seconds to pitch school choice, you might start by saying, let me tell you a story about little Bobby or little Sally — this is what it meant to him, he was here and now he’s here — and you condense that story. Or you make a moral claim that’s going to grab their attention. People’s morals differ based on, roughly speaking, their politics, but you have to make a moral claim that’s going to resonate with them.

So if you’re talking to somebody on the left, their morals are sensitive to claims over equity. If you were talking to somebody in an urban school district and you wanted to get them to support school choice, and let’s say they’re on the left, you might say, look, our school system is deeply inequitable and we need to fix it. And they’re like, huh, yeah, it is — tell me more. You’ve got to figure out what you want to say, but then make sure you’re framing it in a way that is compelling for your audience.

Susan Pendergrass (15:15): So if folks want to find your book and learn how to get what they want, when and where will it be available?

Josh Bandoch (15:22): It’s available April 21st, and it’s available anywhere you can buy books — Amazon, Barnes & Noble.

Susan Pendergrass (15:24): And you said you spent 10 years researching this — tell me about it.

Josh Bandoch (15:33): Yeah, a combination of research and practice. Ten years of on-and-off reading as much as possible — psychology, neuroscience, primarily.

Susan Pendergrass (15:41): Yeah, that’s fascinating. It is — surprisingly, for what I do full time — an easy part to forget. I’ve always felt like if I just lay out facts and fair arguments, the rest will take care of itself.

Josh Bandoch (15:58): Well, those things are necessary, but they’re not sufficient. They’re necessary because our job, working at think tanks, is to make sure the foundation is strong. We have a policy recommendation, and we have to make sure we have really good reasons to think it’s going to be effective — that it’s been tested elsewhere, or all the data indicates this is probably going to work. That’s necessary. It’s not sufficient. The persuasion layer on top of that is what takes your good idea to a good idea somebody else wants to embrace.

Susan Pendergrass (16:30): Yeah, I think it’s great. Like you said, it’s helpful in so many parts of your life. It comes right up to the very edge of manipulation, but pulls back a little bit. It is helpful for getting what you want — whether you’re buying a car or agreeing with your spouse on the paint color for the wall. It’s a really smart approach.

Well, thank you so much for joining us today on the podcast and telling us all about it. It’s fascinating stuff and I really appreciate you taking the time. Thanks, Josh.

Josh Bandoch (16:58): It’s a pleasure, thank you so much.

Produced by Show-Me Opportunity

The post How to Think About Persuasion in Public Policy with Josh Bandoch appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

That one item is substantial. According to a paper in the December 2024 issue of the National Tax Journal, the total revenue loss to the federal government was $4.3 billion due to the 57 stadia built since 2000 that have benefitted from subsidies.

If that tax break is eliminated, team owners will demand that states make up the difference.

We know that these subsidies fail to generate a return on investment for taxpayers. They don’t drive economic development and their economic impacts are overstated. Maybe they make a metro area feel good about itself—but even then the benefits are too small to justify the costs.

Missouri has a lot on its plate right now with efforts to cut spending and income taxes so that Missouri is a more attractive place to live and work. More and greater handouts to billionaires should not be a priority.

The post Missouri Must Protect Taxpayers from Sports Subsidies appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Recently, the White House unveiled its detailed framework for deploying nuclear energy, which emphasized the need for nuclear power in America’s future. This plan included an ambitious target to triple U.S. nuclear capacity by 2050. While this specific plan may not survive the transition, the sentiment is likely to endure.

Bipartisan Support for Nuclear

Both sides of the aisle recognize the potential in an American nuclear resurgence, albeit with different motivations. Part of the reason the Biden administration supports nuclear energy is because of climate change. Ambitious emissions goals are difficult to achieve without nuclear energy. The previously mentioned report argues:

Expanding domestic nuclear energy production has a key role to play in helping to avoid the worst impacts of climate change by enabling the nation to achieve a net-zero greenhouse gas emission economy no later than 2050. Nuclear power delivers safe, clean, reliable, and affordable electricity.

The Trump administration’s support hinges largely on reliability, capacity, and energy security. Members of the first Trump administration have advocated for keeping plants open, investing in SMRs (small modular nuclear reactors), and continuing to modernize the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The president-elect recently affirmed this stance:

Starting on day one, I will approve new drilling, new pipelines, new refineries, new power plants, new reactors and we will slash the red tape. We will get the job done. We will create more electricity, also for these new industries that can only function with massive electricity.

Outside of the Oval Office, another notable example of nuclear momentum is the passage of the ADVANCE Act, which is designed to spur advanced nuclear construction and streamline regulations. This bill flew through Congress with an 88–2 vote in the Senate and a 393–13 vote in the House of Representatives before being signed by the president.

Bipartisan Action in Missouri

Nuclear energy is unique in that it is safe, powerful, and environmentally friendly. It is the most reliable energy source, and some claim it produces the lowest amount of greenhouse gas emissions over the lifecycle of the power plant. Public awareness of these benefits is increasing, as Bisconti Research found that favorability for nuclear energy increased from 49 percent in 1983 to 77 percent in 2024 among the U.S. public.

In the past, nuclear energy may have been viewed through a partisan lens, but today, it represents a solution to address some of our nation’s key concerns. This upcoming legislative session, lawmakers in Jefferson City should come together to craft meaningful policy that will help bring more nuclear power to the Show-Me State.

The post Nuclear Energy Is a Bipartisan Solution appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The good news: progress has been made. According to data released last week, the May consumer price index (CPI) inflation rate came in at 4%, which is far less than the 9% peak from mid-2022. However, now is not the time to move the goalposts. For years, the Federal Reserve has said its inflation target is 2%, and the economy is running at twice that rate. By contrast, before passage of the American Rescue Plan Act stimulus bill in early 2021, the economy had consistently remained at or below 2% inflation for the better part of a decade and had not hit 9% in over four decades. It turns out that former Treasury Secretary and National Economic Council Director Larry Summers was spot on in spring 2021 when he warned that “I think this is the least responsible macroeconomic policy we’ve had in the last 40 years.”

What is the reason for falling inflation? One explanation can immediately be ruled out. No, the Inflation Reduction Act (a misnomer if there ever was one) did not defeat inflation. For one thing, inflation was already falling before the bill passed in August 2022. Secondly, many of the provisions of the law have yet to go into effect. In fact, the treasury department and IRS just released guidance on some of the significant provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act just last week—nearly a full year after the bill’s passage.

The idea that the Inflation Reduction Act was going to reduce inflation has always been implausible, seeing as its tax hike provisions constrain supply, and its supposed deficit reduction does not begin to take place until 2028. The law increases deficits in the years 2024–2027. More artificially stimulated demand and constrained supply is not a recipe for bringing down inflation. If anything, the Congressional Budget Office is likely taking an overly sanguine view by saying that the law will have a negligible effect on inflation.

Instead, the Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes and the expiration of American Rescue Plan Act provisions are likely the key factors behind the decline in inflation. Broadly speaking, there are essentially two ways to bring down inflation: reduce spending demand or expand the supply of goods and services. The second approach is preferable in that it simultaneously allows for lower inflation and higher economic growth, but the types of regulatory and tax policy changes needed to expand supply would require consensus in Congress and the White House abandoning the anti-growth policy agenda pushed by many progressives.

The first approach (reducing demand) is what the Federal Reserve has pursued. As the Fed raises rates, borrowing becomes costlier, which makes it less attractive for consumers to purchase things like houses, vehicles, and appliances using credit. Higher interest rates also make saving more attractive. The result: consumers pull back demand. Similarly, the expiration of stimulus from the American Rescue Plan Act reduces overheated demand while the expiration of anti-work provisions removes part of the straitjacket imposed on supply.

Is the falling inflation a surprise? Prognosticators have been all over the map with their inflation forecasts during the past two years, but it ought not to be surprising that inflation would come down once the Federal Reserve finally began to take action and hike rates. At the beginning of the year, soon after the release of the December 2022 inflation data, I published a blog post with a forecast of where inflation might be headed in the first half of 2023. In the spirit of accountability, the figure above shows my inflation projection through May 2023 compared to how inflation has actually played out in reality.

The red (projection) and blue (actual) curves track each other remarkably well in 2023. In fact, my earlier blog post stated “topline year-over-year inflation readings are set to fall rapidly over the next several months—possibly even falling below 4% by early summer.” As a reminder: the May inflation rate came in at exactly 4%. Although my projections were mildly on the optimistic side, they have mostly held up.

Does that mean inflation is no longer a problem? Quite the contrary. The figure below shows that higher prices have essentially been locked in. The Federal Reserve is not even attempting to bring prices down. It is just trying to moderate the future pace of price increases to historic norms. Unfortunately, purchasing power is still more than 3% lower than it was at the beginning of 2021, as shown in the figure below. Until wages start to consistently outpace prices, workers will continue to suffer from the lingering effects of the inflation surge. Here, too, the economy faces serious headwinds, considering that labor productivity is on the decline. But addressing the low productivity crisis is a topic for another day.

Where do we go from here? There is no such thing as almost landing an airplane. You either land it, or you crash. In this case, the Federal Reserve has one task: to land inflation at 2% sooner rather than later. The longer it takes to achieve the 2% target, the less inflation-fighting credibility the Fed will have as people start to accept a persistently higher inflation rate as normal, which will make the Fed’s job even more difficult.

While the headline inflation number is moving rapidly in the right direction (and will likely continue to do so at least for one more month), some of the components of inflation are still concerning. In particular, core inflation (which excludes food and energy) is falling much more slowly. The latest core inflation rate from the CPI report is 5.3%, which is only modest progress from the 5.6% rate from the start of the year. One glimmer of hope is that housing costs have been a significant recent driver of inflation, but the data are lagging. Because most people who rent sign one-year leases, large rent increases from several months ago when conditions were different in the rental market still affect current inflation readings. As tenants begin to roll over into new leases, the data should adjust and likely show a slowdown in rent increases.

The bottom line is that the inflation picture has improved, but we are arguably entering a murkier phase over the next several months. The Federal Reserve made clear in its statement regarding pausing rates that it was likely not done raising rates. Rather, the pause is an opportunity for more data to come in to guide future actions. But one thing is clear: the mission is not yet accomplished.

The post Taking Stock of Inflation and the Recent Fed Pause appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

What is the debt ceiling, and what would have happened had we not raised it?

The debt ceiling (or debt limit) is a legal limit on how much money the U.S. government is authorized to borrow. Once the country reaches this limit, the Treasury is not permitted to issue more debt.

Can we simply not raise the debt limit?

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that the federal government will run a deficit of more than $1.5 trillion in 2023 alone, with spending amounting to $6.4 trillion and revenue coming in at $4.8 trillion. Of the $6.4 trillion in spending, $4 trillion is for mandatory programs that operate without Congress needing to regularly reauthorize them (e.g., Social Security and Medicare), $1.7 trillion is discretionary spending, and $660 billion goes to interest payments. Balancing the budget and eliminating the deficit in one fell swoop would require essentially zeroing out discretionary spending or making instant, draconian cuts to mandatory programs. Given the deep fiscal hole that the federal government has put the country in, there was no real alternative to raising the debt ceiling.

If both sides agreed that the debt ceiling had to be raised, what were the negotiations about?

Historically, occasions when the government has reached the debt ceiling have produced negotiated agreements that both raise the ceiling and limit spending, as was the case with the Budget Control Act of 2011 during the Obama-Biden Administration. However, this time around, the White House insisted for months that it would not negotiate on any spending reforms as part of raising the debt ceiling.

Given the unsustainable fiscal path that the United States is on, the White House was essentially sending the message that the only way to avert a debt crisis now (by raising the debt ceiling) was to cement the current spending trajectory in place—and thereby increase the chance of a debt crisis down the road. The House of Representatives disagreed with this false choice between a debt crisis today and a debt crisis later and instead passed the Limit, Save, and Grow Act, which simultaneously raised the debt ceiling and slowed the trajectory of spending, among other reforms. Passage of this bill forced the White House to the table, abandoning its no-negotiations stance on spending reforms.

What is contained in the debt ceiling deal?

The debt ceiling deal contains a number of elements. First, it raises the debt ceiling through the end of 2024 and it establishes spending caps for fiscal years 2024 and 2025 that limit the growth of spending to 1% with tough enforcement provisions during the appropriations process, which is when Congress formally makes detailed, program-level spending decisions. In addition, the bill prescribes a 1% cap on spending growth through 2029. By way of comparison, the CBO projected an 8.1% jump in discretionary spending between 2024 and 2025, followed by average annual increases of 2.8% through 2033.

Besides affecting topline spending, the debt ceiling bill rescinds certain COVID-19 and IRS funds, expands work requirements for food stamps and welfare, and implements energy-permitting reforms to reduce delays from excessive and unresponsive bureaucracy.

What is the overall effect?

The CBO projects $1.5 trillion lower spending growth (or in Washington, DC parlance: cuts) because of the deal. Without the deal, discretionary spending would have risen from $1.7 trillion in 2023 to $2.4 trillion in 2033, whereas now the projection is for $2.2 trillion in discretionary spending in 2033.

To give further perspective, the figure below plots three different projections for the path of discretionary spending as a percentage of the country’s annual economic output. The blue dots are CBO projections made in fall 2019 under the previous administration and before COVID-19. The orange dots are CBO projections from this May, but before the debt ceiling deal. The red arrow showing the upward shift from the blue dots to the orange dots represents the persistent increase in discretionary spending under the current administration’s policy plans. The gray set of dots represent discretionary spending under the debt ceiling deal, with the green arrow showing the reduction relative to what was slated to occur before the deal.

As the figure makes clear, the debt ceiling deal essentially takes discretionary spending halfway back to the path it was set to follow before COVID-19 and the change in administration.

Figure 1: Discretionary spending as a percentage of GDP. Source: Congressional Budget Office, Show-Me Institute calculations.

How should Missourians view this deal?

The United States faces a profound and troubling fiscal situation with its unsustainable spending levels, not to mention slow economic growth, declining productivity, and inflation that remains much too high. It is important to recognize that the country has a spending problem, not a revenue problem. Federal revenues are currently above historical average, but the reason deficits are so large is that spending as a share of GDP is higher than it has ever been over the past century except during peak COVID-19 and World War II. The debt ceiling bill does not fully reverse the spending increases of the past two years, but it represents a step in the right direction, especially compared to the White House’s previous no-negotiations spending stance.

Taking a step back, whereas the debt ceiling debate focused on discretionary spending, the vast majority of federal spending goes to mandatory programs, chiefly entitlements. The CBO projects that, absent reforms, federal spending will rise from 23.7% of GDP in 2023 to over 30% by 2053, annual deficits will more than double to over 11% of GDP, and the national debt will balloon to almost 200% of GDP. In this scenario, interest payments on the debt would triple as a share of the economy and would represent the single largest spending item for the U.S. government. Even this scenario is rosy in that it assumes an infinite willingness among investors to buy U.S. debt regardless of how dire the fiscal picture becomes—a rather implausible assumption that America would be wise not to test.

Going forward, much work remains to be done to right-size government and revitalize economic growth so that Americans can enjoy a more prosperous future free from the risk of steep tax hikes, crippling inflation, debt crises, and adversarial foreign governments buying up large quantities of government debt. The debt ceiling deal is by no means a cure to the country’s current fiscal ills, but it’s one step in the right direction, and the starting point for a much-needed national conversation.

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Spencer boils down the issues succinctly:

The White House says extending the length of these policies from 90 days to up to three years offers an affordable alternative for Americans who do not qualify for premium subsidies under the Affordable Care Act and cannot afford the premiums that come with the ACA’s mandatory coverages. The Trump rule allows ACA subsidies to be used to promote sales of short-term policies.

Those who want to curb the expansion say it will undermine the nation’s individual insurance market and health care reform by drawing away millions of the healthiest participants from the coverage pool.

It would be good news for consumers if these changes to STM plans last. I have said again and again that one of the main problems in American health care is the absence of price competition that would allow consumers to shop for health insurance products like they shop for other items—by comparing benefits, assessing costs, and making buying decisions that comport with their personal needs. More liberalized short-term medical insurance policies provide at least some of that flexibility in the insurance marketplace by providing less expensive coverage, albeit with fewer features.

Is short-term medical insurance for everyone? Of course not. But that decision should be for consumers to decide, not the U.S. Senate.

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Taxes will not be collected until construction is ready to begin.

But the tax funds will not come close to covering the cost of building the new line. The KC Streetcar Authority will also seek $100 million in federal funds. Earlier this year Congress rolled back the Trump administration’s proposed deep cuts in transit funding. But the outlook for help from Washington remains uncertain.

That assertion isn’t wrong, but it is woefully incomplete. As we’ve reported previously, the Jackson County court ruling allowing for the creation of the transportation development district that will levy taxes for the streetcar includes an important restriction: No taxes or assessments are to be collected from within the district until enough external funding—in this case federal funds—is available.

And those federal funds are indeed uncertain. The Trump administration position seems to be that it won’t hand out construction money for transit capital grants unless a previous administration signed a full-funding grant agreement, and no such agreement is in place for Kansas City’s streetcar. The Federal Transit Administration has previously called for the New Starts/Small Starts grant program—on which the Kansas City effort is dependent for funding—to be scrapped. As of now it is authorized only through 2021, after which it will cease to exist. Congress seems unwilling to reauthorize it.

Even if the occupants of Congress or the White House change significantly in 2018 or 2020, we are a long way from receiving any federal money for the streetcar, money necessary to permit the TDD to collect taxes and assessments. In the meantime, expect streetcar advocates to start looking elsewhere for their financial support.

The post The Asterisk in Streetcar Reporting appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

James G. Blaine was the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, a Senator from Maine, and the Republican party’s nominee for president in 1884. While historical accounts differ about his personal attitudes toward Catholics, there is no question that he tried to leverage anti-Catholic sentiment to make his way into the White House. He attempted to amend the U.S. Constitution to bar aid to the burgeoning Catholic school system that was cropping up around the country in response to the public schools’ emphasis on teaching Protestantism. (Many might be unaware that for a long time, students in public schools would read from the King James Bible and sing Christian hymns). 

While Blaine was unsuccessful in amending the U.S. Constitution, 38 states have so called “anti-aid” provisions in their Constitutions, including Missouri.

Lawyers for Trinity, and for numerous faith groups filing amicus briefs, argue that the application of such provisions violates the First and Fourteenth amendment rights of individuals and organizations. As lawyers for the Institute for Justice put it, “the Religion Clauses of the First Amendment, as well as the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, demand neutrality—not hostility—toward religion.” The State of Missouri singled out Trinity, whose application otherwise would have been approved, solely because it is a religious organization even though the “aid” does not advance its religion.

Understandably, many folks reading this might not care about a school resurfacing its playground. But it is important to note that religious organizations provide important social services to members of our community—and to poor and marginalized communities around the nation—with government support. Soldiers use the GI Bill to attend Saint Louis University, and low-income families use Medicaid dollars at Cardinal Glennon hospital. If providing used tires to Trinity Lutheran is unlawfully providing aid to a religion, wouldn’t these other examples of cooperation between government and religious organizations amount to the same thing? 

A decision in favor of Trinity would reinforce a commitment to treat religious organizations neutrally (neither privileging them nor discriminating against them) and would help close the door on a sad time in American history.

The post The Supreme Court Can Put a Nail in the Anti-Catholic Coffin appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

A quarter of a century ago, Margaret Thatcher threw the British House of Commons into an uproar when she mocked the concept of a United State of Europe in no more than three words. Punctuating each one, she said:

“No. No. No.”

This wasn’t just verbal overkill.  More precisely, she was saying “No” to a European Parliament comparable to the U.S. House of Representatives, “No” to a European Council of Ministers comparable to the U.S. Senate, and “No” to a European Commission approximating the power of the White House and executive branch.

Nevertheless, senior members of her party railed at her vehement rejection of a new conventional wisdom.  They challenged her leadership—and forced her resignation.

After eleven years (the most of any British prime minister in the 20th century), she was booted out of office on the issue of European integration. She resigned on Nov. 28, 1990.

Since her departure, every British PM (two Conservatives and two Laborites) has waved the pro-Europe flag. Support for the European Union (EU)—supplanting what began as the European Common Market—has been the consensus view of the British political establishment EST (Ever Since Thatcher).

However, with the “Brexit” vote last month, this era may also come to an abrupt close. After 26 years, will the British public  have swung around to her thinking? 

Thatcher foresaw many of the difficulties today’s Europe.

In 1975, as opposition leader, she campaigned to keep Britain in the Common Market. However, after winning a third term as prime minister in 1987, she worried about the metamorphosis of the Common Market from free-trade zone into the “Babel Express”—a new super-state with many different languages and national identities. Ironically enough, the EU was taking shape just as an older super-state (the Soviet Union) was falling apart.

A new super-state centered in Brussels, Thatcher thought, would be as antithetical to democratic freedom and democratic accountability as the older one centered on Moscow.  In her memoirs she wrote: It would have “the same inclination toward bureaucratic rather than market solutions” . . . and it would make distant and unelected elitists the masters rather than the servants of the people.

“Ultimately,” she wrote, “there was no option but to stake out a radically different position from the direction in which most of the Community seemed to be going, to raise the flag of national sovereignty, free trade, and free enterprise—and fight.”

Here are eye-opening excerpts from a major speech she gave less than two years out of office.  At the Hague, she predicted worsening problems of:

Insecurity—because Europe’s protection will strain [relations with the U.S.] on which the security of the Continent ultimately depends.

Unemployment—because the pursuit of policies of regulation will increase costs, and price Europeans out of jobs.

National resentment—because a single currency and centralized economic policy . . . will make [people in various countries] feel angry and powerless.

Ethnic conflict—because the wealthy European countries will not be the only ones faced with waves of immigration from the south and east.

Suffice it to say that all she predicted has come to pass.

The post Leadership Lessons from Attila the Hen: Margaret Thatcher on Europe-and the United States appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

This February, Doug McMillon – the current CEO – agreed to raise the hourly wage at Wal-Mart to no less than $9 an hour in April and to $10 an hour (or 33 percent above the current federal minimum wage) in early 2016.

How is the sharply elevated internal “minimum wage” working out for the world’s largest retailer and (by a wide margin) the nation’s largest private employer?

So far, not at all well.

In announcing the company’s third-quarter results this Tuesday, McMillon acknowledged that the wage hike had been “by far the biggest driver” in causing a 13.3 percent reduction in corporate earnings over the first nine months of its current fiscal year (ending on Jan. 31, 2016). Higher wages have added $1.2 billion in annual costs in this fiscal year and will add another $1.5 billion in costs next year.

Net income at Wal-Mart hit an all-time high of $17.0 billion in calendar 2012 (fiscal 2013, ending in January 31, 2013). According to Value Line estimates, it will drop to $14.8 billion at the end of this year and to $12.6 billion next year, which would be the lowest annual earnings for Wal-Mart in a decade.

That is no big deal to critics like Robert Reich, who served as Secretary of Labor under President Clinton. Reich pointed to Walmart and McDonald’s in a petition that he launched on MoveOn.org in 2013 urging the biggest employers to increase wages so workers can finally “get a fair share in this economy.” “Your typical employee is now earning $8.25 to $8.80 an hour,” Reich wrote. “They [Walmart and McDonald’s] can easily afford to pay [workers] $15 an hour without causing layoffs or requiring price increases.”

In regarding any profit as proof that a company can afford to pay more to its workers – without doing harm to its customers – that viewpoint disregards the realities of a competitive marketplace.

For one thing, Wal-Mart competes with other public companies in striving to maximize returns to shareholders. To say that Wal-Mart has been getting hammered in this regard is something of an understatement.

Wal-Mart’s shares have lost a third of their value since the beginning of this year – falling from a high of $90 a share in January to $60 at the close of business on Nov. 17. Meanwhile, its biggest rivals have done substantially better. Costco has climbed from $140 a share to $159, and Amazon.com has more than doubled in price.

In July, Amazon passed Wal-Mart to become the most highly valued company in the retail sector and it has shot further and further ahead since then. It now has a total market capitalization of $308 billion, compared with $195 billion for Wal-Mart.

Wal-Mart lags far behind both Amazon and Costco in productivity – measured in sales per employee, with Wal-Mart at $219,000, Costco at $565,000, and Amazon at $578,000. It is clear that Wal-Mart is intent on closing the gap by slowing the growth of bricks-and-mortar stores while putting much greater emphasis on e-commerce. As McMillon put it in his presentation on Tuesday:

We will be the first to deliver a seamless shopping experience at scale. No matter how you choose to shop with us – through your mobile device, in a store or a combination – it will be fast and easy. Online retailers are testing physical store experience because they recognize the same customer desire that we do. There’s a race to do this right.

But consider the impact on total employment at Wal-Mart if the company were to close the productivity gap between itself and Amazon by 25 percent over the next three years while also achieving its stated objective of growing annual sales from about $485 billion to $530 billion or more.

In this situation, Wal-Mart would need a global workforce of 1.7 million associates, compared to the 2.2 million it has now – a loss of approximately 500,000 jobs. That would entail a loss of about 320,000 associates out of the U.S. workforce of 1.4 million associates.

While those numbers are speculative, they clearly point to the conclusion that Wal-Mart will no longer be the great job-creation machine that it was years past, which is something that self-declared champions of working class should be thinking about in agitating for higher wages. Paying higher wages has made the company more focused on achieving higher levels of productivity.

At the same time the company may water down if not abandon its historic commitment to serving less affluent shoppers with rock-bottom prices across a vast array of merchandise. The late founder Sam Walton said his dream was “to serve the under-served.” That is less of a priority today. “Globally, we know growth will come from middle- and upper-income households in years ahead,” McMillon stated at an analysts’ meeting in October.

The post Killing the Golden Goose: How Walmart’s Left-Wing Critics Destroy Job Creation appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Unfortunately, there isn’t much new in the report. As expected, the authors conflate Medicaid “coverage” and medical care, when the concepts are very different things, and they gloss over the fact that throwing more beneficiaries into the Medicaid program will actually make care delivery to the most vulnerable even more difficult.

Show-Me Daily readers may not be surprised, then, that my reaction, printed in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, was not exactly high on the report’s contents.

But opponents say such studies and data miss the mark when evaluating whether states should expand Medicaid eligibility. Patrick Ishmael, a researcher at the conservative Show-Me Institute, said the current program is “deeply broken” and that adding more people to it would be irresponsible and immoral.

Medicaid beneficiaries and Missouri taxpayers deserve a better program, not these tired talking points, and there are many reforms out there that deserve to be debated.

But that debate is not helped along by reports like this from the White House. Expansion is not reform; coverage is not care. Until the White House and Obamacare supporters in general take those facts to heart, fixing Medicaid in any sort of meaningful way will continue to be very, very difficult in the near term.

The post White House Report Is the Same Tired Medicaid Message, but Newly Packaged appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Here is a quick recap of recent events. This past year the airport enjoyed service from American Airlines, Delta, and Frontier Airlines. But American Airlines is now the only commercial airline staying in Columbia, as Delta already left the market, and Frontier exits in May.

Consulting firm Parsons Brinckerhoff will provide design services for the new terminal for $38,000. In a recent press release, Parsons Brinckerhoff hypes the new terminal and defends the need, stating that “Columbia Regional Airport has been experiencing growth and has seen an increase in the number of commercial airline service offerings.”

After reading that, I literally double-checked the date of the press release to confirm that it indeed said March, 28, 2013, and not 2012. While it is technically true that the airport has increased commercial airline service offerings, the statement leaves off the very important second half of that statement — the growth has stopped, and service offerings are much lower than they were a year ago.  It is like saying George Bush is president. It was true, at one point in time, but you are not going to find him at the White House today.

Still, city leaders seem confident with their multi-million dollar plan. The Columbia City Council decided on Monday to transfer $1.2 million away from other city projects to fund the terminal, and plan to allot another $18.7 million to the project in the 2014 Capital Improvement Plan, in hopes that the federal government will agree to contribute a large portion of the total cost.

The post Funny-But-Not-So-Funny Update On Columbia Airport appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

PPACA’s negative economic effects only compound the problems of a slow recovery in which young people in particular are hurting financially. The official unemployment rate in the United States is 8.3 percent, but for people ages 16-25, it is almost double that, at 16.5 percent. The Wall Street Journal describes the situation as “Generation Jobless,” and while college graduates have better opportunities than non-college graduates, they are still making less and saving less than if they had graduated in better economic times. There is no doubt that people of all ages are suffering, but unemployment during some of the most important wealth-building years could be disastrous when today’s young adults are ready to retire — both personally and for the country.

Unfortunately, PPACA only worsens the situation because it raises taxes. Yesterday, Americans for Tax Reform highlighted the (at least) four tax hikes contained in PPACA which hurt young people. The first two are especially troubling to me: the “excise tax,” for not buying a government-approved insurance plan; and the “medicine cabinet tax,” which prevents people from using flex accounts and Health Savings Accounts to pay for non-prescription, over-the-counter medicine. The former penalizes people for not purchasing a government-approved health insurance plan; the latter reduces choice and flexibility with one’s personal health dollars.

Young people are less likely to draw deeply on prescription medication benefits or other health care services than older and less healthy policyholders. The result? The government forces young people to pay for insurance plans that they do not need and will not use, and prevents them from taking full advantage of HSAs — health care dollars they would control and manage as part of their own personal budgets. Essentially, the government is forcing young people to subsidize the health care of others during some of their most economically fragile years.

That is bad policy and bad news for young people. PPACA may be marketed as “reform,” but it harms young people, who already are hurting economically, by raising costs and reducing choice.

The post Reminder: Health Care ‘Reform’ Law Raises Costs On Young People appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

According to an editorial in the Wall Street Journal, the government is picking winners and losers
by exempting some companies from regulation, and not others. From the editorial:

One of these effects [of the health care law] is the spectacle of employers going hat-in-hand to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for waivers from some of the law’s more onerous provisions. […]

It’s not hard to connect the dots. The Obama administration is using waivers to reward friends. On the flip side, business executives will be discouraged from contributing to the president’s opponents or from taking any other steps that might upset the White House or its political appointees at HHS.

Providing special exemptions to some is a tacit admission that the cost of providing health care under the new regulations is prohibitively high. From the perspective of overall welfare, it would be better if the the federal government enacted a policy that favored no groups over others.

Contributors to Show-Me Daily have previously discussed the negative consequences of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. In particular, the measure will will ultimately limit health care coverage because it eliminates limited-benefit health insurance plans known as “mini-meds.” Additionally, it will likely increase unemployment, particularly among those with low incomes, because it increases the cost of labor to an employer.

The post Picking Winners and Losers Using Health Care Regulation appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Can anybody hear me yeah, I guess I keep talking to myself
Feels like I’m going insane, am I the one who’s crazy?

The president recently signed the Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Act. I might favor this type of reform if the fraudulent payments it intends to target were recovered in a cost-effective manner. But is this law even needed?

Here’s a quote from the White House Blog:

Last year, improper payments by the Federal Government added up to $110 billion.

If a publicly owned corporation misplaced $110 billion dollars, it would be more than reprimanded — it would be bankrupt and out of business.

This legislation shows in unadulterated clarity the inherent flaws of government. The federal agencies responsible for this irresponsible behavior will be fined and face “penalties and other repercussions,” but I wonder who exactly the federal government thinks pays for penalties levied on federal agencies.

And people wonder why consumer confidence is low.

The post Talkin’ 2 Myself appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Credit card contracts have become increasingly complicated and ridden with hidden fees in recent years, as financial institutions have up until now had the freedom to impose such fees and rate hikes without notice or advance consent by the consumer. According to a White House press release issued in May 2009, “Every year, Americans pay around $15 billion in penalty fees.” Legislators hoped their bill would foster transparency, accountability, and responsibility on the part of banks, credit unions, and other financial institutions.

These are some of the CARD Act’s provisions, as summarized by the White House press release:

• Bans Retroactive Rate Increases: Bans rate increases on existing balances due to “any time, any reason” or “universal default” and severely restricts retroactive rate increases due to late payment.
• First Year Protection: Contract terms must be clearly spelled out and stable for the entirety of the first year. Firms may continue to offer promotional rates with new accounts or during the life of an account, but these rates must be clearly disclosed and last at least 6 months.
• Ends Late Fee Traps: Institutions will have to give card holders a reasonable time to pay the monthly bill – at least 21 calendar days from time of mailing. The act also ends late fee traps such as weekend deadlines, due dates that change each month, and deadlines that fall in the middle of the day.
• Enforces Fair Interest Calculation: Credit card companies will be required to apply excess payments to the highest interest balance first, as consumers expect them to do. The act also ends the confusing and unfair practice by which issuers use the balance in a previous month to calculate interest charges on the current month, so called “double-cycle” billing.
• Requires Opt-In to Over-Limit Fees: Consumers will find it easier to avoid over-limit fees because institutions will have to obtain a consumer’s permission to process transactions that would place the account over the limit.
• Limits Fees on Gift and Stored Value Cards: The act enhances disclosure on fees for gift and stored value cards and restricts inactivity fees unless the card has been inactive for at least 12 months.
• Plain Sight /Plain Language Disclosures: Credit card contract terms will be disclosed in language that consumers can see and understand so they can avoid unnecessary costs and manage their finances.
• Real Information about the Financial Consequences of Decisions: Issuers will be required to show the consequences to consumers of their credit decisions.

Increasing levels of consumer debt are certainly worrisome, but new legislation setting mandates for credit card companies and financial institutions will almost certainly cause problems, and could even make the status quo situation worse. As mentioned in an article on MSN Money, there is currently no cap on how high interest rates could go. And, as expected, card companies are already devising methods of circumventing the provisions of the new legislation. They are developing new products that aren’t specifically banned but that still impose the type of fees and interest rates that this legislation was intended to combat.

Reason editor Nick Gillespie pointed out in a recent article that this type of legislation stunts the development of financial instruments that could be otherwise used by responsible credit card holders, and so is not the best way to ensure that consumers obtain access to reliable credit. Gillespie points out, “No financial crisis is created by access to credit per se; it’s created by real and presumed government bailouts of bad decisions made by folks with access to credit.” As a result, this new government legislation may help to exacerbate the negative aspects of the economic climate.

There has also been discussion of the creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency that would attempt to ensure that consumers of credit cards and other financial instruments are protected from practices that the agency deems to be unfair. However, this idea also deserves scrutiny, because it would impose more costly rules and regulations, stunting growth and innovation. As Anthony Randazzo argued in another Reason article, it would most likely create conflicts between federal and state governments, among other problems.

The Federal Reserve is cracking down on an analogous issue: overdraft fees. As a part-time bank teller, I see this issue arise more often than you might expect. It is a baffling and complex issue for many account holders. In the near future, financial institutions will be required to offer customers the ability to make decisions about overdraft services and fees. What most account holders don’t realize is that they have an overdraft matrix — an amount that they are allowed to overdraw their account — based on complex factors. At the time of a transaction that will pull funds from an account, customers are not presented with the knowledge that they are about to overdraw their available funds. The purchase or ATM withdrawal simply goes through successfully, and later later entails a hefty fee. If customers are not aware that this has happened, and make a few more purchases with that account on the same day, the same sizable fee will recur — for as many times as they charge an individual transaction and overdraw the account. This can quickly add up to a significant sum of money. It is true that account holders have the responsibility to know how much money is available in their accounts and keep track of whether they will overdraw, but the new rules will require that consumers be presented with the choice either to overdraw their account and pay the associated fee — a service provided by their financial institution — or to have the transaction declined. These rules are expected to take effect in July. This ability to choose between voluntarily paying an overdraft fee and abstaining from a particular transaction will be a positive development for many.

The impulse to help consumers during the financial crisis is admirable, but the Credit Card Act and a proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency will also have hidden costs — downfalls that may not be worth the expected benefits. Some consumers of credit cards, loans, bank accounts, and other financial instruments are suffering from an economic phenomenon called “information asymmetry,” whereby relevant information is known to some but not all parties involved in market transactions. While such asymmetry applies to some degree in every market, the gap of knowledge between the producers and consumers of financial instruments has grown significantly. I suggest, however, that instead of formulating costly rules and regulations regarding fees, interest rates, and certain types of financial instruments, more attention be paid to allowing consumers to make these choices for themselves. In order for consumers to make better decisions, however, resources must be applied toward educating consumers about these instruments, and bringing greater transparency to financial institutions’ operations. When consumers feel confident that they fully understand the financial instruments they use, it may also help to stave off the urge that regulators often have to indulge their paternal instincts and attempt to protect us to the point of stifling us.

The post Is Debt in the CARDs for You? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Some districts will not show the speech at all, while others will let individual teachers decide what to do in their classrooms. A few districts intend to videotape the speech, review it, and then show it to students later if it conforms to their video guidelines. The diversity in district responses is a good sign. It means that districts are making decisions locally and aren’t just taking orders from the federal government. I think we’d see a different outcome if airing the speech were connected with “Race to the Top” money. Fortunately, it isn’t (yet).

I’d like to see more districts address the issue of how they’ll use the Department of Education’s teaching materials. Will teachers ask students how they can help the president, following the initial set of instructions? Will students brainstorm about personal goals instead? Or will students rigorously examine the president’s speech, considering arguments both for and against?

The post Districts Plan for Sept. 8 Speech appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Here’s the issue that got the story going: Sen. Gary Nodler, one of the candidates for Congress, maintained that his support for government funding of a business in his district was not an “earmark.” His position has raised the ire of certain people, including the commentators over at MOPNS. I completely understand the frustration there with the far-too-common issue of conservatives who decry government spending except when it occurs in their own districts, but I am going to come (somewhat) to Sen. Nodler’s defense.

We will get into strict definitions of pork, earmarks, etc., in a moment, but I agree with the conventional understanding, which Sen. Nodler appears to share, that an “earmark” constitutes spending that is added to a bill late in the legislative process, usually after all the committee work has been completed. Such spending usually receives little, if any, oversight or review before the money goes out the door. “Pork”, as I have generally considered it, is spending for specific projects that strictly benefit a limited group of people but are paid for by a wide group of people. So, I think it’s fair for Sen. Nodler to contend that this spending for the Joplin battery maker was not an “earmark,” because it was included during the committee debates. However, the spending is clearly “pork,” by anyone’s definition.

In my mind, earmarks and pork do not have to be the same thing. Both are usually poor policy, but not always. How do others define them? Here is the White House definition, which I basically reject outright because it totally co-opts Congress’ constitutional authority to appropriate money. As the Office of Management and Budget basically puts it, if Congress spends money the way that the White House tells it to do so, that is good. However, if it spends money outside White House authority, that is bad. Total garbage. Slate had a good piece a few years ago trying to explain the differing definitions of “pork” and “earmark.”

Citizens Against Government Waste is a terrific group. They have a definition of “pork” that includes most earmarks. To them, any government spending is “pork” if it meets two of these seven guidelines:

• Requested by only one chamber of Congress;
• Not specifically authorized;
• Not competitively awarded;
• Not requested by the President (or Governor in our case);
• Greatly exceeds the President’s budget request or the previous year’s funding;
• Not the subject of congressional hearings; or
• Serves only a local or special interest.

So, I agree with Sen. Nodler that his project was not an earmark, according to how I understood the term. Now, if he tried to say that spending $25 million for a battery factory in his district was not “pork,” that would be different, because it seems to fit at least four of the above criteria (3, 4, 6, 7, and perhaps 1). I will gladly stand corrected if anything I have said is incorrect, so Jeff City staff should be feel to clarify in the comments section.

The post Pork vs. Earmarks: What’s the Difference? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

They are contract mail carriers, a phenomenon that is starting to take
root in the Kansas City area. It has union members and politicians
squawking, but Postal Service accountants are smiling.

Because of rising costs and lower revenues at the U.S. Postal Service, the move toward private mail carriers is a great way to reduce costs, especially for a government-run service that hasn’t produced a profit in the past few years. Yet, as always, unions and politicians see a problem in saving taxpayers some money:

Sen. Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat, has introduced a bill to stop
contracting mail carriers except in the most sparsely populated rural
areas. Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat, is a co-sponsor.

The primary complaint that the politicians and unions have made is that mail carriers handle sensitive documents that should only be delivered by postal employees. Well, last time I checked, many delivery services other than the USPS handle sensitive documents, and they deliver them to their destinations on time. It’s not like the USPS delivers classified documents from CIA headquarters to the White House.

Overall, what the USPS is doing is the first smart move in ages that will facilitate cutting costs and saveing money for millions of Americans. Maybe, for once, I will receive the mail I really need on time — if it ever gets to St. Louis.

The post The U.S Postal Service is Privatizing appeared first on Show-Me Institute.