In his 2012 book, “Coming Apart,” the social scientist Charles Murray discusses an increasing economic and moral divide among Americans.
Decades ago, Murray argues, the typical American was more likely to regularly interact with people from a different social class. People were more likely to marry across classes, attend churches with those of different backgrounds and participate in civic programs together. But today, Americans are increasingly stratified across social classes and distinctly different groupings on issues like religiosity, work ethic, education, family structure and more.
An op-ed published in the Detroit Free Press that is co-authored by a Mackinac Center analyst highlights the need for civil asset forfeiture reform in Michigan.
Michigan is one of the few states in the country that not only allows law enforcement to seize property from people who have not been charged with a crime, but requires the owner to pay between $250 and $5,000 to try to get it back. Such is the focus of the op-ed written by Mackinac Center Policy Analyst Jarrett Skorup and Nick Sibilla, a communications associate at the Institute for Justice.
By Jack McHugh
Senate Bill 564, Criminalize selling aborted fetuses or body parts: Passed 26 to 10 in the Senate
To make it a crime to receive a financial benefit or any type of compensation for transferring or selling an embryo, fetus or neonate, including organs, tissues or cells, if this was obtained as the result of an elective abortion.
By Ben DeGrow
On the surface, DeWitt Public Schools just north of Lansing and Edwardsburg Public Schools on the Indiana border look very similar. They each serve about 3,000 students in predominantly white communities with poverty rates at or below the state average, though DeWitt’s median income level and rate of college-educated residents are noticeably higher.
The path to improving student performance isn’t as simple as spending more on education, according to a new study by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.
The study — authored by Mackinac’s Education Policy Director Ben DeGrow and Edward C. Hoang, a professor of economics at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs — found no correlation between increased spending and student achievement. These findings suggest that how schools spend money may be more important than how much schools spend.
A May 10 election in West Virginia could leave the state’s new right-to-work law in peril. On that day, voters will decide whether to re-elect Republican Justice Brent Benjamin to the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals, or replace him, possibly with union-supported Darrell McGraw.
This op-ed was originally published in Tulsa World on April 27, 2016.
Raising the state tax on cigarettes by $1.50 per pack would result in a 700 percent increase in cigarette smuggling into Oklahoma, among other consequences.
Cigarettes are a legal product. Those who use cigarettes are usually those who strongly prefer them. The high taxes imposed on cigarettes in various states create profit opportunities for those willing to buy them in low-tax states and ship them to high-tax states for resale. Thus, the product is attractive to lawbreakers.
Costs at Michigan’s state universities have increased substantially over the past 10 years, so much so that returning tuition rates to what they were a decade ago would cost $2.8 billion, according to two analysts at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.
By Jack McHugh
Senate Bill 637, Expand grass seed seller regulations: Passed 37 to 0 in the Senate
To revise details of a law that imposes a testing and labeling mandate on grass seed sellers. The bill would require cool season lawn and turf seed and mixtures to include a "sell by" date, and ban selling them if a state-mandated germination test was more than 15 months earlier. The bill would also require a larger font size be used on a required warning label.
For years my colleagues and I have charted the rise and fall of Michigan’s economic fortunes using a number of different metrics. We did so because we care deeply about the well-being of Michigan citizens — and by extension — the whole Great Lake State.
Ridesharing companies face a number of difficulties in Michigan. Municipalities regulate taxis and the state regulates limousines, but Uber and Lyft don’t fall into either category. The legal gray area they occupy has made it difficult for drivers to operate in places like Ann Arbor, as described in a recent article.
Last month the Michigan Senate passed a plan for Detroit Public Schools that gives the district a $700 million-plus bailout while establishing a commission with the power to shut down schools, including independent charter schools.
The Detroit Education Commission has long been pushed by labor unions and school administrators who dislike competition from outside charter schools, which both parents and Stanford University's Center for Research on Education Outcomes believe do a better job educating students.
When a Wisconsin judge struck down the state’s right-to-work law April 8, he relied on the false argument that giving employees the ability to work without the fear of being fired for not belonging to a union creates a “free-rider” problem.
As the Mackinac Center’s Director of Labor Policy F. Vincent Vernuccio explained in an op-ed published in both the National Review and The Washington Times, the real issue is that even in right-to-work states, those who work in unionized shops have no choice but to do so under terms negotiated by unions. Unions have long lobbied for the monopoly they have on representing all workers, even those who opt not to belong, and now accuse them of being “free riders.”
Uber and Lyft have provided excellent transportation alternatives to countless Michiganders in metro Detroit and Ann Arbor for the past few years, and Uber has since expanded to Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Lansing, East Lansing and Flint. But both companies operate in a legal gray area, and unclear regulations have caused headaches for passengers and drivers in some cities.
Mackinac Center for Public Policy’s Education Policy Director Ben DeGrow corrected the myth that charter schools do not serve students with great learning disabilities.
In a letter published in the Detroit Free Press and USA Today, DeGrow explained that Columnist Rochelle Riley was mistaken when she made the claim in one of her columns. Because charter schools are public, they may not refuse students selectively.
Michigan taxpayers spend $33 million each year marketing the state through the Pure Michigan ad campaign. New findings from the Mackinac Center find that money is largely wasted.
The ineffectiveness of the Pure Michigan promotional program is the focus of an op-ed in The Detroit News by Mackinac Center scholar Michael Hicks and Michael LaFaive, director of the Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative. The piece was published as the Pure Michigan Governor’s Conference on Tourism convened in Lansing, and suggested lawmakers end the subsidy.
By Jack McHugh
The following is a quote from Pope Francis’ recent “apostolic exhortation” on the subject of “Love in the Family:”
At the same time I feel it important to reiterate that the overall education of children is a “most serious duty” and at the same time a “primary right” of parents. This is not just a task or a burden, but an essential and inalienable right that parents are called to defend and of which no one may claim to deprive them. The State offers educational programmes in a subsidiary way, supporting the parents in their indeclinable role; parents themselves enjoy the right to choose freely the kind of education – accessible and of good quality – which they wish to give their children in accordance with their convictions. Schools do not replace parents, but complement them. (Emphasis added.)
By Jack McHugh
Senate Bill 818, Exempt yoga instruction schools from licensure mandate: Passed 35 to 0 in the Senate
To exempt yoga teacher training schools from a state licensure mandate imposed on private trade-schools, with annual fees, government inspections, regulations and more. A Senate Fiscal Agency analysis notes that many take the classes just for the experience, and "the regulations reportedly have created a business environment that deters...offering or expanding instruction programs."
Michigan lawmakers voted 20 years ago to close the state employee pension system to new members. A new study by Anthony Randazzo and Truong Bui of the Reason Foundation looked at Michigan’s experience to see whether this reform helped the state. They found that the state saved itself from racking up hundreds of millions more in additional unfunded liabilities. But their study also has other major lessons for Michigan as it considers further pension reforms.
Background
Previous articles in this series have documented the secrecy surrounding what have been called “budget justification” reports purchased through no-bid contracts by the Michigan Economic Development Corporation from a company called Longwoods International. (See “Pure Michigan Puffery” Parts I and II as well as “Puffery or Proof?”) Longwoods produces very similar products for agencies in at least eight other states, claiming high returns from taxpayer-funded tourism ads.
By Ben DeGrow
It doesn’t take much to trigger one education official’s strong instinct to constrain parental choice, a reaction not justified by the evidence. State Board of Education President John Austin misused a study on Michigan’s Schools of Choice program to try and make the case for curtailing parents’ ability to find a school that best fit their children’s needs.
By Jack McHugh
The House and Senate are on a two-week spring break. Therefore, this report contains several recently introduced bills of interest.
Senate Bill 512: Mandate schools teach sexual activity rules/etiquette
Introduced by Sen. Curtis Hertel, Jr. (D), to require public school sex education classes to teach this:
“…That in order for consent to be given by both parties to sexual activity it must be affirmative consent and that ‘affirmative consent’ means affirmative, conscious, and voluntary agreement to engage in sexual activity; that it is the responsibility of each individual involved in the sexual activity to ensure that he or she has the affirmative consent of the other to engage in the sexual activity; that lack of protest or resistance does not mean consent and that silence does not mean consent; that affirmative consent must be ongoing throughout a sexual activity and can be revoked at any time; and that the existence of a dating relationship between the persons involved, or the fact of past sexual relations between them, should never by itself be assumed to be an indicator of consent.” Referred to committee, no further action at this time.
There is a vast turnover in jobs in Michigan’s economy — more than one out of 20 are added and lost every three months. This means that there’s always someone being left behind during an economic recovery and there’s always someone finding new opportunities in a recession. Yet, the overall direction of the economy still matters and things are going well in Michigan.
By Kahryn Riley
The U.S. will face a shortage of 46,000 to 90,000 physicians by 2025, according to a report issued by the Association of American Medical Colleges. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services notes that the population of Americans age 65 and older will double between 2013 and 2040, swelling to 98 million. Older patients face complex health issues that require more frequent and intensive forms of treatment.
By Kahryn Riley
Michigan faces a widespread shortage of primary health care providers, and state rules on midlevel health care providers have held up a valuable solution to this problem. Nurse practitioners and physician assistants offer competent care in more locations and at a lower cost than physicians, but these professionals are limited by protectionist restrictions known as “scope of practice” rules. Policymakers should loosen these restrictions to make health care services easier to obtain and afford.
