If you wanted something done in your community, would it ever occur to you to send a check to Washington, D.C., so the federal bureaucracy could take a cut before sending back the rest?
A private nonprofit environmental group knows that the free market is the most effective tool for protecting the environment. This is a wonderful success story of voluntary cooperation instead of government coercion.
Ironically, taxpayers' cherished deductions and loopholes stand in the way of meaningful tax reform. There is a fairer system that would still provide adequate government revenue.
Two new laws take effect in April 1995 that will help Michigan's 1.7 million school children and their parents. Will schools take advantage of the newly created freedoms and opportunities?
The prison business is booming in Michigan-fifteen percent of the General Fund. Can taxpayers afford the bills that mount from business as usual? Michigan can save hundreds of millions of dollars by trying what other states are already doing.
Michigan's turbocharged economy is a result of courageous government streamlining and downsizing. If the federal government is serious about "reinventing," it should follow Michigan's blueprint.
In a stunning retreat from free-market principles, Governor Engler asks Michigan to join the bandwagon of states in which government picks the industrial winners and losers. The MEGA plan will not work, and may have unintended negative consequences.
New technology makes it possible to ticket speeders with cameras, radar, and computers-and no cops. Should it be allowed? There are many pros and cons.
Why do more Americans believe in UFOs than have faith in Social Security? Can the system be rescued? Other nations have saved their systems with free-market reforms.
When government forces others to do its bidding without providing the money to pay for it, it is called a mandate. Politicians and bureaucrats try to wriggle out of the responsibility with carefully crafted code phrases. This glossary of "governmentese" will entertain and enlighten.
Welfare programs are one of the most unpopular of government activities. Though Michigan has made progress over the past four years, the real challenge lies ahead: making assistance to the needy a private initiative instead of a government responsibility.
Proposed core curriculum from Lansing is more of the same fuzzy thinking that has produced declining achievement scores and increasing functional illiteracy in the schools.
Economic progress means enhancing opportunities, promoting capital formation, insisting on fairness in taxation, and keeping good people who create jobs here in Michigan. The onerous intangibles tax works against all these things and should be abolished.
Labor reform that brings Michigan law up-to-date is not something to be feared. Giving workers freedom of choice in union membership would be a plus for the Michigan economy.
What financially hobbles our schools is not a lack of money, but a lack of money management. Contracting with the private sector offers a promising solution.
A burgeoning national movement to assert state sovereignty promises to mushroom into a crisis for the federal government if it refuses to live within its constitutional boundaries. Unfunded mandates are at the core of the controversy surrounding interpretations of the 10th Amendment.
Public Act 362 of 1993 authorized charter schools and did not violate the Michigan Constitution. Charter schools are a creative way to make changes within public schools. However, luring private schools into the public domain with tax dollars is a danger.
Advance disposal fees are taxes imposed on containers at either the distributor or the retail level and are likely to add more burdens than they relieve. Managing the waste stream effectively requires a reliance upon markets, not new taxes that make little economic sense.
Our state constitution would be improved if it incorporated provisions to restrict the state's ability to dictate terms of private contracts, protect and enhance educational freedom, and limit regulatory "takings" of private property.
Though certain initiatives are needed to clarify the law and ensure enforcement, the 1978 Headlee Amendment to the Michigan Constitution has worked reasonably well in limiting the growth of government.
