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| published Wednesday, August 15, 2007 |
35326 Views
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With the total cost of the Iraq war and occupation now approaching half a trillion dollars ($456 billion and counting), Idaho taxpayers’ share of that cost is now more than $1.2 billion and rising. This report reveals what the $1.2 billion in our state could provide for families and communities if that money were invested instead in priorities in Idaho that have long been neglected.
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| published Tuesday, July 31, 2007 |
23958 Views
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Paul Krugman's column in the New York Times on July 30, 2007 notes that "When a child is enrolled in the State Children's Health Insurance Program (Schip), the positive results can be dramatic. But President Bush has declared that he'll veto any Schip expansion on "philosophical" grounds.
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| published Tuesday, July 31, 2007 |
30398 Views
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Since about 1980, the federal government has adopted a tortoise's pace
in increasing the minimum wage, and increases in the minimum wage have
failed to keep pace either with inflation or with growth in average
wages. However, there is a hare — rather hares — in this race too, with
interesting lessons emerging.
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| published Tuesday, July 31, 2007 |
30449 Views
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Families all over the US have an additional reason to celebrate July 24 this year and for the next two years. This is the day we will finally see a long-delayed increase in the minimum wage. Our grandparents’ generation first enacted this moral principle in 1938 to reflect the basic American value that an honest day’s work deserves an honest day’s pay.
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| published Wednesday, June 06, 2007 |
36022 Views
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Betsy Russell with the Spokesman Review has written one of the best articles to date on the decision by Governor Otter to cut the popular and effective Families as Teachers program. This is well worth reading. It exposes a weakness in one of the dominant political perspectives in Idaho: that all programs we fund are inherently suspect and that it is easier to just take it away rather than work out the bureaucratic or jurisdictional challenges. Another related dominant perspective is that all tax breaks for the most powerful interests are inherently good regardless if they impair the state's ability to invest in strengthening families.
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| published Tuesday, April 03, 2007 |
44564 Views
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As the session ended on March 30, a lot was left out, the victim of the spat between the governor and the legislative leaders of his own party...
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| published Friday, March 30, 2007 |
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With little on the House or Senate calendars and little will to compromise, nothing was done on the grocery tax or closed primaries or the effort to shut the revolving door on legislator-lobbyists. Rhetoric and symbols won out over substance. Lots of new legislators promised to come back and finish things—not knowing that once the momentum is gone it may take years before certain ideas get revisited.
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Idaho's Structural Deficit | |
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| published Friday, March 30, 2007 |
30679 Views
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| published Friday, March 30, 2007 |
37356 Views
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offers some striking advantages as an alternative to taking the sales tax off food.
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| published Wednesday, March 28, 2007 |
40720 Views
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The veto of the grocery tax credit bill on Tuesday pretty well knocked the wheels off of plans to adjourn on Friday. On Monday and Tuesday each House was dealing with 30 and 40 bills a day. By Wednesday that had slowed to a crawl. Lots of time was spent in caucusing, meeting with the Governor, taking field trips to the City Club, waiting… Decisions may be being made all around us but no one seems to know what they are.
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