Before voting to spend another $23 million to expand More at Four, lawmakers should be required to read the Charlotte Observer article by Ann Doss Helms, “Does Bright Beginnings really work?” Helms shows how Bright Beginnings – which in part, served as the model for More at Four – was passed on the promise that CMS would track students throughout school. CMS has not followed through on its promise. Albeit, initial results show the program provided early educational benefits to disadvantaged children. Third grade math and reading scores reveal the gains of many disadvantaged students had shrunk considerably. The difficulties of keeping a control group together limited evidence about Bright Beginnings long term impacts. Despite the failed efforts at tracking and lack of positive evidence, the program continues to grow.
Sound familiar? More at Four has developed much the same way – and regrettably shows many of the same shortcomings. Helms notes that More at Four students are tracked only through kindergarten and also lack a viable control group. Just like Bright Beginnings, there were lots of promises from pre-school advocates but now there seems to be little proof. All the more reason to stop expanding More at Four and have it evaluated not by a UNC child development office, but by the Program and Evaluation Division of the General Assembly.
There are some new clever, but epicyclical, ways of determining whether someone is underage for drinking. For example, N.C. is considering vertical driver’s licenses for people under 21. Now that’s smart, but probably more bureaucratic and costly. So what would be the simple, copernican approach?
Let’s make everything happen at 18. Drinking age. Driving age. Voting age. Soldiering age. Currently it’s almost cliche to say that you can go to war and vote, but not drink a beer. We entrust driving priveges to 16-year-olds — some of which would be better off with provisional or learners’ licenses. The state should have a single age at which someone is considered a fully responsible agent and citizen. Why not 18? No crazy driver’s licenses. No dubious restrictions based on traffic fatality reduction rates and drunk driving concerns. Just 18. Simple. Then we could prepare our children to be responsible citizens along the way without sending them mixed signals and unprincipled notions of rights and responsibilities.
-Max Borders
The N&O is reporting that House budget writers are proposing “$1 million to help sheriffs enforce federal immigration law.”
In short, the House seems set to refund the 287(g) program. Last year’s budget, allocated $750,000 in nonrecurring funds for the program, which is now in place in several counties throughout North Carolina, with the ongoing assistance and support of the N.C. Sheriffs’ Association.
Contrary to charges made by the ACLU, the 287(g) program in North Carolina is a detention model, not a field model. This essentially means that local law enforcement are not actively investigating immigration violations, but only cooperating with ICE when they discover such violations while investigating other crimes. Insofar as sheriffs take an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, local law enforcement have both a right and a duty to take such immigration violations seriously. House budget writers should be applauded for recognizing this fact.
Commerce Department says we’re still growing.
-Max Borders
From today’s Finance Committee meeting comes approval of HB2642. The bill slightly increases the size of the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). The state tax credit will be in addition to the federal credit eligible people already receive. To be eligible, you must be below certain income thresholds, based on filing status and number of dependents.
According to Representative William Wainwright (D – Craven), the increase in the EITC will "help families make ends meet." Really?
According to analysis presented by the bill’s sponsors, this new law will increase the average recipient’s benefit by $24 – per year. That’s right, $2 a month. Those ends better be awfully close together if 2 bucks a month will make them meet. All told, the newly increased EITC will provide the average recipient with less than $7 per month – many of these recipients will be families. Seven bucks a month may get you a super-sized value meal at McDonalds – but making ends meet? Please.
Further, the maximum benefit estimated for a family of four is estimated to be $20 a month. Whoopee! Take the family to Golden Corral – kids eat free on Tuesdays!
So what will this minuscule benefit cost North Carolina taxpayers – about $70 million a year. Not one word in that committee meeting was dedicated to the thousands of jobs that could be created if that $70 million were left in the hands of entrepreneurs around the state. But who can think of creating jobs when you are an omnipotent state legislator who can "do something" to help poor people "make ends meet?" Why bother yourself with such trivial details like cost-benefit analysis when you can pat yourself on the back and convince yourself you are a good person because you "helped" people.
Even more maddening was the discussion that the EITC is needed to offset the high burden that state and local taxes and fees place on poor people. Why not just lower those taxes instead? For example, last year lawmakers extended the 1/4 cent "temporary" sales tax – a tax that will extract $258 million from consumers, and hit the poor the hardest. But allowing people to keep more of their money in the first place erodes the amount of money Raleigh politicians control, and therefore chips away at their power.
Of course, lawmakers will always opt to increase dependency on government programs rather than promoting financial independence in the private marketplace. They’ve figured out that the more folks that are dependent on you, the more votes you will get.
This is a bad piece of journalism – worst I’ve seen in a long time. Here’s some of the fuzzy math and omitted information from the cheerleaders for Charlotte’s rail system:
The average Lynx trip costs $2.70 in operating dollars, but that doesn’t include the cost of building the line. [Right, what's that TOTAL cost per passenger?] Three-quarters of the train’s $462.7 million cost came from federal and state grants [someone has to pay for that]. When CATS’ portion of the train’s capital cost is included, the per-passenger cost jumps to about $4.50. [So why not tell us the total capital cost instead of making it look like rail is cheaper than buses?]
The average bus trip is about $4.30, which doesn’t include the cost of buying the bus. The cost is rising quickly due to fuel prices. [This is the most egregious bit. 1) Compare bus ridership to Lynx ridership, first. Then, 2) compare capital costs to capital costs. Then get back to me.]
The whole section quoted above is worthless at best, misleading and mendacious at worst. It doesn’t matter if you packed that train to the gills. There will never be enough riders to make it cost effective. Never. (Update: the paper seems to justify omitting the total cost by saying that Mecklenburg residents don’t pay for it directly (i.e. the rest of N.C. and taxpayers around the U.S. do. Concentrated benefits and dispersed costs.)
-Max Borders
To those on the left who mocked my question relating the issues, I give you this press release:
Union prepared to spend more than $150 million, mobilize tens of thousands during and AFTER the election to win healthcare, big improvements for working people.
Under the plan, SEIU leaders are pledging to
spend more than $150 million and put tens of thousands of members in
motion to achieve those goals by the end of the first 100 days of a new
administration.
SEIU leaders also
pledged to continue the union’s unprecedented growth by creating a
national plan to unite more than 500,000 new members in the union by
2012. That would make SEIU the largest union in American history that
is not exclusively public sector, and ensure that it has the strength
to continue winning high standards of pay and benefits for its members
and all working people.
So, once again, tell me how expanding collective bargaining rights to public employees and SEIU’s involvement in elections aren’t related?
Apparently I struck a nerve with some on the left with my poll question on collective bargaining. Not only did Left-wing Cheerleader-in-Chief Chris Fitzsimon decry the results as "push polling", but the talking points were passed on to UNC Professor Andrew Perrin (who is basically a government-paid lobbyist for the labor unions) who accused us of the same on his blog.
Take a look at the definition of "push polling" by the polling community standards (and interestingly enough, it’s the one Perrin links to on his blog.
Basically, a "push poll" is something that is not really a poll, but calls large quantities of people (usually voters) and spreads false information in order to influence public opinion, i.e. "Would you be more or less likely to vote for John McCain if you knew that he had fathered 6 illegitimate children?"
Since we conducted an actual scientific telephone survey of a random sample of voters and published the results (that Fitzsimons likes to use when results turn out his way, btw), our poll does not fit the definition of a "push poll."
However, what our poll does do is it tests different messages, and that is perfectly legitimate. Part of the debate in the public policy arena is how issues are framed and many issues can be framed many ways. My question on collective bargaining framed the policy question in the terms of organized labor’s participation in elections. It was just another way to frame the debate on the issue of collective bargaining.
Unfortunately, Fitzsimon and Perrin are falling into the usual left-wing play book of using demonization and scare tactics to distract you from a poll result that they disagree with. It is sad that they have to resort to this to get their message across. If either would like to have a real debate on the perils of collective bargaining and the influence of big labor in our elections, I welcome it any time. (As an aside, isn’t it funny how Fitzsimon can on one had decry the influence of unregulated money in the political system and the need for clean elections, yet turn a blind eye to the millions of unregulated money spent by labor unions.)
Unbelievable.
-Max Borders
Here’s the legislation to study it. And the citizens agree, apparently. As gas prices continue to rise, let’s see if this bill ever sees the light of day.
-Max Borders