Los Angeles Rip Off
In 2008, L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa promised voters that extending the city’s Red Line subway would relieve congestion. Voters believed him and supported a sales tax increase to build the line. Now the environmental impact report finds that the subway line will increase rush-hour traffic speeds on parallel streets by, at most, 0.3 mph (p. […]
ObamaCare lawsuits: Sissel vs. HHS & Coons v. Geithner
Two free-market organizations have filed lawsuits against the health control bill (HR 3590): The Pacific Legal Foundation has filed Sissel v. United States Department of Health & Human Services. Matt Sissel writes: … because I’ll be older than 30 when the mandate kicks in, I won’t be given an option to buy low-cost, high-deductible insurance […]
Notes from Orlando
PowerPoint shows from the 2010 Preserving the American Dream conference are posted on the American Dream Coalition web site. Here are a few interesting comments made at the conference. “The U.S. Department of Transportation was created on April Fools Day, 1967. Today, it produces a product (mobility) that it doesn’t understand and doesn’t care much […]
Teacher Performance Pay Alive and Well: But Just What Will It Look Like in Jeffco?
Two days ago I commented on the big splash Denver Post story about a new study calling into question teacher performance pay. Today the Post’s big headline touts that “Jeffco schools to increase some teachers’ pay to more than $100,000″:
Top-level teachers in select Jefferson County schools could be paid more than $100,000 a year under […]
Edujobs Bailout: Another Overreach from D.C.
Education policy analyst Ben DeGrow deconstructs the $10 billion Edujobs bailout passed by Congress in August, noting that the policy not only seriously overestimated the need to curb teacher layoffs and ignored other available solutions but also discriminated against charter schools. It remains unclear exactly when and how Colorado school districts will use the funds to hire and rehire employees.
Colorado Amendment 63: doctors for or against?
Regarding Colorado Amendment 63 (health care choice), Mike Krause of the Independence Institute writes: The 7,000 plus member Colorado Medical Society (CMS) had its annual meeting last weekend, and the Affordable Care Act (H.R. 3590, aka Obama Care) was a main focus of the gathering. The CMS apparently surveyed its membership, and according to an […]
Waiting for Superman Approaches: It’s Hard Waiting for the EduFilm Phenomenon
I am so excited, I can hardly wait. Another great education movie is coming out, and this one may be the best of them all! Get a taste of Waiting for Superman by watching the trailer:
After a lot of well-deserved attention, the movie’s national premiere comes tomorrow: Friday, September 24. To mark the opening of […]
DC funds opposition to Colorado Amendment 63
The Colorado Secretary of State’s website reports that Colorado Deserves Better, the group opposing Amendment 63 received 90 percent of its $156,000 in funds from groups with addresses in Washington, DC. They include the National Education Association, the Service Employees International Union, the AFL-CIO, and the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center. The three Colorado groups in […]
What Does the Vanderbilt Study Really Say (and Not Say) about Performance Pay?
The Denver Post reports this morning (via the Washington Post) about a newly-released Vanderbilt University study on teacher performance pay:
The study, which the authors and other experts described as the first scientifically rigorous review of merit pay in the United States, measured the effect of financial incentives on teachers in Nashville public schools and found […]
Colorado insurers seek to raise premiums in response to ObamaCare
From the Denver Post: Some of the same insurers, meanwhile, have filed proposed rate increases with Colorado for individual policies, hiking premiums by up to 27 percent, regulators said. UnitedHealthcare has asked for an 8.3 percent increase in large-group plans, affecting 71,400 people; it also asked for 20.5 percent increases for 241 individuals. Aetna, in […]
Ben DeGrow Tells Family News in Focus about Edujobs Bailout Discrimination
Last week Family News in Focus talked to my Education Policy Center friend Ben DeGrow about this issue. You can listen to the brief news story with select interview clips, or read the story on Citizen Link.
Will Colorado “hammer” insurers into selling child-only policies at a loss?
Update to: CO insurers stop selling child-only policies – blame health control bill: “It’s strictly information-gathering, as far as I’m concerned — no hammers, no nails.” — State of Colorado Insurance Commissioner Marcy Morrison on her meeting with insurance companies about their decision to stop selling child-only policies because of insurance price controls. From the […]
