by Dan Mitchell | Jan 20, 2014 | Big Government, Blogs, States
If you’re a libertarian, you generally don’t act and think like other people. Most folks, when they heard about Governor Christie’s bridge-closing scandal, focused on the potential political ramifications. But not me. My immediate reaction was to think that the...
by Dan Mitchell | Oct 10, 2013 | Blogs, Tax Competition, Taxation
The Tax Foundation in Washington does some great work on fiscal issues, but I also admire their use of maps when they want to show how various states perform on key indicators. They’re best known for “Tax Freedom Day,” which measures how long people have to work each...
by Brian Garst | Sep 23, 2013 | Big Government, Blogs, Tax Competition, Taxation
The relationship between federal and state governments – the division of power between the two levels being known as federalism – is an integral part of the American constitutional system. Federalism uses separate and competing spheres of sovereignty to...
by Dan Mitchell | Aug 24, 2013 | Blogs, Tax Competition, Taxation
Maybe this means I’m not a nice person (notwithstanding my high score for tenderness in a recent test), but I can’t help but be happy when I read bad news about fiscal policy in high-tax welfare states. And because I’m a huge fan of tax competition, I get even happier...
by Dan Mitchell | Jul 25, 2013 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Welfare and Entitlements
Back in 2010, I put together a “Moocher Index” as a rough measure of which states had the highest levels of welfare dependency after adjusting for poverty rates. My goal was to answer this question. Is there a greater willingness to sign up for income redistribution...
