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Build a Brighter PA

  By American Rescue Plan, COVID-19, We The People–PA

Thanks to the American Rescue Plan providing grants to all Pennsylvanians, additional funds to Pennsylvania families with children through the child tax credit and higher subsidies for health insurance, we have seen a faster economic recovery than we might have imagined a year ago. And the Infrastructure Bill will help keep the recovery growing by creating 80,000 jobs each year by funding massive new investments in roads, bridges, and public transit, as well as the in the clean energy we need to limit climate change.  But while the federal government has done its part, the state government has not. The economic recovery of thestate lags behind that of other states. Our unemployment rate is well above the national average. And there are many needs that the state could and should be meeting with ARP funds. And many people are still suffering from both the hangover of the pandemic recession and the recent… Continue reading

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Use ARP Funds to Help With High Gas Prices

  By Economic Development, Inflation, PA Budget and Policy Center, PA Economy, Policy briefs

Pennsylvania’s families and economy are currently dealing with rising prices that are the result of the supply chain issues created by an unexpectedly quick economic recovery and the rise in gas prices created by Russia’s war on Ukraine. As we have shown, the state will have an accumulated surplus of $10.2 billion at the end of the current fiscal year. It’s time to use that money to deal with the current difficulties Pennsylvanians are facing—including the rise in gas prices—which in turn threaten to slow our economic recovery. Republicans in Harrisburg have recently called for cutting Pennsylvania’s gas tax to soften the blow of higher gas prices. But a temporary cut in the gas tax is the wrong policy for four reasons. First, when gas taxes go down, wealthy oil companies don’t reduce prices at the pump at the same rate, if at all. Instead, oil companies take their time… Continue reading

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Pennsylvania’s Financial Outlook Just Got Better Again—It’s Time to Help Pennsylvania Families

  By Budget, PA Budget and Policy Center, PA Economy, PBPC Blog posts, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Budget

Pennsylvania’s financial outlook for 2022/23 just got better. In March 2022, state revenues came in higher than expected as they have in nearly every month this fiscal year. Several months ago, we calculated that the state would have an estimated surplus of $10.7 billion at the end of 2021/22. Our revised estimate, after the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue’s March report, is that Pennsylvania will have a surplus of between $11.2 billion and $12 billion by the end of June 2022. Fiscal year collections to date for 2021-22 total $2.7 billion, or 8.5% above estimates. If in the last quarter of this fiscal year, revenues come in according to the estimates of last June, the state budget surplus will be $2.7 billion greater than projected at the start of the fiscal year. If, however, revenues continue to come in at the rate of 8.5% above projections (and April is a big… Continue reading

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The Big Lie Is the Problem, Not Nonprofit Funding of PA Elections

  By Elections and Voting, PBPC Blog posts, Voting

Senate Bill 982, introduced by Senators Baker and Phillips-Hill, looks like an innocuous bill to ban “third-party funding” of our elections—that is the grants that nonpartisan, nonprofit groups give county election officials to help run our elections. But in fact, it is a hypocritical attempt to carry out the Republican agenda of supporting the Big Lie about the 2020 election and making voting more difficult in our state. Start with the hypocrisy: the Republican Party is the party of privatization. They want to privatize our schools by giving corporations tax breaks to support private schools. They want to hollow out our public schools by creating charter schools funded by private enterprises. When we criticize those proposals on the grounds that private funding is not accountable to the public and does not flow equally to all children, they scoff. They are also the party that pushed to use private-public partnerships to… Continue reading

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It’s Time to Reinstate the Philadelphia Wealth Tax

  By PA Budget and Policy Center, Philadelphia, Philadelphia Budget, Philadelphia Taxes, Policy reports, Wealth Tax

Wealth inequality in America, in Pennsylvania, and in our region has been growing strikingly since the late 1970s. And wealth inequality continues to increase during the pandemic. The dramatic rise in wealth inequality threatens economic growth, reduces the tax revenues needed to fund vital public institutions, and undermines our democracy. To counter wealth inequality and to raise the revenue needed to fund programs that support the well-being of working people in our city, we call for the reinstitution of a wealth tax of 4 mill or .4% of the value of intangible wealth in Philadelphia. We estimate that this tax would raise more than $200 million per year in revenues for the city, which would provide the funds necessary to create and / or expand programs that would enable us to break down the barriers of class, race, and gender that stand in the way of opportunity for so many… Continue reading

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It’s Time to Help People, Not Oil Companies

  By Energy, Inflation, PA Budget and Policy Center

Pennsylvania’s families and economy are currently being stressed by a rise in prices that’s the result of an unexpectedly quick economic recovery and the supply chain issues it created, the gas price spike created by Russia’s war on the Ukraine, and the determination on the part of multi-national corporations to take advantage of these conditions to maximize their profits. As we have shown elsewhere, the state will have an accumulated surplus of $10.2 billion at the end of the current fiscal year. The Republican-controlled General Assembly has left much ARP money unspent and added far more of it than necessary to the General Fund to balance the budget. It’s time to use that money to deal with the current difficulties faced by Pennsylvania families—including the rise in gas prices—which in turn threaten to slow our economic recovery. Continue reading

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On Cultivated Ignorance

  By Philosophy

When I was 15 I decided life was too short to follow both basketball and hockey. (And I never understood what Icing the puck meant anyway.) That was the start of a life-long devotion to ignoring many of the thinkgs people today care about. I ignore much of the news everyday, starting with the sports pages–except for the NBA–then the gossip page (also known as arts and culture), then the financial pages, and even much of the political pages. On philosophy and politics, I read books and academic journals and journals of opinion and specialized reports. I read enough of the daily press to do my work and to follow the couple of sports I really enjoy, especially basketball. Even there, I pay a lot more attention to specialized on-line sports journals than the daily press. (Sports writers in the daily press are the worst of journalists, imo.) I pay… Continue reading

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STATEMENT: Celebrating the 12th Anniversary of the ACA

  By ACA, Health Care, PA Budget and Policy Center, Statements

Tomorrow, March 23, 2022, is the 12th anniversary of the enactment of the Affordable Care Act. This is a day worth celebrating because of the enormous advances it made in enabling Americans, including almost a million Pennsylvanians, to secure quality, affordable health insurance.   In just twelve years, the ACA has succeeded in cutting the number of uninsured Pennsylvanians in half. The percentage of Pennsylvanians under 65 who are uninsured has declined from 11.9% in 2010 to 6.6% in 2017. The decline has been particularly striking for Black Pennsylvanians between 18 and 64 for whom the percentage of uninsured has declined from 24% in 2010 to 11.4% in 2017 and Hispanic Pennsylvanians, for whom the rate has declined from 32.2% in 2010 to 18% in 2017. The rates at which Pennsylvanians were uninsured increased by a few tenths of a percentage point after 2017 due to Trump administration restrictions on the… Continue reading

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Every kid deserves a chance; Republicans don’t agree

  By Education, K-12 Education in PA, Public Policy, Published op-eds

Originally published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on February 25, 2022 Before he became the great liberator, Sen. Thaddeus Stevens was, as state Representative, the author of the first Pennsylvania legislation to provide public funds to ensure that all children, no matter how rich or poor, could secure a good education. Stevens’ support for universal education grew out of the same fundamental commitment to equality that animated his opposition to slavery. Stevens, like Abraham Lincoln, believed that America must give everyone the opportunity to use their talents and abilities, to the best of their ability. Slavery blocked this opportunity, and so he opposed it. Lack of access to education blocked opportunity for every child of the working class, and so he supported universal education. Sadly, Republicans no longer seem to support that ideal. Four years ago, the Republican Chair of the Senate Education Committee, John Eichelberger, said that “inner city” education… Continue reading