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The Warren Plan and the Prospects for Medicare for All

  By 2020, Elections, Health Care, Public Policy

I’ve been ambivalentabout the politics and policy of single-payer for a long time. That’s for three reasons First, while I by and large don’t think that a more left-wing program will hurt Democrats in the general election—just the opposite is true—there are certain ways it can hurt. The first is if we put forward plans that require tax increases on the working and middle classes. I do think that ultimately some of those tax increases will be necessary and that the benefits received in return for them will be greater than the costs of the tax increases. But it is a fundamental rule of politics that people are more agitated by what they are losing than what they are gaining. And talking about tax increases for future benefits is hard to explain and hard to defend especially because most Americans are not terribly well-informed about politics and public policy and… Continue reading

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Election Reform Enacted!

  By Elections and Voting, PA Budget and Policy Center, PBPC Blog posts

Originally published at KRC-PBPC here. Yesterday, Governor Wolf signed Act 77, historic legislation that expands the opportunity to vote in Pennsylvania. The legislation includes the following provisions: No excuse mail-in voting: The law creates a new option to vote by mail without providing an excuse, which is currently required for voters using absentee ballots. Pennsylvania joins 31 other states and the District of Columbia in instituting mail-in voting. 50-day mail-in voting period: All voters can request and submit their mail-in or absentee ballot up to 50 days before the election, which is the longest vote-by-mail period in the country. The law also allows county election officials to establish an unlimited number of satellite offices where citizens can register, pick up a mail-in ballot, and deposit their ballot. Establishing satellite offices in communities that have historically low voting rates will do much to encourage more Pennsylvanians to vote. Permanent mail-in and absentee ballot… Continue reading

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The Problem with Act 77: Eliminating Straight Ticket Voting

  By Elections and Voting, Memos, PA Budget and Policy Center

Originally published by KRC-PBPC here. To: State legislators, editorial board writers, political reporters, and interested parties From: Marc Stier, Director, Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center Re: Elimination of Straight-Ticket Voting and Related Matters Voting is the fundamental political right of all Americans. And so, election reform must mean making it easier, rather than harder, for Americans to cast their votes for every office. Sadly, there is a long legacy in this country of doing the opposite. Whether put forward by racists determined to protect white supremacy or good government “reformers” determined to weaken the political power of immigrants and the working class, American states have adopted a series of proposals—such as onerous barriers to registration, limited hours and times for voting, too-frequent purges of the voter rolls, and Voter ID laws—that, inadvertently or in many cases deliberately, have made it more difficult to vote. A package of election reforms is now under… Continue reading

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Five myths about raising the minimum wage — debunked

  By Minimum Wage, Published Op-Eds

Originally published by the PA Capital-Star on October 3, 2019. By Marc Stier While raising the minimum wage has been a conversation that continues to reverberate around the capitol, it’s clear that many legislators are apprehensive about raising the wage for the first time in over a decade. Some legislators have told advocates they don’t believe there should even be a minimum wage. But raising the minimum wage isn’t just about a few more dollars a month in the pockets of working people. It’s not a hand-out to low-wage workers. It’s part of an effort to change the rules of our economy so that working people do better, reversing the trends of the last 40 years in which a greater share of our income and wealth has gone to the very rich. Raising the minimum wage will help benefit all working people and help expand the middle class. In our advocacy… Continue reading

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Fact vs Myth on the Minimum Wage

  By Minimum Wage, Public Policy

A one-page version of this piece can be found here. Raising the minimum wage is not a hand-out to low-wage workers. It’s part of an effort to change the rules of our economy so that working people do better, reversing the trends of the last 40 years in which a greater share of our income and wealth has gone to the very rich. Raising the minimum wage will help benefit all working people and help expand the middle class. But, in our advocacy to raise the minimum wage over the past few years, we’ve heard a number of misleading, incorrect talking points over and over in response to our efforts. We wanted to address the most common of those quickly and concisely:   “The minimum wage was never meant to be a living wage. It’s primarily for young people starting out.” FALSE The minimum wage was established to ensure that… Continue reading

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PA Protects Against Insurance Losses Caused by Trump

  By PA Budget and Policy Center, PBPC Blog posts

Originally published by KRC-PBPC here. A census bureau report released on Tuesday shows that 1.9 million more Americans were uninsured in 2018 than in 2017, with the rate of those uninsured rising from 7.9% to 8.5%. However, in Pennsylvania the rate is unchanged at 5.5%, and the best estimate we have is that only 7,000 fewer people have health insurance in the state (and even that difference might just be a result of sampling error). We have better results in Pennsylvania than nationwide as a result of the aggressive steps taken by the Wolf administration to expand access to health insurance in the state. Health insurance rates are dropping nationwide because of a relentless attack by the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans on the Affordable Care Act. At the outset of his administration, Trump issued an executive order calling on federal agencies to waive and delay ACA provisions ‘to the maximum extent… Continue reading

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Some Steps Forward Amid Major Disappointments: Pennsylvania’s Enacted Budget 2019-2020

  By Policy reports

Originally published by KRC-PBPC here. By Diana Polson and Marc Stier Pennsylvania enacted a $33.997 billion budget on June 28, 2019. And for the second year in a row, the budget was in place by the June deadline. This year, unlike his first few years in office, Governor Wolf did not seek major spending initiatives and ask for new broad-based revenues. And that made it easier to reach agreement with the Republican-controlled General Assembly. Indeed, it was the members of his own Democratic Party who expressed the most dissatisfaction with the final budget, largely because it did not include the increase in the minimum wage he requested and eliminated the General Assistance program he proposed to fund after it was restored by the Courts last year. We share the disappointment about these two parts of the budget and also regret that the state’s current politics doesn’t allow our government to… Continue reading

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Will There Be a Child Care Benefit Cliff if We Raise the Minimum Wage?

  By Childcare, Minimum Wage, PA Budget and Policy Center, Policy reports

Published by KRC-PBPC here. Introduction Raising the minimum wage is one of the most important steps that Pennsylvania can take to fix a political economy that has been tilted against working people for decades. Two bills before the General Assembly, HB1215 and SB12, propose increasing the minimum wage to $12 per hour on July 1, 2019, and increasing the wage in 50-cent increments until it reaches $15 per hour in 2025. Raising the minimum wage to $15 would ultimately lift wages for two million Pennsylvanians, not only those who make the minimum wage now or who would after an increase, but also many whose wages would be pushed higher when the floor on wages is raised. Raising the minimum wage would also help local economies and the economy of the state as a whole by giving working people the capacity to buy more goods and services. Every state around Pennsylvania… Continue reading

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Please No Entry Level Politicians

  By Politics

The most foolish idea in politics: an utterly inexperienced person can be effective in high office because he or she can hire “talented, experienced people to guide them.” Here’s the problem: There are always “talented, experienced” people willing to give advice. But (1) half of them aren’t really all that talented and their experience comes from working with and following others who are genuinely talented and experienced. And (2) all those folks disagree in the advice they give. So if you are going to be president or some other high level position you better have some capacity to choose between different advisors and the advice they give. And you can’t do that if you don’t, yourself, have sufficient talent and experience in poiltics. And you need both. The examples are legion, starting with the current occumpant of the White House. But they are all around us and include two of… Continue reading

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Increased Income from a Minimum Wage Increase is Greater, and in most cases, Far Greater Than the Loss in Benefits and New Taxes Paid

  By PA Budget and Policy Center, Press release

Originally published by KRC-PBPC here. By Marc Stier and Diana Polson HARRISBURG—As Pennsylvania seriously considers raising the minimum wage for the first time in over a decade (and as the U.S. House prepares to vote on a bill to increase the minimum wage federally), concerns have been raised that workers receiving a higher wage also will face a “benefits cliff.” A benefits cliff occurs when individuals get a wage increase but the social benefits they lose and the taxes they pay increase more than their additional earnings, resulting in an overall reduction in a family’s standard of living. The Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center today released two policy briefs examining the effects of a minimum wage increase to $15/hr in Pennsylvania. One brief examines a wage increase when compared to any cuts in benefits from programs/tax breaks like the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), the Child Tax Credit (CTC), the… Continue reading