Category: Economic Development

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The real path to economic prosperity

  By Economic Development, Economic Justice, Public Policy, Published Op-Eds

Originally published in the Bradford Era, May 27, 2018 In the aftermath of the Trump-GOP tax cut enacted at the end of the last year, some legislators and advocates are calling for Pennsylvania to also cut tax rates for both individuals and corporations in the hopes of spurring economic growth and job creation. It is hard to think of a worse idea for our political community, not only because it is unfair, but because it has been tried and failed again and again. Pennsylvania has one of the most unequal tax systems in the country. Low-income Pennsylvanians pay 12 percent of their income in state and local taxes while middle-income Pennsylvanians pay 10 percent. But those with incomes in the top 5 percent pay only 6.8 percent of their income taxes while the top 1 percent pay only 4.2 percent. With a tax system this unfair, why should we emulate… Continue reading

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Tax cuts for wealthy won’t bring prosperity to PA

  By Economic Development, Economic Justice, Pennsylvania, Public Policy

Originally published in Public Opinion, March 21, 2018 In the aftermath of the Trump-GOP tax cut enacted at the end of the last year, some legislators and advocates are calling for Pennsylvania to also cut tax rates for both individuals and corporations in the hopes of spurring economic growth and job creation.   It is hard to think of a worse idea for our political community, not only because it is unfair, but because it has been tried and failed again and again.   Pennsylvania has one of the most unequal tax systems in the country. Low-income Pennsylvanians pay 12% of their income in state and local taxes while middle-income Pennsylvanians pay 10%. But those with incomes in the top 5% pay only 6.8% of their income taxes while the top 1% pay only 4.2%. With a tax system this unfair, why should we emulate a federal tax cut that mostly reduces taxes for those at the top?   It wouldn’t be because cutting taxes for the rich… Continue reading

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Public Investment and Economic Growth: Even the Commonwealth Foundation Gets It (Sometimes)

  By Economic Development, Severance Tax, Taxation

A strange post a few days ago by Elizabeth Stelle of The Commonwealth Foundation seeks to undermine the case for a severance tax on natural gas drilling, but inadvertently explains exactly why we need new recurring revenues in the state. Stelle first repeats once again — without evidence — the same tired argument that natural gas drillers “pay more in taxes and regulatory costs than producers in competing states.” Not once has anyone at the Commonwealth Foundation quantified those regulatory costs or attempted to respond to a series of papers put out by PBPC, including this most recent one, that show that natural gas drillers are not paying much, if anything, in corporate income taxes to Pennsylvania and are paying far less in taxes (and fees) here than in other states. The second part of Stelle’s post then points out that there is a large backlog in Department of Envioornmental Protection… Continue reading

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The Origins of our Politico-Economic Crisis

  By Economic Development, Politics, Public Policy

This is a summer of liberal / progressive discontent. As one talks to activists and leaders of progressive organizations and campaigns around the country, and read the blogs and commentary, one can't help but notice a sense of disappointment and worry and, from time to time, even despair. Some of this worry is about the election. This is not going to be a great Democratic year, although I think that the Republican crack-up—the willingness of Republican party leaders to embrace a partly racist radical right wing tea party—is going to help a great deal. And it is not going to be 1994 all over again if only because we don't have all that many Southern seats to lose this time. I think the bigger source of progressive disquiet is our worries about the economy and trajectory for progressive politics over the next few years. Right now, we progressives are radically… Continue reading

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Fear of deficits haunts our politics

  By Economic Development, Politics

Published in the Philadelphia Dailiy News, June 21, 2010 A SPECTER is haunting American politics – it’s the great and growing fear of budget deficits. In Washington, public policies critical to restoring the health of our economy are being delayed because of the deficit. Outside Washington, politicians and opinion leaders, and some citizens, are wringing their hands about our deficits. Some of these opinion leaders, with foundation backing, are holding a series of public town halls about the deficit, including one in Philadelphia on June 26. We need to stop and think seriously about the kind of problem the deficit presents and how we should deal with it before we let hysteria lead us down the wrong path. We need to stop and think, first, about the difference between the immediate and the long-term budget deficit. Right now, our economy is recovering slowly from the most serious recession since the… Continue reading

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An Alternative To The Decoupling Strategy

  By Economic Development, Social Justice

I’m not going to respond Hughes’ vision in any detail here as it would take a small book. Everything I’ve written on city politics and policy in the last four years—which amounts to s small book–is a response. I’m just going to sum up those arguments. (I’ll put in links from this summary essay to the essays where I discuss ideas in detail as I rebuild this blog.) Continue reading

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Mark Alan Hughes, The Decoupling Strategy, and The Nutter Administration

  By Economic Development, Philadelphia, Social Justice

I have had really high hopes for Michael Nutter as Mayor since the primary in May 2007. But along with those hopes, I’ve had a nagging worry since October 2007. That’s when Mark Alan Hughes, who once served as a policy advisor to the Nutter campaign and is now the sustainability director, published two deeply disturbing columns about his vision for the future of the city. You can read them here and here. At the time he published those columns Hughes did not work for Michael Nutter. And I had heard Nutter speak enough during the campaign to feel confident that the then future Mayor did not share the ideas found in those columns. But, in the last few weeks, I’ve started to worry that maybe what Hughes wrote reflects the policy of this administration. I’ll explain why in a moment. First I have to present Hughes’s vision for the… Continue reading

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A Regional Tax swap?

  By Economic Development, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Taxation

One of the major problems with politics in Philadelphia is that it is focused just on Philadelphia. However many of the most important problems we face are regional in nature. Our public transit system is clearly a regional problem. So is economic development and job growth. It is not just Philadelphia but the whole region that has been growing slowly. And many environmental problems, especially the loss of open land, are regional as well. Continue reading

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Community Based Economic Development Strategies II

  By Economic Development, Philadelphia, Social Justice, Taxation

In the first post in this series I argued that we need an economic development strategy that no only creates middle and upper incomes jobs for educated workers but that leads to a rebirth of troubled communities. In this post I want to point out some of the key differences between what I will call a community based economic development strategy and a tax cutting economic development strategy. Continue reading

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Community Based Economic Development Strategies I

  By Economic Development, Philadelphia, Social Justice, Taxation

I have been writing here, and talking on the campaign trail, about developing a “community based economic development strategy.” I want to explain in a little detail what I mean by that phrase and why it is different from, though perhaps partly complementary to, other strategies for economic growth, such as the tax cutting strategy. Continue reading