Financial Services Archives - Page 4 of 8 - Progressive Policy Institute

PPI Launches Center for Funding America’s Future

Posted on February 12, 2018 by The Progressive Policy Institute

WASHINGTON – The Progressive Policy Institute today announced the launch of a new Center for Funding America’s Future that will promote a fiscally responsible public investment agenda.

This launch comes at a pivotal moment in the federal budget debate. In under two months, Donald Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress have enacted policies that grow federal budget deficits by several trillion dollars throughout the next decade. The administration’s latest budget proposal, meanwhile, offers few ideas to tackle the soaring deficit aside from gutting critical investments in our nation’s intellectual, human, and physical capital.

The PPI Center for Funding America’s Future will offer sensible center-left alternatives to this reckless agenda that foster robust and inclusive economic growth. The Center’s work will include publishing research reports, providing timely commentary on policy debates, and organizing a series of public engagement events around the country.

“The United States now faces trillion-dollar deficits every year as far as the eye can see, which threaten to undermine public support and funding for important investments in the long-term health of our economy,” said Will Marshall, President of the Progressive Policy Institute. “The events of the past week make clear that the work of PPI’s new Center on Funding America’s Future is needed now more than ever.”

The Center will be led by Ben Ritz, who will provide PPI with expert analysis of government spending and tax policies. Ritz previously staffed the Bipartisan Policy Center’s Commission on Retirement Security and Personal Savings, where he helped develop the commission’s comprehensive proposals to reform Social Security and retirement-related tax expenditures, and served as Legislative Outreach Director for the budget-focused Concord Coalition. Ritz has also provided communications and research assistance to several victorious Democratic political campaigns in the Trump era.

“Democrats have a unique opportunity to present themselves as the responsible stewards of government,” said Ritz. “But in order to do so, they need to stand firm against Republican profligacy and offer a credible alternative. I am excited to help PPI’s Center on Funding America’s Future make the case for a fiscally responsible public investment agenda to policymakers and their constituents alike.”

Don’t Help GOP Budget Busters

Posted on February 8, 2018September 18, 2024 by The Progressive Policy Institute

The Republican Party, led by self-proclaimed “King of Debt” Donald Trump, is embracing fiscal profligacy on an epic scale. First, the Trump Republicans broke their promise of “revenue-neutral tax reform” and instead rammed through a bill that will grow deficits by at least $1.5 trillion last December. Now they’ve struck a deal with Senate Democrats that, combined with the tax bill, would add more than $3 trillion to the deficit over the next decade. It’s a one-two gut punch to fiscal responsibility.

It’s regrettable that Senate Democrats have made themselves complicit in the Republican raid on the U.S. Treasury. Yes, this deal would avoid a federal shutdown, which is a good thing. But the pricetag is simply too steep. We support funding disaster relief, health care programs and other critical public investments, and we support adequate defense spending as well. But we’re against unnecessary borrowing to pay for it, which represents an abdication of Congress’s core Constitutional responsibility: paying for government without passing the bill to the next generation.

From the Brownback debacle in Kansas to the tax bill and this latest budget deal, Republicans are proving to be the most reckless and incompetent managers of public finances. All their fiscal posturing and brinksmanship during the Obama years stands exposed as rank hypocrisy. But Democrats can’t effectively make that case to voters if they join in a bipartisan conspiracy against fiscal discipline in Washington.

It would be one thing if this budget deal merely repealed the sequester, which was never meant to take effect and has hamstrung important investments in both defense and domestic initiatives. The Senate budget deal, however, would raise spending above the original levels agreed to by both parties in the Budget Control Act of 2011. It would also cut taxes for corporations by an additional $17 billion and repeal important cost-control measures imposed by the Affordable Care Act – all without paying for them.

If policymakers are going to abandon the BCA, they need to replace it with another plan for controlling America’s massive public debt. The Senate deal places America on the fast track to trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see. That’s the opposite of the fiscal policy our country needs today. When the economy is expanding, we should be unwinding the debt, not using the threat of a government shutdown to make it worse. Otherwise, young Americans will face higher tax and debt payment burdens, and the federal government will have little “fiscal reserve” to tap the next time the economy goes into recession.

Happy Holidays from PPI

Posted on December 19, 2017September 18, 2024 by The Progressive Policy Institute

It’s been a surreal political year, but PPI has much to celebrate this holiday season. Throughout 2017, we expanded our productive capacity and the scope of our political and media outreach significantly. For example, PPI organized 150 meetings with prominent elected officials; visited 10 state capitals and 10 foreign capitals, published an influential book and more than 40 original research papers, and hosted nearly 30 private salon dinners on a variety of topical issues.

Best of all, we saw PPI’s research, analysis, and innovative ideas breaking through the political static and changing the way people think about some critical issues, including how to revive U.S. economic dynamism, spread innovation and jobs to people and places left behind by economic growth, and modernize the ways we prepare young people for work and citizenship.

Let me give you some highlights:

This fall, David Osborne’s new book, Reinventing America’s Schools, was published on the 25th anniversary of the nation’s first charter school in Minnesota. David, who heads PPI’s Reinventing America’s Schools project, documents the emergence of a new “21^st Century” model for organizing and modernizing our public school system around the principles of school autonomy, accountability, choice, and diversity. David is just winding up a remarkable 20-city book tour that drew wide attention from education, political, and civic leaders, as well as the media. Because David is a great storyteller, as well as analyst, it’s a highly readable book that offers a cogent picture of a K-12 school system geared to the demands of the knowledge economy. It makes a great holiday gift!

Dr. Michael Mandel’s pioneering research on e-commerce and job creation also upended conventional wisdom and caught the attention of top economic commentators. Dr. Mandel, PPI’s chief economic strategist, found that online commerce has actually created more jobs in retail than it destroys, and that these new jobs (many in fulfillment centers in outlying areas) pay considerably better than traditional ones. His research buttresses the main premise of PPI’s progressive pro-growth agenda: that spreading digital innovation to the physical economy will create new jobs and businesses, raise labor productivity, and reduce inequality.

PPI challenged the dubious panacea of “free college” and proposed a progressive alternative – a robust system of post-secondary learning and credentials for the roughly 70 percent of young Americans who don’t get college degrees. PPI Senior Fellow Harry Holzer developed a creative menu of ways to create more “hybrid learning” opportunities combining work-based and classroom instruction. And PPI Senior Fellow Anne Kim highlighted the inequity of current government policies that subsidize college-bound youth (e.g., Pell Grants), but provide no help for people earning credentials certifying skills that employers value.

Building on last year’s opening of a PPI office in Brussels, we expanded our overseas work considerably in 2017. In January, I endeavored to explain the outcome of the U.S. election to shell-shocked audiences in London, Brussels, and Berlin. In April, we led our annual Congressional senior staff delegation to Paris, Brussels, and Berlin to engage European policymakers on the French presidential election and other U.S-E.U. issues, including international taxation, competition policy, and trade. PPI also took its message of data-driven innovation and growth to Australia, Brazil, Japan and a number of other countries.

Other 2017 highlights included a strategy retreat in February with two dozen top elected leaders to explore ideas for a new, radically pragmatic agenda for progressives; a Washington conference with our longtime friend Janet Napolitano (now President of the University of California system) on how to update and preserve NAFTA; public forums in Washington on pricing carbon, infrastructure, tax reform, and other pressing issues; creative policy reports on varied subjects; and a robust output of articles, op-eds, blogs, and social media activity.

I’m also happy to report many terrific additions to PPI in 2017. Rob Keast joined to manage our external relations and new policy development; Paul Bledsoe assumed a new role as Strategic Adviser as well as guiding our work on energy and climate policy; and Emily Langhorne joined as Education Policy Analyst. We will also be adding a fiscal project next year.

All this leaves us poised for a high-impact year in 2018. In this midterm-election year, our top priority will be crafting and building support for a new progressive platform — a radically pragmatic alternative to the political tribalism throttling America’s progress. That starts with new and better ideas for solving peoples’ problems that look forward, not backward, and that speak to their hopes and aspirations, not their anger and mistrust.

It’s a tall order, and we cannot succeed without your help and support. Thanks for all you have done over past years, and we look forward to working with you in 2018.

Happy holidays and New Year!

Flashback Friday: PPI in Hindsight

Posted on March 31, 2017September 18, 2024 by The Progressive Policy Institute

Just over a year ago, PPI unveiled a big ideas blueprint with a prescient subtitle: Unleashing Innovation and Growth: A Progressive Alternative to Populism. We knew that progressives in the United States and Europe needed better answers to the economic and cultural grievances that have fueled the rise of a retrograde populism and nationalism around the world. We did not foresee that Democrats would fail to offer a forward-looking plan for jobs and shared growth, opening the door to Donald Trump’s improbable victory.

Which makes the themes and ideas in PPI’s sweeping policy blueprint more important than ever. Populism today thrives in the political vacuum left by center-left parties that offer no clear vision for reviving economic dynamism and hope. “Winning the economic argument will be essential to victory in the 2016 elections and it starts by getting the diagnosis right,” the blueprint noted. Instead, Democrats ran a campaign that leaned heavily on identity politics, wealth redistribution and centralized, small-bore solutions.

Unleashing argued that America (and Europe) are stuck in a slow-growth trap that holds down wages and living standards. And it offered bold prescriptions for building on America’s competitive advantage in technology and entrepreneurship to spread innovation – now concentrated in a vibrant digital sector — to the nation’s physical economy, which continues to suffer from low productivity. In addition, the document proposed creative ways to modernize the nation’s economic infrastructure, improve the regulatory environment for innovation, build middle class wealth and empower poor Americans to work, save and chart their own course to social mobility and inclusion.

Crucially, the blueprint also urged progressives to reject anger and victimhood and offer voters a confident account for how America can build a new, inclusive prosperity:

What America needs is a forward-looking plan to unleash innovation, stimulate productive investment, groom the world’s most talented workers, and put our economy back on a high-growth path, It’s time to banish fear and pessimism and trust instead in the liberal and individualist values and enterprising culture that have always made America great.

That was the road not taken in 2016. Now it’s the road to political relevance and success for progressives here and elsewhere.

The Hill: Universal Pensions: A Progressive Alternative to Retirement

Posted on May 25, 2016 by The Progressive Policy Institute

In the midst of the chaos of this election cycle, some important themes are emerging. In particular, voters are highly worried about retirement security. Indeed, 91 percent of voters in four swing states agree that most Americans are not prepared for retirement. That’s according to a poll by the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), in partnership with veteran Democratic pollster Peter Brodntiz.

That’s why it’s time for a Universal Pension system that would help all U.S. workers save for retirement by eliminating the need to navigate the maze of tax-favored retirement plans, and making their job-based pensions portable. Specifically, the UP would reduce today’s welter of tax-favored retirement accounts into one universal IRA account (with a choice between a traditional or Roth-style IRA).

The accounts would be managed by private firms, under the supervision of the individual rather than the employer, giving workers more control over their investment choices. Furthermore, when workers switch jobs, they can rollover their existing 401(k) or other company pension plans into their Universal Pension reducing paperwork burdens and financial fees for both employers and employees.

And by helping all workers start saving for retirement from their very first day of work, the Universal Pension would harness the power of compound interest for everyone. It would help to close a yawning wealth gap at a time when wealth inequality is roughly 10 times wider than income inequality.

Continue reading at The Hill.

Slate: One Reason Tax Returns Are So Complicated? Because H&R Block and Other Preparers Like It That Way

Posted on April 18, 2016 by The Progressive Policy Institute

Slate columnist Helaine Olen references a PPI report in this article on the complexity and cost of filing taxes.

“According to the Progressive Policy Institute, the average recipient of the earned income tax credit loses about $400 of his or her refunds to the preparers who helped complete and submit his or her taxes. For some, that’s almost 25 percent of what they received back from the federal government.”

Read the article in its entirety at Slate.

The Atlantic: How the Tax-Prep Industry Takes Advantage of Low-Income Filers

Posted on April 14, 2016 by The Progressive Policy Institute

The Atlantic’s Gillian B. White wrote about the PPI’s recent report on the exploitation of low income workers by tax preparation services.

The Earned Income Tax Credit program has become one of the largest national anti-poverty programs in the country, distributing about $67 billion to around 28 million low-income workers and their families. By that measure, it may seem the EITC, implemented in 1975, is a success. But a recent study from Johns Hopkins finds that the dubious practices of some tax preparers mean that many families are losing a sizeable chunk of their annual credit to tax professionals who, aware of how much money was in play, didn’t hesitate to charge qualifying families excessive amounts for help filing.”

Continue the article at The Atlantic.

The Hub: Income tax preparation chains target low-income filers, study suggests

Posted on April 14, 2016 by The Progressive Policy Institute

A PPI Report by senior fellow Paul Weinstein is discussed in this article for Johns Hopkins University’s magazine.

National tax preparation chains continue to exploit the working poor, many of whom spend a significant portion of a key federal anti-poverty tax credit just to pay for filing their taxes, a new study concludes.

These large tax preparation companies tend to cluster their offices in low-income neighborhoods, according to the study, co-authored by Paul Weinstein, director of Johns Hopkins University’s Graduate Program in Public Management. ZIP codes with the highest level of taxpayers eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit have about 75 percent more tax preparers per filer than neighborhoods with a more modest share of people eligible for the credit, researchers found.”

Read the rest of the piece at The Hub.

Unleashing Innovation and Growth: A Progressive Alternative to Populism

Posted on March 15, 2016 by The Progressive Policy Institute

As Americans choose a new president in 2016, populist anger dominates the campaign. To hear Donald Trump or Senator Bernie Sanders tell it, America is either a global doormat or a sham democracy controlled by the “one percent.” These dark narratives are caricatures, but they do stem from a real dilemma: America is stuck in a slow- growth trap that holds down wages and living standards. How to break this long spell of economic stagnation is the central question in this election.

Today’s populists peddle nostalgia for our country’s past industrial glory but offer few practical ideas for building a new American prosperity in today’s global knowledge economy. Progressives owe U.S. voters a hopeful alternative to populist outrage and the false panaceas of nativism, protectionism, and democratic socialism. What America needs is a forward-looking plan to unleash innovation, stimulate productive investment, groom the world’s most talented workers, and put our economy back on a high-growth path. It’s time to banish fear and pessimism and trust instead in the liberal and individualist values and enterprising culture that have always made America great.

Download Unleashing Innovation and Growth: A Progressive Alternative to Populism

The Wall Street Journal: Marshall on Anger with Wall Street

Posted on January 11, 2016 by The Progressive Policy Institute

In his analysis of how the two parties still do not agree what caused the 2008 financial crisis, Nick Timiraos of The Wall Street Journal quotes PPI president Will Marshall:

Anger at Wall Street among primary voters in both parties illustrates how “extreme antibusiness populism on the left is intersecting with extreme antigovernment populism on the right,” said Will Marshall, president of the Progressive Policy Institute, a centrist Democratic think tank.

Read the article in its entirety at The Wall Street Journal.

Marshall on Appointments of Wall Street Veterans

Posted on November 16, 2015 by The Progressive Policy Institute

To The Wall Street Journal‘s Nick Timiraos, PPI President Will Marshall defended the use of Wall Street appointees to high-level presidential administrative positions:

Some Democrats have faulted that approach. ‘The idea that you have to excommunicate anybody who ever worked in the financial sector is ridiculous,’ said Will Marshall, president of the Progressive Policy Institute, a centrist Democratic think tank. ‘We need people who oversee the Federal Reserve system and have high posts at Treasury that have expertise in finance.'”

Read the article in it’s entirety at The Wall Street Journal.

Agenda 2016: Reviving U.S. Economic Growth

Posted on November 13, 2015September 18, 2024 by The Progressive Policy Institute

The Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) teamed up with Columbia University’s Richard Paul Richman Center for Business, Law, and Public Policy to co-host a compelling symposium Nov. 6-7 in New York on revitalizing the U.S. economy. The event featured a distinguished roster of Richman Center economists and scholars, as well as PPI analysts and special guests, and more than two-dozen top policy aides to Members of Congress, Governors, and Mayors.

Held on Columbia’s Manhattan campus, the symposium examined the U.S. economy’s recent performance, as well as the causes of the long-term decline of productivity and economic growth. Against the backdrop of the 2016 election debate, the participants grappled with specific ideas for unleashing more economic innovation, modernizing infrastructure, reforming taxes, improving regulation, expanding trade and reducing inequality by ensuring that all children have access to high-quality public schools.

The discussions, which were off-the-record to encourage maximum candor, featured the following speakers and topics:

An overview of the U.S. economy’s recent performance by Abby Joseph Cohen, President of the Global Markets Institute and Senior Investment Strategist at Goldman Sachs.

A roundtable on key elements of a high-growth strategy, led by Michael Mandel, Chief Economic Strategist at PPI, Andrew Stern, former head of the Service Employees International Union and now Ronald O. Perelman Senior Fellow at the Richman Center, and Philip K. Howard, Founder of Common Good, a nonpartisan reform coalition. The conversation touched on ways to improve the regulatory environment for innovation, including reducing regulatory accumulation and requiring faster permitting for big infrastructure projects, as well as a lively debate on the future of work in a tech-driven knowledge economy.

An insightful macroeconomic analysis of why productivity and economic growth have slowed, by Pierre Yared, Associate Professor at the Columbia Business School and Co-director of the Richman Center. Yared highlighted three potential contributors to the slowdown: labor demographics and participation; “capital intensity” or business investment; and the “production efficiency” of U.S. companies.

A detailed examination of the impact of energy innovation—from the shale boom to renewables and the construction of a new, “smart” grid—on jobs and economic growth. Leading this segment were Jason Bordoff, formerly energy advisor to President Obama and Director of Columbia’s Center on Global Energy Policy, and Derrick Freeman, Director of PPI’s Energy Innovation Project.

A dinner conversation at the Columbia Club with Edmund Phelps, the 2006 Nobel Laureate in Economics and Director of Columbia’s Center on Capitalism and Society at Columbia University. Drawing on his recent book, Mass Flourishing: How Grassroots Innovation Created Jobs, Challenge and Change, he stressed the importance of indigenous innovation in creating the conditions for broad upward mobility. He also emphasized the crucial role of “modern” or individualistic cultural values in sustaining the mass innovation and entrepreneurship America needs to flourish again.

A detailed look at business taxation and reform as a potential driver of economic growth. It featured Michael Graetz, Alumni Professor of Tax Law at Columbia Law School, David Schizer, Dean Emeritus and the Harvey R. Miller Professor of Law and Economics at the Columbia Law School and Co-director at the Richman Center, as well as PPI’s Michael Mandel. The discussion ranged widely over global tax frictions, including the OECD’s new “BEPS” project; the need for corporate tax reform; “patent boxes” and mounting U.S. interest in consumption taxes.

A roundtable on trade and productivity growth with Ed Gerwin, PPI Senior Fellow for Trade and Global Opportunity and the versatile Michael Mandel. Noting President Obama’s controversial call for a Trans-Pacific Partnership, Gerwin stressed the agreement’s potential for “democratizing” trade by making it easier for U.S. small businesses to connect with customers abroad. Mandel underscored another PPI priority: raising awareness among policymakers of the growing contribution of cross-border data flows to growth here and abroad, and the need to push back against proposals that would impede “digital trade”

A luncheon presentation on “financial regulation after the crisis” by Jeffrey Gordon, Richard Paul Richman Professor of Law at Columbia Law School and Co-director of the Richman Center. Gordon described the new regime put in place by Dodd-Frank and other rules to guard against “systemic risk” of another financial meltdown, and suggested its “perimeter” may been to be expanded beyond banks.

The symposium’s final panel featured a vigorous discussion on K-12 education reform and the economy. The discussants were Jonah Rockoff, Associate Professor at the Columbia Business School and David Osborne, who directs PPI’s Reinventing America’s Schools Project, and is a co-author of the seminal “Reinventing Government.” Rockoff highlighted research showing that the returns to school improvement are enormous, and recommended reforms that could increase school quality. Osborne traced the evolution of school governance in America, and offered detailed looks at new models emerging in cities like New Orleans and Washington, D.C., both of which are leaders in the public charter school movement.

The symposium gave the policy professionals who participated a rare opportunity to delve deeply into complicated economic realities, guided by presenters of extraordinarily high caliber. The conversations were highly illuminating and will inform PPI’s work on Agenda 2016—a new blueprint for reviving U.S. economic dynamism and opportunity.

How the Ex-Im Bank Serves Main Street

Posted on October 26, 2015September 18, 2024 by The Progressive Policy Institute

On real Main Streets across America, from Idaho to California to Maine, the Ex-Im Bank supports U.S. jobs.

On Main Streets across America, small businesses are a critical source of economic growth and good jobs. Over the past two decades, entrepreneurs and small firms have generated an astounding 65 percent of America’s net new jobs. Small businesses that export drive even greater growth.

According to shipping firm UPS, small firms engaged in global trade are 20 percent more productive and produce 20 percent greater job growth when compared to non-exporters. And because only about 4 percent of U.S. small businesses export, boosting small business trade can pay huge dividends for local communities and the overall American economy.

U.S. Export-Import Bank plays a key role in helping American small businesses seize export opportunities in foreign markets. Over the past four years, it has completed over 12,000 financing transactions for small firms—supporting nearly $50 billion in small business exports and well over 100,000 small business jobs—and has hosted over 75 small business export forums in communities nationwide. In 2014, 90 percent of the Ex-Im Bank’s transactions benefitted small businesses.

Despite this, critics like House Financial Services Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) have suggested that gutting the Ex-Im Bank would somehow be a victory for the “Main Street competitive economy.”

In real “Main Street” communities across America, however, small businesses and workers that have benefitted from Ex-Im Bank financing support would certainly disagree. Indeed, more than a few of the small firms that the Ex-Im Bank has supported in recent years are actually located on “Main Streets” across America. Here are just a few examples:

FHC Inc., a producer of neurosurgical products located on Main Street in Bowdoin, Maine.
Integrated Industrial Systems Inc., a manufacturer of metal rolling mills, located on Main Street in Yalesville, Connecticut.
Jason Mills, LLC, a knit textile producer, on South Main Street in Milltown, New Jersey.
Halcyon Manufacturing Inc., a diving gear manufacturer located on South Main Street in High Springs, Florida.
Val-Co Pax Inc., a producer of equipment for poultry and pig operators, on East Main Street in Coldwater, Ohio.
Diamond Power International, Inc., a firm specializing in boiler cleaning and ash handling technologies, located on East Main Street in Lancaster, Ohio.
Estron Chemicals, Inc., a specialty chemical and coatings producer located on North Main Street in Calvert City, Kentucky.
SSD Control Technology Inc., a maker of fence production equipment, on South Main Street in South Bend, Indiana.
Midwest Ag Enterprises, Inc., a feed exporter located on West Main Street in Marshall, Minnesota.
Roll-A-Ramp, a producer of portable access ramps, on Main Avenue West in West Fargo, North Dakota.
Wenger Manufacturing Inc., a producer of extrusion systems for the food and farm sectors, located on Main Street in Sabetha, Kansas.
River Valley Manufacturing, Inc., a farm equipment producer located on East Main Street in Burley, Idaho.

The Ex-Im Bank provides these and many other local companies with the real-world help they need to grow, support their communities, and create good jobs by selling globally. For instance, Ex-Im Bank loan guarantees enable NOW International, a small producer of dietary supplements in Bloomingdale, Illinois and Sparks, Nevada, to gain financial backing from local lenders for exports that directly support 35 jobs at the company.

And the benefits of Ex-Im support for larger companies like Boeing also flow to the thousands of U.S. suppliers and workers that participate in large company supply chains, including businesses that line the “Main Streets” of communities throughout America.

There are, no doubt, scores of government programs that need to be replaced or reformed. But the Ex-Im Bank isn’t one of them. Rather, the Ex-Im Bank is an efficient and prudent institution that drives exports and economic growth and supports good American jobs, all while actually making a $2 billion profit for the U.S. Treasury over the past five years. If that’s not a model for good governance, what is?

Main Street America is already increasingly frustrated with Washington. Let’s not fuel the fire by eliminating worthwhile programs that directly address Main Street’s real needs.

This piece was originally published in Republic 3.0.

Kim for The Hill, “Giving tax cuts to the companies that deserve them”

issue: Financial Services