issue: Politics

Kane for Medium: “Health care debate heats up in Iowa”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Last week PPI returned to Des Moines for a second “Conversation with Iowans,” this time about progressive alternatives to nationalized health care. The ideas forum featured former Colorado Gov. and presidential aspirant John Hickenlooper, Theresa Greenfield, a Des Moines business owner, PPI President Will Marshall and yours truly.

A strong turnout and often impassioned debate underscored that health care — the fear of losing it or not being able to afford it — is still a burning issue for Americans, just as it was during last year’s midterm election. Many participants told gut wrenching personal stories about their maddening interactions with our complex and costly health delivery system. One woman, for example, relayed how her Type 1 diabetes diagnosis had led to multiple hospital stays, medical debt, and anxiety every month over covering her insulin costs.

 

Read the full piece on Medium by clicking here.

The Australian App Economy: 2019 Update

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Apple introduced the first iPhone in 2007 just as the Global Recession was about to begin. While central bankers and national leaders struggled with a deep financial crisis and stagnation, the fervent demand for iPhones and the wave of smartphones that followed provided a rare force for growth.

The smartphone also triggered a new era for job creation around the world. Apple opened the App Store in 2008, followed by Android Market (now Google Play) and other app stores. This unexpected “side-effect” of the smartphone quickly took on a life of its own, creating a whole new class of iOS and Android developers who were writing mobile applications that could run on smartphones anywhere. 

It’s not an exaggeration to speak of a global App Economy, with an army of app developers writing mobile applications for billions of users. For businesses, apps have become the essential front door for their customers, providing access to everything from shopping to customer service to banking services to entertainment to information to essential health knowledge. 

What’s more, the App Economy still has room to grow. Internet of Things (IoT) mobile connections are estimated to reach 4.1 billion by 2024, increasing at an annual growth rate of 27 percent.2 Consumers and businesses are increasingly interfacing with physical objects and processes through their smartphones and tablets via the IoT. Companies and individuals are utilizing apps to control everyday items and processes such as smart homes, e-commerce shopping, manufacturing analytics, smart. This report updates our 2017 paper, “The Rise of the Australian App Economy”.

[gview file=”https://www.progressivepolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/PPI_AustraliaAppEconomy_V4-1.pdf” title=”PPI_AustraliaAppEconomy_V4 (1)”]

New Ideas for a Do Something Congress No. 7: Winning the Global Race on Electric Cars

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

On Donald Trump’s watch, America is losing what is probably the most important new manufacturing opportunity in the world–the global race to produce affordable electric vehicles that people want to drive. The United States currently accounts for just 20 percent of global electric vehicle production, far behind China.

Jumpstarting U.S. production and purchase of Electric Vehicles (EVs) would produce an unprecedented set of benefits, including cleaner air and a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions; a resurgence of the U.S. auto industry and American manufacturing; the creation of millions of new, good, middle class manufacturing jobs; lower consumer costs for owning and operating vehicles; and the elimination of U.S. dependence on foreign oil. U.S. automakers are already moving toward EVs, but the pace of this transition is lagging behind our foreign competitors. A dramatic expansion of tax credits for EV purchases could go a long way toward boosting the U.S. EV industry as part of a broader agenda to promote the evolution of the transportation industry away from carbon-intensive fuels.

 

THE CHALLENGE: THE US ELECTRIC VEHICLE INDUSTRY IS FALLING BEHIND ITS GLOBAL COMPETITORS

Leading experts predict (1) that electric vehicles will be the key to global auto industry growth over the next years and decade—from about 1.1 million EVs last year to 30 million by 2030. Ominously, however, China is already dominating (2) the emerging EV market, with about 40 percent of global production, and plans to expand even more rapidly over the next few years. The United States, on the other hand, currently produces only about 20 percent of the world’s EVs and is moving too slowly on the EV transition.

Electric vehicles account for just 0.3 percent of the total U.S. fleet

U.S. EV production is small – fewer than 200,000 were manufactured (3) here last year, accounting for less than 0.3 percent of the total U.S. fleet. Production is also not growing nearly fast enough. Out of the roughly 350 million vehicles on the road today, a little more than 1 million are electric.

Electric vehicles are too pricey for most consumers or are not offered in models consumers want

Most Americans cannot afford more expensive EVs—like the high-end Tesla models—that have dominated (4) the market so far. For example, two of the top three selling models in 2017 cost well over $80,000 a vehicle. The second selling model, the more affordable Chevy Bolt (still more than $36,000), sold only about 25,000 units in 2017. And the EVs that are affordable are not available in the models—especially SUVs, minivans and light trucks—that most consumers prefer, and that provide higher profit margins for automakers. As a consequence, fewer than 2 percent of the more than 17.3 million new American car purchases in 2017 were of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles or battery-electric vehicles.

 

THE GOAL: MAKE AMERICA THE GLOBAL LEADER IN EV MANUFACTURING, PRODUCTION, AND DEPLOYMENT

The aim of America’s EV policy should be to quickly gain by far the largest part of the global EV market penetration by reaching the mass market of average domestic and international consumers of high volume models. Doing this can rapidly help lower consumer costs, cut emissions, end oil imports, reduce pollution, and prompt a resurgence of domestic auto manufacturing. Specifically, the United States should set a goal of producing more than 50 percent of the global EV production—or 15 million vehicles a year–by 2030.

Fifteen years ago, the U.S. allowed Chinese subsidies to displace U.S manufacturers and dominate the global race for solar panel manufacturing—and today China owns more than (5) 60 percent of the global market. America cannot allow that to happen with EVs, which under any scenario will be an essential part of the next generation of global clean energy technology and auto manufacturing.

Electric Vehicles at scale will bring America remarkable, one of a kind benefits. For instance, EVs can dramatically reduce air pollution, which is among the leading causes of lung disease, lower life expectancy and asthma among Americans. Transitioning to EVs will also reduce America’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions—transportation. EVs have less than half the GHG emissions of gasoline-powered cars, and are getting even cleaner every year (6). An average U.S. EV today has greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to a gasoline car getting 80 MPG (7). EVs will only get higher gasoline equivalent mileage over time.

At the same time, EVs will save U.S. consumers money because of much lower fuel and vehicle operating costs (8). The total cost of owning and operating an EV is already cheaper than oil-fueled cars (9). The U.S. average price per gallon of gasoline is $2.50 while it costs less than half that–$1.10 per eGallon–to charge an electric car, according to the U.S. Department of Energy (10).

Finally, widescale deployment of EVs will also help end America’s reliance on imported oil. Today, the US imports about 20 percent of its oil, including from non-Democratic petro-states like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela.

Gaining American global leadership in one of the world’s the fastest growing major manufacturing sectors will provide the United States a huge economic boost and create an export market for U.S. EVs around the world. Boosting the American EV industry will also bring ancillary benefits to the nation’s overall efforts for a clean-energy transition. For example, large scale EV deployment will enable the creation of a huge distributed network of electricity storage units—that is, car batteries themselves plugged into the electricity grid, especially at night. This network will allow greater electricity storage at scale that in turn will allow major electric grids around the country to integrate higher percentages of clean solar and wind energy. In essence, electrifying transport will therefore help reduce emissions from both the transport and electricity sectors, the two highest emitters in the U.S. economy.

 

THE SOLUTION: DRAMATICALLY EXPAND AND IMPROVE TAX CREDITS FOR CONSUMER PURCHASES OF ELECTRIC VEHICLES

There is no doubt America has the capacity to lead the EV revolution. America has unrivaled technical expertise, a skilled work force, and innovative entrepreneurs and investors (11). But current half-hearted U.S. tax policies on EVs are not coming anywhere near immediately seizing this massive opportunity as other countries threaten to pull so far ahead that we cannot catch up.

One powerful way to speed the revolution is through more robust tax incentives that can boost the pace of technological evolution of U.S. companies and adoption of EVs by the transportation sector as a whole.

For example, existing federal tax credits are not nearly enough to drive the change and scale of EVs that are needed to gain full benefits. The current federal tax credit system, while well intended, has so far been ineffective. It offers $7,500 for the purchase of any all-electric vehicle, but caps the credit at 200,000 vehicles per manufacture, with rapidly reduced credit amounts after that threshold. Several Members of Congress have proposed (12) extending the existing $7,500 credit with no cap per manufacturer, but do not propose changing the overall structure of the credit. These changes are highly unlikely to drive large rapid electrification of the US fleet.

What Congress should do instead is provide American consumers with much more generous tax credits for the purchase of more affordable EV models that Americans actually want and can afford, including minivans, SUVs, and light trucks.

In particular, Congress should provide a consumer tax credit that is the more generous for cheaper vehicles than for expensive ones, thereby encouraging the sale of more affordable electric vehicles. For instance, this credit could be structured on a graduated scale as follows: $7,500 for vehicles priced under $35,000; $5,000 for those under $50,000; $2,500 for those under $75,000; $1,500 under $100,000.

Opinion polls find that nearly three quarters of consumers say a tax credit would affect their decision to buy an EV, and 63 percent say a credit is an important measure to support EV adoption. However, the tax credit must be applicable to cars Americans want to buy to achieve volume and scale (13).

In addition to the graduated tax credit described above, Congress should also provide an extra consumer tax incentives for “trading-in” low mileage “gas guzzlers” for the purchase of an EV to quickly turn over fleet and eliminate the most inefficient, polluting vehicles. Moreover, Congress should provide manufacturer tax credits within each class of vehicle, including SUVs, minivans and light trucks, to drive rapid production and demand for popular models. Finally, to encourage rapid growth and large-scale production, the manufacturer tax credit should become greater for production over a certain high total threshold of vehicles produced.

The tax credits described above can go a long way toward speeding the nation’s transition to EVs while boosting U.S. EV leadership. Nevertheless, these tax credits cannot be effective if offered alone. Rather, they must be offered in concert with a robust, comprehensive agenda to accelerate electric vehicle adoption.

Crucially, the federal government and the states will need to invest in public and private incentives for building out a network of electric charging stations through much needed infrastructure modernizing legislation. Congress should also require that the federal government purchase US-made EVs for most purposes (and other alternative vehicles like Compressed Natural Gas or Fuel Cells as needed for other uses like buses and heavy-duty trucks);

The federal government could also raise Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFÉ) standards for an added push toward EVs. And in order to gain the full reductions in air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, Congress will need to make sure that the electricity sector relies on increasingly clean energy sources.

America cannot afford to lose the EV race, the most important manufacturing opportunity of our time. By creating a comprehensive program to jumpstart the production and purchase of the electric cars and trucks Americans want and can afford, Congress can help the nation take a dramatic, yet pragmatic, step forward toward growing the economy, cutting oil use and consumer costs, improving air quality and combatting climate change.

ENDNOTES

1) “Electric Vehicle Outlook 2018 | Bloomberg New Energy Finance.” Bloomberg NEF. https://about.bnef.com/electric-vehicle-outlook/.

2) Niu, Isabelle. “Your next Car Could Be Electric-and Chinese.” Quartz. November 15, 2018.

3) Kane, Mark. “US All-Electric Car Sales Charted: November 2018.” Inside EVs. December 30, 2018.

4) “Top-selling Electric Cars in the United States 2017 | Statistic.” Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/257966/best-selling-electric-cars-in-the-united-states/.

5) Beinhart, Larry. “Why China, and Not the US, Is the Leader in Solar Power.” Al Jazeera. August 22, 2018.
6) Nealer, Rachael, David Reichmuth, and Don Anair. “Cleaner cars from cradle to grave: How electric cars beat gasoline cars on lifetime global warming emissions.” Union of concerned scientists report (2015).

7) Reichmuth, David. “New Data Show Electric Vehicles Continue to Get Cleaner.” Union of Concerned Scientists (blog), March 8, 2018. https://blog.ucsusa.org/dave-reichmuth/new-data-show-electric-vehicles-continue-to-get-cleaner.

8) Richardson, Jake. “Electric Vehicles Reduce Toxic Air Pollution – Pollution That Hurts & Kills Humans.” CleanTechnica. May 12, 2018.

9) “Electric Vehicles Have Lowest Total Cost Of Ownership, Study Finds.” CleanTechnica. February 05, 2018.

10) “EGallon: Compare the Costs of Driving with Electricity.” Energy.gov. February 9, 2019. https://www.energy.gov/maps/egallon.

11) Kljaic, Vanja. “U.S. Electric Car Battery Production Is Lacking, Says Expert.” Inside EVs. October 7, 2018. https://insideevs.com/us-electric-battery-production-lack/.

12) U.S. Senate. Jeff Merkley. “MERKLEY, HEINRICH, CORTEZ MASTO INTRODUCE LEGISLATION TO EXTEND ELECTRIC VEHICLE TAX CREDIT FOR 10 YEARS.” News release, September 17, 2018. U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon. https://www.merkley.senate.gov/news/press-releases/merkley-heinrich-cortez-masto-introduce-legislation-to-extend-electric-vehicle-tax-credit-for-10-years.

13) “EV Statistics of the Week: Range, Price and Battery Size of Currently Available (in the US) BEVs.” EVAdoption. January 21, 2018. https://evadoption.com/ev-statistics-of-the-week-range-price-and-battery-size-of-currently-available-in-the-us-bevs/.

Kane for Medium: “Trump’s trail of broken promises on health care”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

On the campaign trail, Donald Trump promised no cuts to Medicaid, that he would protect those with preexisting conditions, and that everyone would have insurance under his new health care plan.

He has broken every one of those promises over the last two years. What’s more, the White House campaign to sabotage the Affordable Care Act (ACA) sparked a voter backlash that cost Republicans dearly in last year’s midterm election.

The president apparently has learned nothing from that rebuff. Having failed to pass legislation to kill the ACA, the administration is now turning to judicial activism and the courts. The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced yesterday that it is endorsing a Texas court ruling striking down the entire ACA.

 

Read the full piece on Medium by clicking here.

Kim for Medium: How “Moderates” are bolder than the left

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently drew big cheers at the South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas, earlier this month when she dissed the views of political moderates as “misplaced.” “Moderate is not a stance. It’s just an attitude towards life of, like, ‘meh,’” she told a standing-room only crowd. “The ‘meh’ is worshipped now — for what?”

Ocasio-Cortez’s remarks reflect an old line of attack from the progressive left: that moderates are “mushy” — timid, if not cowardly; that they value incrementalism over true progress; and, worst of all, that they are guilty of “triangulation” — the unprincipled pandering to swing voters by pushing off both left and right.

 

Read the full piece on Medium by clicking here.

America’s Skills Gap: Why it’s Real, And Why it Matters

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

A common view among the left is that the “skills gap” – a shortage of workers with the skills employers want – is a mirage.

A new PPI report decisively debunks this myth. As author Ryan Craig explains, the skills gap is real: employers are having trouble finding enough workers with digital skills and “soft skills.”

Craig attributes these shortages to two factors: “Education friction” – the failure of higher education institutions to turn out job-ready graduates — and “hiring friction” – digital screening practices that cause employers to overlook qualified workers.

Craig offers a fresh take on why skills gaps persist, the consequences for economic growth and what he calls “economic alienation” among workers feeling left behind in today’s economy.

Sen. Warren’s Tech-Bashing Populism Misses the Mark

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

The last time we checked, the United States was locked in a high-stakes race with China to lead the world on digital innovation.  So we’re mystified by Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s call today to break up Google, Amazon and Facebook. These are not only America’s most creative companies, but they and other large tech platforms have pioneered a global digital revolution.

They’ve grown big because they’ve been successful. That doesn’t make them perfect and, like any private enterprise large or small, they need strong public oversight and regulation. But breaking them up, absent compelling evidence that they are systematically gouging consumers or stifling competition, would be an act of stupendous economic folly.

To be sure, business consolidation and concentrated market power are real concerns.  But as PPI economist Michael Mandel has demonstrated, such worries apply less to the dynamic and fiercely competitive digital ecosystem than to America’s older and more static physical industries.

Perhaps Sen. Warren is jockeying to enter a very crowded populist “lane” in the 2020 presidential nomination contest.  But if she believes that anti-tech populism is broadly popular with U.S. voters, she’s mistaken. In fact, as a recent PPI poll makes clear,  most Americans have a favorable view of the big tech companies, and oppose breaking them up.

Our poll found that 67 percent of likely voters view the tech companies positively, as shown in Figure 1, and 55 percent oppose breaking them up. While 60 percent of voters acknowledge they are concerned about tech companies’ handling of privacy and data protection, 71 percent of voters view tech companies as “a sign that the American economy is working.” In contrast, just 32 percent view Big Tech as “too powerful.”

Sen. Warren’s call to break up America’s tech leaders may go down well with her party’s “democratic socialist” faction. It will no doubt be applauded by European regulators, who have also drawn a bead on U.S. tech companies. But to most voters, they symbolize American ingenuity and entrepreneurial prowess. Are those qualities progressives really should oppose?

 

Gerwin for Medium: “Trump Thinks ‘Trade Isn’t Tricky'”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

When economic historians recount U.S. trade policy under Donald Trump, they’ll tell a cautionary tale. Like the current consensus that the Smoot-Hawley tariffs worsened the Great Depression and tanked global trade, future analysts will detail the negative economic effects of Trump’s go-it-alone trade policies. And historians will draw from a treasure trove of quotes from the “Tariff Man,” who famously said that “trade wars are good and easy to win.”

Perhaps no quote better captures the essence — and dysfunction — of Trump’s trade policies than his claim that “trade isn’t tricky.” Trump sees trade as a straightforward, black-and-white issue. As a result, he’s pursued simplistic — often blunt-force — solutions. Trump’s failure to appreciate the complexity of the interconnected global economy is perhaps the greatest source of the long-term damage that his policies are causing to America’s economy and global standing.

 

Read the full piece on Medium by clicking here. 

New Ideas for a Do Something Congress No. 6: Break America’s Regulatory Log-jam

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Regulation plays a critical role in refereeing competition in a free market economy. But there’s a problem: Each year, Congress piles new rules upon old, creating a thick sludge of regulations – some obsolete, repetitive, and even contradictory – that weighs down citizens and businesses. In 2017, the Code of Federal Regulations swelled to a record 186,374 pages, up 19 percent from just a decade before.

The steady accumulation of regulations raises compliance and opportunity costs for businesses, especially small enterprises, putting obstacles in the way of economic innovation. Dozens of agencies in Washington issue new rules, but not one is dedicated to retiring old ones. To fill this institutional vacuum, PPI proposes a Regulatory Improvement Commission (RIC), modeled on the highly successful Defense Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process for closing obsolete military installations. Like the BRAC process, the proposed RIC would examine old rules and present Congress with a package of recommendations for an up-or-down vote to eliminate or modify outdated rules.

 

THE CHALLENGE: REGULATORY ACCUMULATION DAMPENS AMERICA’S ECONOMIC VITALITY

Wise regulation is essential to facilitate market competition, protect public health and safety, and keep powerful economic actors honest. But as PPI has pointed out in a series of reports, even if any particular regulation is defensible, the sheer accumulation of rules over time can dampen economic vitality (1). New regulations can interact with old ones in unintended ways, and business owners end up spending more time trying to navigate and comply with proliferating rules rather than on growing their companies.

  • Federal regulations hardly ever die, resulting in a dense thicket of rules that raise costs for America’s entrepreneurs and economy.

As shown in Figure 1, the Code of Federal Regulations has steadily grown in size over time, swelling to a record 186,374 pages in 2017 (2). Because the extent of regulation can be difficult to measure, the Code of Federal Regulations’ size is commonly used to provide a sense of the scope of regulations businesses and consumers must comply with. Measured another way, the Federal Register (where the federal government prints new rules) published 61,950 pages in 2017 alone, including proposed rules, final rules, and notices.

Spread across every sector, regulatory accumulation acts as a drag on the economy. One often-cited 2010 study for the Small Business Administration placed just the direct cost of compliance with all federal regulations at $1.7 trillion in 2008, or $15,584 per household (3). A 2012 consulting study for the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation estimated the cumulative cost of major regulations for manufacturers to be $164 billion in 2011 (in constant dollars), double the cost just 10 years earlier. More recently, a 2017 National Small Business Association survey estimated that the average small business owner spends at least $12,000 every year on compliance, with nearly one in three spending more than 80 hours every year dealing with federal regulation (4).

The Trump Administration’s “2-for-1” approach to deregulation fails to distinguish between vital rules and those that tax innovation and growth.

  • President Trump frequently brags about his efforts to provide business with regulatory relief, but his 2017 executive order requiring the elimination of two regulations for each new regulation is the wrong approach. It raises the bar for issuing new regulations without creating a rigorous mechanism for pruning old ones (5).

In addition, Trump’s 2-for-1 scheme fails to distinguish between the kinds of regulations that are reasonable for public health and economic stability or would enhance market competition and those that might be unnecessary or harmful to innovation and growth. Setting aside its conceptual flaws, Trump’s approach has so far not had much practical effect either. According to a Brookings Institute analysis, the Administration’s approach to regulation has largely been one of inaction, and the most consequential “deregulatory” maneuvers have actually been undertaken by the GOP Congress through the wholesale legislative reversal of important Obama-era rules, such as on environmental protection (6). Neither outcome leads to the sort of effective regulatory framework our economy needs.

 

THE GOAL: IMPROVE THE REGULATORY ENVIRONMENT TO UNLOCK ENTREPRENEURIAL GROWTH

Washington needs a mechanism for systematically eliminating regulatory obstacles to economic innovation and entrepreneurship while protecting public safety and ensuring fair competition. Improving the regulatory climate would help inventors and entrepreneurs spend less time and resources on regulatory compliance and focus instead on delivering goods and services and growing their enterprises. A smarter regulatory regime would also realize savings for taxpayers, as less money would need to be spent on enforcement.

While Democrats see the value in responsible regulation that has an important societal function, Republicans take the general view that less regulation is always preferred to more, and that too many regulations of any kind hamper economic growth and potential business investment. These differences in opinion result in incompatible ideas for what regulatory reform should look like.

The answer to outdated, conflicting, or costly rules isn’t deregulation, but the constant updating, streamlining, and improving of our regulatory system. PPI’s proposal for a Regulatory Improvement Commission (RIC) bridges the stale, gridlocked debate on the merits of regulation between Democrats and Republicans, presenting a measured and bipartisan mechanism for improving the regulatory environment to catalyze innovation while also protecting public interests. The RIC would fill an institutional vacuum in regulation policy by creating a mechanism for the periodic clearing out of obsolete rules. Importantly, the RIC has no mechanism by which it can inhibit policymakers’ ability to create critical new rules to address threats to competition or public health and safety. Rather, the RIC would be designed to address only existing regulations that have accumulated over time and are now obsolete.

 

THE PLAN: ESTABLISH REGULATORY IMPROVEMENT COMMISSION TO DEAL PERIODICALLY WITH THE BUILD-UP OF OLD RULES

Washington has dozens of agencies that issue new rules, but not one institution dedicated to streamlining the accumulated body of regulations. To fill that vacuum, Congress should set up a regulatory version of the Defense Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC), which has resulted in the successful closure of more than 350 obsolete installations since the late 1980s. That panel offers a rare example of bipartisan success in accomplishing a politically difficult mission – shutting down old military bases that the Pentagon deemed no longer necessary, but which had influential constituencies in communities around the country.

The RIC would be an independent commission of eight members, appointed by the President and Congress, with regulatory expertise across industry and government. It would meet as authorized by Congress to review and, following a public comment period of 60 days, draw up a list of 15 to 20 rules for elimination or modification. The package would be sent to Congress for an up-or-down vote, and the RIC would be disbanded. If the proposed changes pass Congress, they would go to the president’s desk for signature or veto. The RIC would need to be re-authorized each time Congress would like to repeat this process. Such continued re-authorization is important, as it provides an inexpensive method to solve the problem of regulatory accumulation compared to a standing committee and avoids the creation of a new government bureaucracy.

In 2015, bipartisan groups of lawmakers introduced bills in the House and Senate to establish a Regulatory Improvement Commission based on the BRAC model. House cosponsors included Mick Mulvaney (R-SC), now acting White House Chief of Staff, and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), now a Democratic Senator from Arizona. Unfortunately, the incoming Trump administration ignored the bipartisan RIC bills in favor of anti-regulation bills supported only by Republicans.

The RIC offers an alternative to the witless binary approach to regulation poised by extreme partisans on both ends of the spectrum. Obviously, America’s massive and complex economy needs smart regulation to function properly, and we need institutions charged with constantly improving our regulatory environment, rather than simply piling new rules atop old ones.

In this way, the RIC would fill a vacuum in Washington for a politically viable regulatory improvement mechanism that can inspire confidence across our partisan and ideological divides. And it would create a court of appeal where anyone—business, consumers, labor, civic groups—could challenge existing rules and propose changes.

[gview file=”https://www.progressivepolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/PPI_Break-Americas-Regulatory-Log-jam_V4-1.pdf” title=”PPI_Break America’s Regulatory Log-jam_V4 (1)”]

 

ENDNOTES

1) Michael Mandel, “A Progressive Approach to Regulation”, Progressive Policy Institute, February 2011: https://www.progressivepolicy.org/2011/02/reviving-jobsand-innovation-a-progressive-approach-to-improving-regulation/

2) Federal Register: The Daily Journal of the United States Government, “Federal Register and CFR Publication Statistics – Aggregated Charts (XLS)”: https://www.federalregister.gov/reader-aids/understanding-the-federal-register/federal-register-statistics

3) Small Business Administration, “The Impact of Regulatory Costs on Small Firms,” September 2010: https://www.sba.gov/sites/default/files/The%20Impact%20of%20Regulatory%20Costs%20on%20Small%20Firms%20(Full).pdf.

4) “2017 NSBA Small Business Regulations Survey,” National Small Business Association, 2017. https://www.nsba.biz/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Regulatory-Survey-2017.pdf

5) “Reducing Regulation and Controlling Regulatory Costs,” Executive Order 13771, Federal Register, January 30, 2017. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2017/02/03/2017-02451/reducing-regulation-and-controlling-regulatory-costs

6) Jennifer Erin Brown, Joelle Saad-Lessler and Diane Oakley, “Retirement in America: Out of Reach for Working Americans?” National Institute on Retirement Security, September 2018, https://www.nirsonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/FINAL-Report-.pdf.

7) Connor Raso, “How has Trump’s deregulatory order worked in practice?,” Brookings Institute, September 6, 2018. https://www.brookings.edu/research/how-has-trumps-deregulatory-order-worked-in-practice/.

Kim for Medium: “The Dangers of Big Ideas and Small Tent Politics for House Democrats”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Emboldened by their conviction that the national zeitgeist is on their side, the progressive left is taking a harder line against House Democrats reluctant to embrace their agenda.

Groups like the Justice Democrats, for instance, have signaled their intent to primary moderate members who don’t espouse signature liberal efforts such as the “Green New Deal” or the abolition of private insurance in favor of single-payer health care. And last week, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez reportedly warned her colleagues in a closed-door meeting of House Democrats that they could find themselves “on a list” of primary targets if they bucked the party on certain votes.

These tactics will do the party no favors as it works to maintain a relatively fragile majority. And as the findings of a pre-election poll by the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) show, liberals are wrong to assume that most Americans share their desire for sweeping government intervention in the economy.

 

Read the full piece on Medium by clicking here.

Trump Gets It Half Right on PBMs

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

In searching for ways to satisfy public demand for lower drug prices, President Trump has found rare common ground with Democrats. The White House recently released a plan to reform the way pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) negotiate prices with drugmakers on behalf of health insurance companies. Specifically, the proposal takes aim at special discounts or rebates negotiated by PBMs that create a perverse incentive for drugmakers to push up the list price of their products.

The idea is to get rid of these incentives in order to bring down drug prices, which would mean lower out-of-pocket expenses for patients. Democrats like Senator Ron Wyden have long pushed for changes to the rebate structure. However, Trump’s plan has drawn fire from critics who say it could become a boon for big drug companies by shifting more costs to the federal government. The truth is, the rebate proposal is a good first step to help Medicare beneficiaries at the drug counter; but, without further action to increase transparency around drug pricing and encourage competition, costs could be shifted from drug companies to taxpayers.

 

New Ideas for a Do-Something Congress No. 5: Make Rural America’s Higher Education Deserts Bloom

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

As many as 41 million Americans live in “higher education deserts” – at least half an hour’s drive from the nearest college or university and with limited access to community college. Many of these deserts are in rural America, which is one reason so much of rural America is less prosperous than it deserves to be.

The lack of higher education access means fewer opportunities for going back to school or improving skills. A less educated workforce in turn means communities have a tougher time attracting businesses and creating new jobs.

Congress should work to eradicate higher education deserts. In particular, it can encourage new models of higher education – such as “higher education centers” and virtual colleges – that can fill this gap and bring more opportunity to workers and their communities. Rural higher education innovation grants are one potential way to help states pilot new approaches.

 

THE CHALLENGE: HIGHER EDUCATION “DESERTS” ARE HANDICAPPING RURAL AMERICA

For millions of Americans, distance is as big or bigger a barrier to higher education access as finances. According to the Urban Institute, nearly one in five American adults—as many as 41 million people—lives twenty-five miles or more from the nearest college or university, or in areas where a single community college is the only source of broad-access public higher education within that distance. Three million of the Americans in these so-called “higher education deserts” also lack broadband internet, which means they are cut off from online education opportunities as well (1).

Rural students have lower rates of college-going and completion.

More than four in five people in higher education deserts – 82 percent – live in rural areas. This could be one reason why fewer rural Americans attend or finish college.

In 2016, 61 percent of rural public school seniors went on to college the following year, according to the National Student Clearinghouse, compared to 67 percent for suburban students (2). Only 20 percent of rural young adults between 25 and 34 have four-year degrees, says the USDA’s Economic Research Service, compared to 37 percent of young adults in urban areas (3). Moreover, the urban-rural gap in college degree attainment is growing. From 2000 to 2015, the share of college-educated adults rose by 7-points in urban locales compared to 4-points in rural areas.

Less-educated rural areas are falling behind while better educated cities leap ahead.

With more and more jobs demanding ever higher levels of skill, disparities in access to higher education are translating to vast disparities in the distribution of jobs and opportunity throughout the United States, including a widening urban-rural divide. Wealthy urban areas are getting richer, while rural areas are increasingly lagging.

The Economic Innovation Group (EIG), for instance, reports that of the 6.8 million net new jobs created between 2000 and 2015, 6.5 million were created in the top 20 percent of zip codes, which were predominantly urban (4). These prosperous, job-creating zip codes are also the best-educated. EIG further finds that 43 percent of residents in the top 10 percent of zip codes has a bachelor’s degree or better, compared to just 11 percent in the bottom 10 percent. While a four-year degree is of course not a prerequisite for a good living, the heavy concentration of highly-educated workers is indicative of the imbalance in economic opportunities between rural and urban areas.

Most of the nation’s least educated and most impoverished counties are rural. 

If education and prosperity are linked, so conversely are poverty and the lack of educational attainment.

Out of 467 U.S. counties identified by the USDA as “low education” counties – places where 20 percent or more of the population has less than a high school diploma – 79 percent are rural (5). These counties tend to be clustered in the rural South, Appalachia, along the Texas border and in Native American reservations and also suffer from higher rates of poverty, child poverty and unemployment.

 

THE GOAL: ERADICATE HIGHER EDUCATION DESERTS AND ENSURE EVERY RURAL AMERICAN HAS HIGHER EDUCATION ACCESS

Better access to higher education in rural areas, especially for the many millions of “nontraditional” students who are now increasingly the norm (6), can help close the gulf in opportunity between urban and rural areas. Greater opportunities for convenient, affordable higher education would allow more rural Americans to finish their degrees or pursue occupational credentials, qualifying them for higher-skilled, better-paid jobs. Rural students would also benefit by not being forced to leave home for school – not only lowering costs for students but potentially slowing or even reversing the population declines plaguing rural areas. Institutions of higher education can also serve as engines of economic development in the communities they serve. They can work with businesses to turn out the skilled talent they need and provide research or other support.

 

THE PLAN: CREATE RURAL HIGHER EDUCATION INNOVATION GRANTS TO ENCOURAGE NEW MODELS OF HIGHER EDUCATION REACHING RURAL AMERICA

While it’s unrealistic to establish a new college, community college or university in every rural area that needs one, emerging models for delivering higher education potentially offer a creative, cost-effective and effective alternative. These new models can also expand the ability of workers to obtain high-quality occupational credentials, which in many instances are likely to be more practical, affordable and desirable than pursuing a two-year or four-year degree.

Some states, such as Pennsylvania, Virginia and Maryland, are pioneering new approaches, such as “higher education centers” and virtual colleges, that use technology to broaden students’ options for both traditional college education and occupational training (7). The Northern Pennsylvania Regional College, for instance, operates six different “hubs” scattered throughout the 7,000 square miles it serves, plus numerous “classrooms” using borrowed space from local high schools, public libraries and other community buildings. In addition to conferring its own degrees, it provides the infrastructure for other accredited institutions to extend their reach through “blended” offerings combining virtual and in-person teaching.

Similarly, Virginia’s five higher education centers provide physical infrastructure for colleges and community colleges offering classes as well as occupational training in fields such as welding, mechatronics and IT certification. In Maryland, the Southern Maryland Higher Education Center offers specific courses from ten different institutions, including Johns Hopkins and the University of Maryland. Though relatively new, these institutions are already establishing a track record of success. In South Boston, Virginia, for instance, the Southern Virginia Higher Education Center worked with more than 30 area industries and entrepreneurs in 2017, developed customized training for nearly 150 workers in local companies and placed 173 students into new jobs (8).

Congress should encourage all states to make rural higher education a priority and help more states experiment with new models for accessing higher education in remote areas. One way to do this is to provide seed money in the form of Rural Higher Education Innovation Grants so that states can stand up pilots, evaluate the effectiveness of new models and scale up promising approaches. These grants moreover do not need to be large – the Pennsylvania legislature initially appropriated just $1.2 million to launch what is now NPRC.

As a start, Congress should set aside $10 million in competitive grant funding for states. Funding for these grants could come from an earmark of the money collected from the 1.4 percent excise tax on large university endowments included in the 2017 tax legislation (9).

 

Read Here: New Ideas For a Do Something Congress No. 5

Bledsoe for USA Today, “Trump border emergency is fake and climate crisis is real. Guess which just got funded?”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Donald Trump funds ’emergency’ border wall but relief for victims of wildfires, storms and other climate change-fueled catastrophes must wait.

One emergency, the border wall, is fake, invented by a rogue president desperate for a political win no matter the price. Another, the climate crisis, is real, with tens of millions of citizen victims around the country. Guess which one got funded?

President Donald Trump is risking a constitutional crisis by declaring a false national emergency to fund a border wall that his own government experts say isn’t needed and won’t work, and of which he himself says, “I didn’t need to do this.”

Meanwhile, the bill Trump signed last week to keep the government open leaves out tens of billions of dollars of relief for American citizens who are victims of hurricanes, wildfires and other disasters made worse by climate change.

This should not be a shock to anyone paying close attention. Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, reacting to earlier reports, last week pointedly denied that the administration would raid relief funds designated for victims of storms and wildfires to get money for Trump’s dubious border wall.

The president, who denies basic climate science and is rolling back key climate protections, would have been taking money from its victims to escape the consequences of his own manufactured government-shutdown crisis — all to build a wall that will be ineffective and even counterproductive in improving border security.

A firestorm of criticism prevented that. Yet here we are about a month later with much the same outcome.

Continue reading at USA Today.

Marshall for Medium: “Will the Senate Defend Our Constitution?”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

By declaring a national emergency to build a border wall, President Trump has crossed the Rubicon. He has turned a cheap partisan stunt into a bona fide Constitutional crisis.

Congress this week declined to give Trump all the money he demanded to wall off Mexico from the United States. The president has declared an emergency explicitly to defy the will of Congress and usurp its Constitutional power to raise and spend public money. In his contempt for democratic norms, Trump makes no effort to conceal the fact that the alleged ‘emergency’ on the border is a political contrivance to assert his will. Having failed to extort wall funding from Congress through the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, he is willing to violate the Constitution to get a political ‘win.’

 

Read the full piece on Medium by clicking here.

Press Release: Will the Senate Defend Our Constitution?

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

WASHINGTON—Will Marshall, President of the Progressive Policy Institute, today released the followed statement after President Trump declared a national emergency to fund the border wall:

“By declaring a national emergency to build a border wall, President Trump has crossed the Rubicon. He has turned a cheap partisan stunt into a bona fide Constitutional crisis.

“Congress this week declined to give Trump all the money he demanded to wall off Mexico from the United States. The president has declared an emergency explicitly to defy the will of Congress and usurp its Constitutional power to raise and spend public money. In his contempt for democratic norms, Trump makes no effort to conceal the fact that the alleged ’emergency’ on the border is a political contrivance to assert his will. Having failed to extort wall funding from Congress through the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, he is willing to violate the Constitution to get a political ‘win.’

“This is a clear and cynical abuse of presidential power. Trump seems not to understand or care that U.S. presidents aren’t medieval monarchs, who can demand money from parliaments. Now he’s willing to politicize and trivialize presidential authority to declare national emergencies to fulfill a demagogic campaign promise. The White House will now seek to shift funds Congress has appropriated for national defense and other legitimate purposes to finance a stupid ‘solution’ to a non-existent problem.

“All friends of American democracy, regardless of outlook or party, must rally to the defense of the U.S. Constitution’s separation of powers. Shamefully, Senate Republicans have yet to stand up for the Constitution they’ve sworn to defend. Their supine unwillingness to put patriotism above partisanship means that Americans must trust to the courts to stop a rogue president.

“Trump’s power grab will no doubt give fresh impetus to efforts to impeach him. That’s understandable, but for now the wiser course for progressives is to keep the pressure on the Senate to defend its Constitutional powers and institutional prerogatives, and to use all legal means to prevent Trump from spending public money without Congressional authority. We need to keep the public focused clearly on how deeply Trump is damaging not just our political system, but now also the Constitutional framework that has enabled American democracy to endure through genuine national emergencies.”

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Bledsoe for Forbes, “Green New Deal Must Grow Up Fast To Influence Bills Congress is Already Writing”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Little noticed in the media circus surrounding the mere introduction of a non-binding Congressional resolution on the Green New Deal was the deletion of much-criticized and plainly unachievable mandates contained in previous GND versions.

Gone was the impossible diktat requiring 100% renewable energy for the entire economy by 2030. Missing was the politically suicidal and practically infeasible flat-out prohibition on fossil fuels in little more than a decade. Even extraneous language on guaranteed jobs in the resolution had been watered down from earlier texts, and would of course never be a legal requirement in actual climate legislation that passes Congress in any event.

In fact, the more extreme provisions in the GND have served largely to provide Trump and other Republican anti-climate action forces with irresistible political fodder. Republicans hope to scare the American people into opposing sensible climate actions by invoking GND extremism, and have already produced ads with these themes.

Continue reading at Forbes.