Today Wisconsin, tomorrow California? The battle between government unions and state budgets was inevitable once the unions were given collective bargaining rights over the past 50 years. The battle boiled over the past few weeks in Wisconsin as Republicans in the Legislature are attempting to repeal the state’s collective bargaining …
Wisconsin governor Scott Walker, in an exclusive interview with the Heritage Foundation, called union collective bargaining a “vicious cycle,… one I think people have realized we can’t afford anymore.” Government unions bargain for more taxpayer money, collect dues from their membership, and come right back to the table demanding more. …
The Heritage Foundation has posted a new working paper that considers whether public workers in California are overpaid compared to their private sector counterparts. The paper’s findings are summarized today in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, coauthored by myself and AEI’s Andrew Biggs. We argue that previous public-private comparisons at …
Images of bloodless corpses and gasping babies would have to cover at least 50 percent of each cigarette pack under regulation proposed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Although smoking rates have declined steadily for the past 40 years—down 52 percent since 1965—and every kindergartner can recite the evils …
MADISON, Wis. — Teachers’ unions and representatives of every liberal interest group in the country may have taken over the streets of Madison for demonstrations, marches and speeches, but inside the Wisconsin governor’s mansion its chief tenant remains calm and resolute. The Badger State’s budget will be balanced, Gov. Scott …
“It is impossible to bargain collectively with the government.” That wasn’t Newt Gingrich, or Ron Paul, or Ronald Reagan talking. That was George Meany — the former President of the AFL-CIO — in 1955. Government unions are unremarkable today, but the labor movement once thought the idea absurd. The founders …
A considerable volume of cross-country analysis has found no positive impact on economic growth from more government spending. Many studies (see here and here, for example) find that government spending actually hurts growth. A recent study by The Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street Journal of economic recovery following the …
Let no one be confused, the stakes in Wisconsin are high and the Badger state could turn into the crucial battle ground between progressivism and the new Tea Party majority in the country. Issues as important as public sector compensation, bulging state deficits, union power, federalism, education, federal entitlements as …
EDITOR’S NOTE: As Wisconsin’s Democrat Senators escape to Iowa to avoid voting on Governor Scott Walker’s (R-WI) proposed budget, read Heritage analyst James Sherk’s commentary from NRO on what the fuss is all about. Wisconsinites are still celebrating the Green Bay Packers’ win in Super Bowl XLV, but taxpayers in …
