Governor Wolf’s proposed education budget finally restores Corbett's K-12 classroom funding cuts but inequities and inadequate funding still remain

Posted by Diana Polson on April 3, 2018 1:33 pm
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Governor Wolf’s proposed education budget finally restores K-12 classroom funding cuts (in nominal dollars) from the Corbett years, but Pennsylvania still has a long way to go to reach funding equity and adequacy.

Governor Wolf’s Executive Budget for 2018-19 proposes increases in K-12 education for the fourth year in a row. His proposal this year, if accepted, reaches an important milestone—the disastrous cuts to education instituted under Tom Corbett will be restored. 

The Tax Cut and Jobs Act will Worsen Inequality in Pennsylvania

Posted by Diana Polson on March 23, 2018 10:25 am

President Trump signed the Tax Cut and Jobs Act into law on December 22, 2017. While spun by Republicans in Congress as a boon to middle class Americans, as a factual matter this tax cut is a not-so-veiled transfer of income into the hands of the already wealthy, which will worsen inequality in our state and across the country.

Let’s put this legislation in context. Over the last 25 years, incomes for the very richest Pennsylvanians has been rising fast while incomes for the majority of us have been stagnant. In fact, in Pennsylvania the top 1% has captured 44 cents of every dollar of income growth since 1979 (Keystone Research Center). Low-wage workers, even those who work full time, can’t make ends meet. Meanwhile Pennsylvania has not raised the minimum wage in 10 years and many low wage workers are forced to rely on government programs for health care and food stamps.  At this time of extreme inequality in our country and our state, the injustice of this federal tax legislation is shameful.

Wanted – A NAFTA and Trade Policy That Help Unrig the Economy Against Working Families

Posted by Stephen Herzenberg on March 16, 2018 1:56 pm
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The Lamb-Saccone race in Western Pennsylvania upped the pressure on policymakers of both major political parties on trade. It expands the opportunity for progressives and progressive lawmakers to articulate and advocate for a fundamental change in U.S. trade policy in NAFTA renegotiations.

For the Trump Administration, the special election suggested that some working families are no longer willing to take the President’s word for it that he’s in their corner. That’s hardly a surprise given that the President’s actions so far have rigged the economy further against working families, the opposite of what he promised to do. That’s why some Trump voters have “buyer’s remorse” already.

Why the PA Supreme Court's Lines Should Stand

Posted by Marc Stier on March 5, 2018 1:16 am

The effort by the General Assembly’s Republican leaders to have the United States Supreme Court block the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s decision to create new, fair congressional districts in our state is based on both a hypocritical attempt to undermine the rights of states and a flawed understanding of the subtle, yet fundamental, ideas of our constitutional system. The vehemence with which they are pursuing their case makes one wonder whether those ideas can survive in a day and age when so many politicians, especially on the Right, appear to have neither the intellect to understand principles that are the least bit complicated nor the integrity to follow them when they cut against the results they seek.

(Click to read the rest of the post.)

Key Sources on the Value of Unions and the Importance of Protecting Workers' Real Freedom to Join Together

Posted by Stephen Herzenberg on February 26, 2018 11:01 am
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Today is a little like Labor Day except with a twist: because of oral arguments today in the Supreme Court on the Janus case, editorial boards, the media, social media, and the public are all focused on workers — in this case on their freedom to join together into unions.

Given the widespread interest, here are some links new and old on unions.
 
A "two-pager" on the value of unions that draws heavily from this longer piece by the Economic Policy Institute published last year.
 
A new report by the Economic Policy Institute that documents the orchestrated, decades-old funding by right-wing individuals, foundations, and non-profits that led up to the Janus case. Today's New York Times story appears to draw heavily from the new EPI report althought it does not reference it.

People Who Live in Glass Houses Shouldn't Throw Stones

Posted by Stephen Herzenberg on February 23, 2018 7:17 am
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(NOTE: at a future date we plan to address the substance of the op ed referred to below by Anthony Davies and a co-author in more detail.)

So, this is rich: in an op ed critiquing our Pennsylvania Promise free tuition (not free college) proposal, Anthony Davies and a co-author snidely say “we use the term loosely” after describing the Keystone Research Center and Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center as “think tanks.” 

Why is this rich? Because Davies is the guy who wrote multiple papers for conservative “think tanks“ with flawed statistics claiming to show that states which have not privatized alcohol distribution (like Pennsylvania) have HIGHER traffic fatalities. 

STUDY: Teachers in Pennsylvania Are Undercompensated

Posted by Mark Price on February 15, 2018 4:30 pm
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The Economic Policy Institute is out today with a new paper authored by Jeffrey Keefe examining compensation for public school teachers in Pennsylvania.  If you are still an avid reader of letters to the editor in your local paper, or perhaps a braver reader of the comment section of the online edition of your local paper, you will not infrequently encounter angry comme

Proposed Elimination of the Community Services Block Grant (CSBG)

Posted by Shelley Aragoncillo on February 13, 2018 3:44 pm
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The following is a guest post from Steven Martinez, Communications Director at the Community Action Association of Pennsylvania:

On President Trump's Infrastructure Proposal

Posted by Marc Stier on February 13, 2018 10:41 am
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The president has put forward a "plan" for infrastructure spending that identifies no new source of funding, that makes unbelievable assumptions about how much state and private spending can be leveraged by a limited amount of new federal spending and that proposes an end-around of environmental regulations in the guise of streamlining those regulations. 

In response to deep and long ignored needs in Pennsylvania and throughout the country for upgrading our roads, bridges, transit systems, airports and water and sewer works - needs that should be met by new investments that could create tens of thousands good jobs - the president has offered a glittering fantasy with little of the substance necessary to meet those needs. 

FACT CHECK: Undocumented Immigrants Like the Dreamers Are Not a Drag on State and Local Government

Posted by Marc Stier on January 27, 2018 12:00 pm
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A political movement that is based on demonizing a group of people needs a demon. So the efforts of the Trump administration to generate anger and hatred toward immigrants, both documented and undocumented, has been combined with repeated claims by the administration and its supporters about the terrible burden immigration creates on the United States. Immigrants have been called rapists and murders and terrorists and have been said to be dragging down our economy and burdening citizens with higher taxes.

That rhetoric has heated up as Congress struggles to pass legislation to restore the DACA program, which protects the Dreamers — undocumented immigrants brought to this country as children — from deportation. It has reached even higher levels as the Trump administration uses the debate over DACA as a bargaining chip to win Congressional support for a border wall with Mexico and radical changes to immigration policy.

Most of those claims have been rebutted, time and again. It is not clear how effective facts can be in tempering hatred. But we intend to do our part by putting the truth before Pennsylvanians.

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