Emily Makings

Regulatory Overlap in Washington

Today the latest Thrive Washington paper was released: Confronting Washington State’s Overlapping Regulatory Structures. Regulatory reform efforts are being undertaken in numerous states and in the federal government.  As President Obama said in the Wall Street Journal, “Sometimes . . . rules have gotten out of balance, placing unreasonable burdens on business–burdens that have stifled […]

A Tax Preference is Not a Loophole

TaxVox (the blog of the Tax Policy Center) has a good post today on tax “loopholes.”  The author, Eric Toder, is responding to the faulty yet widespread use of “loopholes” as a synonym for “tax expenditures” at the federal level, but it certainly corresponds to the debate here in Washington as the legislature considers the […]

New Brief: Reforming Public Pensions

In Reforming Public Pensions, we look at the current state of Washington’s public pension system and the methods of calculating unfunded liabilities in these plans.  The good news is that Washington is in much better shape than most other states.  The bad news is that all states are probably understating their unfunded liabilities by assuming […]

Register for our 79th Annual Dinner

The Washington Research Council's 2011 Annual Dinner will be held on June 7, at the Bellevue Club.  Kimberley Strassel, of the Wall Street Journal, is our speaker this year.  Details are available on our website. If you would like to sponsor a table, please contact DeDe McConnell at dede@researchcouncil.org or (206) 467-7088.  If you would […]

New Brief on Senate W&M Budget Proposal

We’ve worked through the Senate W&M Chair’s (and Ranking Member’s) 2011-13 budget proposal, and the resulting brief with the details is available here.  It includes comparisons to the House-passed budget, on which we also have a brief. The Senate W&M Chair’s proposal addresses the $5 billion plus shortfall in many of the same ways the […]

Our Annual Dinner Speaker, Kim Strassel, on the Federal Budget

This week has been a busy one on the budget front.  Here in Washington, the House Ways and Means Committee proposed and passed a 2011-13 budget, which may be passed by the full House today or tomorrow.  (For more on the budget, see here and here.) It has also been budget week in the U.S. […]

New Brief on the House Democrats' 2011-13 Budget

We have a new brief up on Rep. Hunter’s 2011-13 budget proposal.  It is a good starting point, cognizant of fiscal reality.  Although fees do figure in, the proposal does not assume that voters will agree to raise taxes. Rep. Alexander has put forth an alternative.  All the information on both proposals is available here.  […]

House Releases 2011-13 (and 2011 Supplemental) Budget

The House proposal for the 2011-13 budget (including a final 2011 supplemental to close out the 2009-11 biennium) is now public. In Near General Fund-State plus Opportunity Pathways (NGF-P) terms, the 2011 supplemental would reduce spending in the current biennium by $93 million (on top of reductions made in the early action supplementals), to bring […]

Outdated Data in U.S. Chamber Employment Policy Study

AWB’s Olympia Business Watch notes that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has released a study on state employment policies and job growth.  In considering the states’ employment policies, the Chamber looked at employment relationships/costs of separation, minimum wage and living wage laws, unemployment insurance and workers’ compensation, wage and hour policies, collective bargaining, and litigation/enforcement […]

Washington's Union Membership Rates

Last week, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics sent out a press release on union membership in Washington in 2010.  BLS notes, “Since 1990, Washington has had union membership rates above the U.S. average.” In fact, in 2010, Washington’s union membership as a percent of total employment was the fourth highest in the country, behind […]