The full implementation of welfare reform in Massachusetts required a waiver from the federal government. The commonwealth requested such a waiver to allow for the work requirement, time limits, job training, and the centralization of its public assistance system. The waiver was granted for all except time limits.
Data left out of the report of the Special Advisory Commission Regarding the Compensation of Public Officials [Click to download a Word version of this post.] On November 30, 2014, the Special Advisory Commission Regarding the Compensation of Public Officials published a study concerning the compensation of the state’s constitutional officers and members of the state legislature. In my view, the information presented in the report is insufficient to allow a meaningful comparison of legislative pay levels in Massachusetts with those of other states because it excludes from its analysis 39 states in total, including six states with populations greater than that of Massachusetts: Texas, Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina, Washington, and Arizona. The report also excludes eight of the ten states […]
$23 million 11th-hour sweetheart deal by the MBTA will stick taxpayers with a jaw-dropping $10 per one-way ride subsidy on a new full-service Gillette Stadium commuter rail line As the curtain falls on Governor Patrick’s administration, officials at MassDOT have been rushing furiously behind the scenes to pull off one of the most egregious and secretive taxpayer abuses in state history: the execution of a binding $23 million contract to purchase a CSX freight line to provide full-service daily commuter rail service to Gillette Stadium in Foxboro. If the new commuter rail service is provided, the financial benefit to the owners of Gillette Stadium and Patriot Place will be enormous. The MBTA has been offering additional train service for Patriots […]
In FY2011, the year prior to passage of the Affordable Care Act, the administrative budget of the Massachusetts Health Connector Authority was $29 million. By FY2013, while the Connector Authority struggled to implement its change to ACA, its budget had risen to $55 million. By FY2014, it had risen to $118 million. In FY2015, its budget is $98 million. These whopping annual increases in administrative expenditures have paid for converting to the new Affordable Care Act system. Pioneer Institute issued a report today adding up these and all other administrative costs of converting from our pre-ACA connector system, stating “there has been little transparency about the full taxpayer cost of the state-based exchange. Estimates often have been released piecemeal, and […]
Pioneer Institute’s Research Director, Greg Sullivan, sent a letter today to Governor Patrick asking him to veto the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center expansion bill. He outlined six reasons why Governor Patrick should do so: The BCEC expansion will saddle the next administration with hundreds of millions of dollars in deficiencies as a result of Massachusetts Convention Center Authority’s overly optimistic revenue projections. The Massachusetts Convention Center Authority assumes that hotel tax receipts will increase over the next 30 years at an average annual rate nearly three times greater than the historical growth rate of the statewide hotel tax. If its rosy projections are wrong, as they have been in the past, the legislation authorizes statewide taxes to be used […]
Last week, Pioneer Institute issued a report calling for Massachusetts to adopt two enhanced research and development tax credits, pointing out that research and development expenditures by Massachusetts industries dropped by 19% between 2007 and 2011 while California’s increased by 16.9% and the rest of states by 9.2% on average. We also pointed out that California, which offers R&D tax credits vastly superior to Massachusetts’, has outpaced the nation in R&D growth. Over the past two decades, the growth of industrial R&D expenditures by California business was greater than that of its top seven competitor states combined, Massachusetts included. But the part of our report that generated the biggest controversy was the calculation that Massachusetts had added only 571 life […]
Pioneer today released a new report entitled “Regaining Massachusetts’ Edge in Research and Development.” The report focuses on three important takeaways from the job creation and investment data as related to R&D-related companies: A broader tax credit strategy put into place in the early 1990s worked quite well in advancing Massachusetts’ R&D-related job base and expanding R&D investments in the Commonwealth Since then California has put into place a more cutting edge tax credit strategy that has helped the state become a category killer – truly the first among equals in the hunt for expansion of R&D-related sectors While Massachusetts’ life sciences initiative was much ballyhooed as having the potential to create 250,000 new jobs in a decade, after five […]
Massachusetts’ ranking among the states in overall R&D spending by industry rose from fifth to second between 1991 and 2006, but although it’s ranking improved, Massachusetts – and every other state – lost market share over that period to California, which had enacted much stronger tax incentives. In fact, the commonwealth’s market share of national R&D spending by industry actually declined between 1991 and 2011. Over that same period California increased its industrial R&D spending by more than its top seven competitor states combined, including Massachusetts.
The Tax Fairness Commission deserves credit for considering tax issues affecting Massachusetts’ economic competitiveness. Establishing fair tax policies for individual taxpayers is a laudable and worthwhile goal, but the commission is wise to acknowledge as well that issues of tax fairness affect Massachusetts businesses. Massachusetts businesses compete in a national marketplace where state tax policy plays a critical role in decision-making about where to locate and expand business operations.
Gaming Commission’s Enhanced Ethics Code On October 24, 2013, Dierdre Roney, General Counsel of the State Ethics Commission, responded to a request for advice from Stephen Crosby, Chairman of the Massachusetts Gaming Commission, about whether Mr. Crosby should recuse himself from participating in matters concerning the awarding of a casino license in Everett Massachusetts. Chairman Crosby had previously filed disclosures on August 22, 2013 and October 25, 2013 stating in relevant part that “[Paul Lohnes], a part owner of a property in Everett that would be purchased by a casino developer if that property is awarded a license” had “invested in my company about 30 years ago; that business relationship ended 23 years ago.” General Counsel Roney’s letter in response to Chairman […]
The Boston Globe published stories on November 21st and December 8th revealing that Steve Crosby, Chairman of the Gaming Commission, had a previous seven-year business partnership with Paul Lohnes, part-owner of a land parcel in Everett that is the proposed site of a casino in competition to win the sole casino license in Eastern Massachusetts. According to the Globe stories, Chairman Crosby and Mr. Lohnes have had a forty-year relationship and Mr. Lohnes had provided crucial investment money to Crosby’s company when it was struggling. According to the Globe stories, a partnership including Crosby’s former business partner purchased the Everett site in 2009 at a price of $8 million. Subsequently, according to the Globe stories, the property was put under […]
Letter to MassDOT Secretary Richard Davey requesting information regarding the safety of the ramps near the Zakim Bridge
Governor Patrick now concedes it was a bad idea and it appears that the so-called tech tax will be repealed. Repeal will leave a $160 million hole in state transportation funding. But that hole need not be filled exclusively by new revenue. It can be filled by savings, revenue, or a combination of the two, and Pioneer Institute research shows there are plenty of savings to be had from a series of reforms.
This policy paper compares the MBTA’s bus maintenance costs to those of other bus transit agencies and considers the causes of the T’s inordinately high bus maintenance spending. Considering that the MBTA spent a whopping $832 million on bus maintenance between 2000 and 2011, any significant improvement in cost-effectiveness in this area is certain to translate into large savings.
Recent news demonstrates that the state’s transportation system has problems that go beyond a shortage of funding. The Boston Herald has reported that the MBTA doesn’t make public information available about how much they are paying out in pension benefits and who is receiving benefits.