THE PIONEER BLOG

Dana DiChiro

Cape Cod: The Struggles of Year-Round Residents

/in , , , /by Dana DiChiro

Barnstable County contains all 15 Cape Cod municipalities. In 2023, the unemployment rate there was 4.7 percent, while the state average was 2.6 percent. All but one municipality on the Cape had an unemployment rate above the state average. Provincetown, the northern tip of the Cape, faces the highest unemployment rate in the state at 14.6 percent. What causes Cape Cod’s unemployment rate to be so far above that of the state as a whole? Warm weather might be the answer.  For both Massachusetts residents and out-of-state vacationers, Cape Cod serves as a convenient oasis during the summer months. What many vacationers fail to realize is that those booming businesses look quite different during Massachusetts winters. The estimated year-round population […]

Charles Chieppo

An Open Letter to the Governor’s Transportation Task Force

/in , , , , , , /by Charles Chieppo and Eileen McAnneny

An Open Letter to the Governor’s Transportation Task Force: As members of former commissions, we wish you much success as you embark on the important assignment of figuring out how to adequately finance the state’s transportation system.  With respect to MBTA, this will be the fifth major commission analyzing its operations since 2007, and while each commission had a slightly different charge and scope, common themes have emerged that you need not revisit.  To jumpstart your work, we have summarized past findings so you can bring a focused and forward-looking  approach to your task. In summary, revenue has been provided and reforms introduced in the past, but neither were sufficient to make a difference.  So here we are in 2024 […]

Eileen McAnneny

Thoughts on Outmigration and Competitiveness

/in , , , , /by Eileen McAnneny

?Thoughts on Out Migration and Competitiveness   A picture is worth a thousand words. This heatmap lays out the key areas Massachusetts’ needs to focus on to stem net outmigration and improve its competitiveness relative to other move-to states. This analysis shows the competitive advantage the 11 top outbound states enjoy over Massachusetts based on 10 key drivers. The blue (higher numbers) indicate that the competitor state is outperforming Massachusetts, while the red (negative numbers) indicate Massachusetts is outperforming the competitor state. The higher the number, the greater the move-to states competitive advantage. Massachusetts outperforms these top designation states in only three measures – healthcare quality, education, and overall economic conditions.  We perform weakest in three measures – housing cost, […]

Eileen McAnneny

Commentary On The Senate Ways And Means Committee FY2025 Budget 

/in , , , , , /by Eileen McAnneny

The Senate Ways and Means Committee (SWM) released its FY2025 budget on May 7th.  This spending plan totals $57.9 billion, an increase of $1.8 billion over the FY2024 General Appropriations Act (GAA).  Like the Governor’s and House’s versions of the budget, the SWM budget is based on the consensus revenue estimate of $41.5 billion in tax revenue – a decrease of $208 million from last year’s consensus figure.

Eileen McAnneny

Statement: Pioneer Institute in Support of Accessory Dwelling Units

/in , , , /by Eileen McAnneny

Pioneer Institute Statement in Support of Accessory Dwelling Units May 2, 2024 BOSTON – This Wednesday, the Boston Globe editorial board endorsed the accessory dwelling units (ADUs) provision in Governor Healey’s Affordable Homes Act, her $4.1 billion housing bond bill.  Pioneer Institute has long championed ADUs as a potentially important piece in the policy puzzle of how Massachusetts can provide sufficient supply to attract and retain a high-quality talent pipeline. In addition to opinion pieces and media appearances, the Institute’s work on the issue is grounded in data-driven research, including Getting Home: Overcoming barriers to Housing in Greater Boston (2003), Residential Land-Use Regulation in Eastern Massachusetts: A Study of 187 Communities (2005), Housing and Land use policy in Massachusetts (2007), […]

Eileen McAnneny

Outmigration and the Labor Force

/in , /by Eileen McAnneny

Boston University researchers just released new demographic and financial outmigration data that is cause for concern about recent trends in the Massachusetts labor force.  Among the key facts from the BU research are: In the last decade, annual net out migration has increased by a stunning 1,100 percent to 39,000 people.   There is a growing exodus of prime-age workers (24 to 54)  High wage earners are leaving Massachusetts, too. The incomes of over half of those leaving the state range from 1.3 to over 2.6 times the state average. Wealth and tax revenue collections are leaving with them. The report of Prof. Mark Williams and graduate students Yuhan Liu and Linglan Xu at the Questrom School of Business builds on […]

Editorial Staff

Superior Court Judge Invalidates “Equity Theft” Law as Unconstitutional

/in , , /by Editorial Staff

Decision brings Massachusetts into compliance with 2023 U.S. Supreme Court ruling SPRINGFIELD, MA –A Massachusetts Superior Court has ruled that a state law allowing municipalities (or private actors to whom municipalities sell the right to foreclose) to foreclose on homes due to property tax debt without having to pay the homeowner the difference between the taxes owed and the value of the home is unconstitutional as applied to the facts of the case at hand.   Ashley Mills was on the verge of losing her fully paid for Springfield home worth around $230,000 due to a $22,000 property tax debt.  On Mills behalf, the Pioneer Public Interest Law Center, Greater Boston Legal Services, and the law firms of Morgan Lewis and […]

Barbara Anthony

Why the secrecy? Pioneer Calls for Open Meetings Dealing with Steward’s Impact on Patient Care.

/in , /by Barbara Anthony

Recently the Healey administration’s Department of Public health (DPH) announced it was hosting five invitation-only virtual meetings with hospitals, community health centers, and others in communities where Steward hospitals are located. The meetings, as described by letters sent by officials and reported in the Boston Globe, will “focus on meeting the needs of the patients and providers in our communities.” Presumably, the focus will be on continuity of patient care in these communities. None of the five meetings about Steward will be open to the public or the media. Both the Massachusetts Hospital Association and the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers appear to be joining DPH in co-sponsoring these virtual community meetings. The Globe reports that the “hosts said […]

Eileen McAnneny

Mayor Wu’s Commercial Property Tax Proposal: A Solution or a Snuff?

/in , /by Eileen McAnneny

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu is considering shifting more of the property tax burden onto commercial property owners as a way to close a potential budget gap of $1.4 billion by temporarily increasing the commercial property tax rate to 200 percent of the residential rate.  To do this, Mayor Wu would seek approval from the City Council and state legislature to allow Boston to temporarily exceed the 175 percent shift cap allowed by state law.  It would then be phased out over a four-year period by reducing the rate by 7.5 percent annually. When initially introduced, this local option higher property tax rate cap was intended to protect residential property owners from double-digit tax rate increases stemming from the steep rise […]

Aidan Enright

The Necessity of Transparent Tax Revenue Reporting: MA Provides a Shining Example

/in /by Aidan Enright

Revenue collections, predicted revenue, and expenditures are among the most important data points states report. Without accurate predictions and regular reporting, the legislature and governor’s office may go over or under budget, potentially leaving citizens and policymakers in the dark about the fiscal health of the state.

For this reason, all states regularly report those numbers and update estimates based on trends, overall economic conditions, and expected changes as a result of new state policies. However, even among the New England states, the transparency and accessibility of such reporting varies greatly and, as a result, limits analysts’ ability to meaningfully compare state revenues and judge performance in real time.

Gauri Binoy

Middlemen Pushing Up Retail Costs of Drugs

/in , , , , , , , /by Gauri Binoy

The reality is that non-price factors, including several players, are causing net prices to decline and retail prices to increase. Those players include employers, health plans, and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), all of whom have continuously circumvented the system through loopholes and complicated systems of reimbursement that tend to hurt patients

Eileen McAnneny

Milton Shuts the Door
on Multifamily Housing Plans

/in , , , , , , /by Eileen McAnneny

The MBTA Communities Act, passed in 2021, provides that the 177 communities serviced by the MBTA must create multifamily zones to spur housing development close to public transportation. But the issue is an emotionally charged one, with passions high on both sides. And Milton residents in February rejected a plan to create such housing ‚ choosing a loss of some state funding over an approximately 25 percent increase in their housing stock, along with the possibility of greater congestion.

Aidan Enright

State Overtime Expenditures Jump, Even as Employment Increases

/in /by Aidan Enright

A new analysis of state payroll expenditures reveals a sizable increase in overtime expenditures, even as the state has added nearly 3,000 new employees since the beginning of the pandemic.

William Smith

‘High’ U.S. Drug Prices Mask Freeloading by Other Nations

/in , , , , , /by William Smith

The drug company’s choice is to walk away from millions in revenue from a given country and deny their people a lifesaving drug, or swallow hard and accept an unfair price that is nowhere near the drug’s value. For the sake of shareholders and patients, drug companies typically accept the unfair price and devote the revenue to offsetting their previous investments. In short, other nations are freeloading off of American R&D.

Eileen McAnneny

My Musings on Massachusetts’ Fiscal Picture

/in , , , , , , /by Eileen McAnneny

Since the start of FY2024 on July 1, 2023, the state has experienced six straight months of revenues falling short of expectations. The single biggest factor is the unprecedented growth of the state budget since FY2021. The $15 billion increase in state spending contextualizes the seemingly modest projected revenue growth of 1.6 percent for FY2024 by highlighting that the base is very inflated.