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Johns Hopkins’ Ashley Berner on Educational Pluralism & DemocracyApril 17, 2024 - 2:53 pm
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Industrial Policy Reimaged: Can Government Improve Free MarketsApril 16, 2024 - 12:34 pm
39th U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky for National Poetry MonthApril 10, 2024 - 12:16 pm
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Posting Patient Prices: Transparency Cure for Hospital Blank ChecksApril 9, 2024 - 11:51 am
Pioneer Institute Statement on the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ March Tax Revenue CollectionsApril 4, 2024 - 3:34 pm
WSJ: “The Massachusetts Health-Reform Mess” Swing and Miss
/0 Comments/in Blog, Blog: Healthcare, Healthcare /byThe late John Calfee, has an opinion piece in the WSJ this morning on Massachusetts health reform. The piece is right on with a few fundamental points. One, that it was hubris to take the state experiment of 2% of the population—in a high income, high insured, and high medical infrastructure state– and mandate it on all other states, as if they are all the same. I also think Governor Patrick’s most recent bill is ill-defined and misguided in its potential anti-market elements. However, there were a few statements that are on very shaky grounds in the piece or are just wrong. (Gov. Deval Patrick wants a new law to force the unions into the Connector.) This is not true, […]
Scott Walker’s double
/0 Comments/in Blog, Related Education Blogs /byThe biggest danger that the teachers’ unions, and really all public sector employee unions, face is that of “copycat” Walkers. But let’s be clear: The Wisconsin battle over collective bargaining is not going to play out in Massachusetts like it has in the Badger state. The fact is that there are important differences between our states. Our major collective bargaining issues are local in the short-term and in the longer-term both state and local. In the near-term that means we need to focus on giving local municipal leaders the same ability that the state has to purchase health care benefits in bulk and without negotiating collectively on the benefit packages put forward. But lest unions take the wrong lesson—that Massachusetts […]
Worcester Telegram and Gazette: Black history — blacked out
/in Oped: Education, Oped: US History, Opeds, Related Education Blogs /byUntil state education leaders reinstate the MCAS history requirement, students won’t know important chapters in black — and Massachusetts — history.
What does the Madison catfight mean for teachers?
/0 Comments/in Blog, Related Education Blogs /byThe public debate in Wisconsin over the effort by Governor Scott Walker to curtail collective bargaining rights for public employees has all the stuff of a great teaching moment. It has the governor of a state that is known for and has a long history of progressivism. The president of the United States has lined up against the governor. Thousands of workers are swarming into the State House, and legislators exiting across state lines. The story also has the benefit of being about something we all understand—we are broke. We’re broke as states and a nation, and how are we going to work through this. The story has the added benefit of being something familiar to all of us: We […]
Good Stuff in Transportation
/0 Comments/in Blog, News /byIt’s easy to be cynical in this day and age, so we’ve put together a transcript of our May 2010 transportation forum to restore your faith. In it, we get to hear from three transportation innovators doing great work with limited resources. I urge you to give it a read. We hear from Jon Davis from the MBTA who explains how their Open Data Initiative has spawned a number of privately-developed applications. The MBTA’s strategic approach is a subtle, but crucially important one — rather than decide what their customers want, then slog through an in-house software and hardware procurement and development process — the T cleaned up their data and made it available to private developers. The result? A […]