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eDIGEST April 2011
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Archives | Upcoming Events | Quick Reference List | Alumni & Student Newsmakers | Faculty in the
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1. “Women in Politics” –
Lunch panel presented by the Women in Public Policy group at the
Emily Campbell, Manager of the western regional office, EMILY’s List
Karen
Middleton, Executive Director of Emerge
Jennifer West (MPP cand. 2012), Vice Mayor of Emeryville
April 1, 2011, at 12 noon, Room 250
2. International Development Speaker Series: “Michael Kobori speaks on international economic development and human rights”
April 4th, 12 noon - 1:30 pm, Room 250 GSPP
Michael Kobori (MPP 1995) is currently Vice-President, Supply Chain Social and Environmental Sustainability at Levi Strauss & Co.
Presented by the International Public Policy Group
3. 2nd
Annual Michael Nacht Distinguished Lecture in
Politics and Public Policy:
“Oil and Money: The Twin Crises of 2010” (and how public policy can protect our vital interests)”
Former Senator Bob Graham, co-chair of the investigation of the BP Oil Spill and member of the Financial Inquiry Commission
April 5 | 5:30-7:30 p.m. | Toll and Bechtel Rooms, Alumni House
RSVP by April 4 by calling Dana Stern at 510-642-5032, or by emailing Dana Stern at dstern@berkeley.edu .
4. “Kids
First: Five Big Ideas for Transforming Children’s Lives and
David Kirp will be talk about his new book and the themes of transformation that emerged from his service on the 2008 Presidential Transition Team at two events:
April 6th, 7:00-8:30 pm Books, Inc. Laurel Village, 3515 California Street, San Francisco, CA 94118
April 20th,
7:00-8:30 pm, Books, Inc.
5. 2011 Aaron Wildavsky Forum on Public Policy: “The Coming Transformation of American Medicine”
Lecture |
April 7 | 7:30-9 p.m. | 105
David
Cutler, economist at
6. Wildavsky Forum Panel Discussion
Prof. Jane Mauldon, panel chair
Prof. Richard Scheffler
Visiting Professor Jennifer Granholm
Friday,
April 8, 9 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. Room 250,
7. “Behind the AB 32 Lawsuit: A Call for More Responsible Environmental Policy”
Panel Discussion | April 11 | 1:30-3 p.m. | 155 Donner Lab
Alegria De La Cruz, Legal Director, Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment; Rafael Aguilera, Principal, Verde Group
Sponsored by the Graduate Assembly, the
8. “Private insurance market reforms under the Affordable Care Act”
Herb
Schultz, Regional Director,
Wednesday, April 13th, 2:00 p.m. Room 105 GSPP
Presented by the student-led course Public Policy of Health Reform Implementation
9. 7th Annual Environmental Policy Group Alumni-Student Dinner
April 14th,
6:00-9:00 p.m.,
John Mikulin (MPP cand. 2011) - EPG Chair
Dr. Blas Perez Henriquez (MPP 1992/PhD 2002) - Executive Director, Center for Environmental Public Policy
Asher
Burns-Burg - Co-President,
John Andrew (MPP 1996) - Executive Manager for Climate Change, California Department of Water Resources
Please RSVP for this event by March 31st by clicking here
10. Cal Day Open House: “Can We Engage in Civil Discourse and Work Together to Solve Public Problems?”
April 16, 2-3:30 p.m. Alumni House
Henry E. Brady, Dean of the
Honorable Roger E. Dickinson
Prof. Paul Pierson, Political Science
Sponsored
by: Cal Class of 1968, Center on Civility & Democratic Engagement at the
11. “Honoring new women faculty and academic appointees”
Special guest, newest faculty member, Sarah Anzia, and special video message from Visiting Lecturer, Gov. Jennifer Granholm.
April 19, 5:30 pm, GSPP Living Room
Presented by the Women in Public Policy student group at GSPP
12. “Building our Awareness: How We Engage Race in our Work”
A Race and Policy Symposium presented by Students of Color in Public Policy
April 20, 2011, noon – 5:00 p.m. Goldman School of Public Policy
Keynote speaker: Christopher Edley, Dean of Berkeley Law School
Welcome address by Dean Henry Brady
Featured panelists include:
Jack Glaser,
Rucker Johnson,
Steven Raphael,
13. “Policy Driving Health Care Transformation: IT and Health Reform”
Lecture | April 20 | 2-3:30 p.m. | 355 Goldman School of Public Policy
Erwin Cho,
Director of Financial Sustainability for
Sponsor:
Event Contact: keriann@berkeley.edu
14. “Should
Public Policy Professor Jesse Rothstein
April 20, 4:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m, School of Education – 2515 Tolman Hall
15. “
Seminar |
April 22 | 12-1:30 p.m. | Goldman
Rebecca
Blanco, Office of Community Planning and Development,
Kara
Douglas, Affordable Housing,
John T. Nagle, Attorney at Law, Goldfarb & Lipman LLP
Presented by
the
Event Contact: housing@haas.berkeley.edu , 510-642-0891
16. “
Robert Collier, visiting scholar at the Center for Environmental Public Policy at UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy and a consultant to nonprofit organizations on climate and energy policy
Monday, April 25, 12:00 pm. Location: TBD. More info
Presented by the Center for Latin American Studies, UC Berkeley
17.
“Realizing the Vision of a High-Speed Rail System in
May 2-3,
2011,
For more information and registration details, please send an email to CEPP.
Presented by
the Center for Environmental Public Policy at the
18. Commencement of the Graduating Class of 2011
Saturday, May 14, 2011. International House
ALUMNI AND STUDENT NEWSMAKERS
1. “CalSTRS reports big gap between assets, pension obligations” (Sacramento Bee, March 31, 2011); story citing ED DERMAN (MPP 1978); http://www.sacbee.com/2011/03/31/3517578/calstrs-reports-big-gap-between.html#ixzz1ICFRQQev
2. “Consumer Protections: Patient’s Bill of Rights” (States News Service, March 31, 2011); newswire citing KAREN POLLITZ (MPP 1982).
3. “
4. “Can Congress and the White House reach a deal before the latest round of funding for Uncle Sam expires?” (The Nightly Business Report [PBS], March 29, 2011); features commentary by MICHAEL LINDEN (MPP 2007).
5. “GOP Has Put Itself into a Corner on the Budget” (Roll Call, March 29, 2011); commentary by STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976).
6. “Broad and Bipartisan Support for Clean Energy and Job Creation” (States News Service, March 29, 2011); newswire citing LAURA WISLAND (MPP 2008).
7. “Political Blotter: Lawmakers: Eat California grown, aid the economy” (San Jose Mercury News, March 28, 2011); column citing MIKE GENEST (MPP 1980); http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_17713738?IADID=Search-www.mercurynews.com-www.mercurynews.com
8. “
9. “Budget cuts leave cops shorthanded” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 25, 2011); story citing DEBORAH LANDIS (MPP 2007); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/24/MNTA1IISVC.DTL#ixzz1Hw0aQ3M6
10. “Twitter would move Tenderloin forward” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 24, 2011); column citing CARMEN CHU (MPP 2003); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/23/BAFE1II5UI.DTL#ixzz1HXHkK3mb
11. “Report: Many Bay Area bridges and overpasses need more maintenance” (Contra Costa Times, March 23, 2011); story citing organization co-founded and directed by STUART COHEN (MPP 1997); http://www.insidebayarea.com/top-stories/ci_17677239
12. “The Planned Parenthood government shutdown” (Salon.com, March 23, 2011); analysis citing STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976); http://www.salon.com/technology/how_the_world_works/2011/03/23/planned_parenthood_and_the_budget_showdown/index.html
13. “We’re Not Broke: We Could Pay All Our Bills Without Borrowing a Cent” (On The Hill, March 22, 2011); analysis by MICHAEL LINDEN (MPP 2007).
14. “Daniel Borenstein: Our elected officials, not labor unions, are the real problem” (Oakland Tribune, March 21, 2011); editorial by DANIEL BORENSTEIN (MPP 1980/MJ 1985); http://www.insidebayarea.com/news/ci_17658575
15. “AT&T to buy T-Mobile, creating wireless giant” (Los Angeles Times, March 21, 2011); story citing DEREK TURNER (MPP 2006); http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-att-tmobile-20110321,0,4651801.story
16. “Metro to lure bike-to-rail commuters” (The Washington Post, March 21, 2011); story citing HARLEY FRAZIS (MPP 1981/PhD); http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/metro-to-lure-bike-to-rail-commuters/2011/03/18/ABiJmZ3_story.html
17. “Production Networks and Trade Patterns in
18. “Cultural Exchange: ‘Presumed Guilty’ turns the lens on
19. “Insurer wants focus on what drives up health costs” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 19, 2011); story citing MARIAN MULKEY (MPP/MPH 1989); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/18/MNCE1I3D1T.DTL#ixzz1HG3uxmQZ
20. “Health Service Board blamed for SF’s rising costs” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 16, 2011); story citing CARMEN CHU (MPP 2003); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/15/MN361IBT07.DTL#ixzz1Gmb8QEgP
21. “Meanwhile in
22. “
23. “Investigating Farm Subsidies on a Global Stage. The collaborative effort among journalists to make the E.U.’s farm subsidies transparent is a striking example of how developing networks and providing support for reporters can result in important stories being told” Nieman Reports, Spring 2011); story citing JACK THURSTON (MPP 1999); http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/reports/article/102601/Investigating-Farm-Subsidies-on-a-Global-Stage.aspx
24. “Surgeon general discusses preventive health in
25. “Health Reform: Lessons Learned During the First Year” (Congressional Documents and Publications, March 16, 2011); congressional testimony citing JANUARY ANGELES (MPP 2002).
26. “Polls Undercut Budget Demagogues’ Message” (Roll Call, March 15, 2011); commentary by STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976).
27. “Debt leaves no wiggle room for disasters” (CNNMoney.com, March 15, 2011); story citing STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976).
28. “Lawmakers bet that
29. “Mideast crisis fuels new debate on oil” (
30. “Western Colleges Commission Gives UCSF High Marks for Collaboration and Diversity” (Targeted News Service, March 11, 2011); newswire citing JOSEPH CASTRO (MPP 1990/PhD).
31. “The
32. “
33. “S.F. ranked-choice mess looms for mayor’s race” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 10, 2011); column citing DAVID LATTERMAN (MPP 2002); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/09/BALE1I7DCV.DTL#ixzz1GDp52KRe
34. “Conventional gas-powered cars starting to match hybrids in fuel efficiency” (The Washington Post, March 10, 2011); story citing ROLAND HWANG (MPP 1992); http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/conventional-gas-powered-cars-starting-to-match-hybrids-in-fuel-efficiency/2011/03/08/ABcPYjP_story.html
35. “California Wine Country Offers Environment Friendly Events for Earth Day Celebrations” (Travel Business Review, March 10, 2011); story citing ALLISON JORDAN (MPP 2004).
36. House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Terrorism,
Nonproliferation, and Trade Hearing; “
37. “Release: The Real Heroes of the 1998 Budget Surplus: Clinton and His Economy” (States News Service, March 7, 2011); analysis by MICHAEL LINDEN (MPP 2007).
38. “Latest not ‘greatest’” (The Sunday Mail (
39. “A Free Man Still Looks Over His Shoulder in Mexico” (New York Times, March 5, 2011); story citing LAYDA NEGRETE (MPP 1998/PhD candidate) and ROBERTO HERNÁNDEZ (PhD candidate); http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/05/world/americas/05mexico.html?_r=1&emc=eta1
40. “Next up for Senate: votes on two budget plans, more than $50 billion apart” (The Christian Science Monitor, March 4, 2011); story citing STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976); http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2011/0304/Next-up-for-Senate-votes-on-two-budget-plans-more-than-50-billion-apart
41. “They’ve started, but will they finish?” (The Times Higher Education Supplement, Pg. 38 No. 1988, March 3, 2011); story citing NANCY BOROW SHULOCK (MPP 1978).
42. “
43. “Lake Tahoe Restoration” (KQED public radio, March 3, 2011); features commentary by PATRICK WRIGHT (MPP 1987); Listen to the story
44. “State Duals-Demo Plans Vary, but Sharing Medicare Savings a Commonality” (Inside Health Reform, Vol. 3 No. 9, March 2, 2011); story citing TOBY DOUGLAS (MPP 2001/MPH 2002).
45. “Making Immigration Work for American Minorities” (Congressional Documents and Publications, March 1, 2011); congressional testimony citing JULIA BIXLER ISAACS (MPP 1985).
46. “Why Not Try a
47. “Pay for California’s 72 community college district chancellors varies widely” (Sacramento Bee, February 27, 2011); story citing NANCY BOROW SHULOCK (MPP 1978); http://www.sacbee.com/2011/02/27/3433947/pay-for-californias-72-community.html
48. “Merging administrative costs could save Bay Area transit agencies $100M” (San Francisco Examiner, February 21, 2011); story citing STUART COHEN (MPP 1997); http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/transportation/2011/02/merging-costs-could-save-transit-100m#ixzz1HRKnzXtn
49. “Schools Sacrificing Gifted Programs to Balance Budgets” (The New York Times, February 20, 2011); story citing EDGAR CABRAL (MPP 2005); http://www.baycitizen.org/education/story/schools-sacrificing-gifted-programs/
50. “
51. “Snow barriers; wheelchair users often struggle to
navigate
52. “Growing Push to Make It in
53. “Classroom cash: Educators, researchers clash on school spending report” (Santa Cruz Sentinel, February 7, 2011); story citing JANNELLE LEE KUBINEC (MPP 1997); http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/ci_17315045?IADID=Search-www.santacruzsentinel.com-www.santacruzsentinel.com
54. “Report:
55. “
FACULTY IN THE NEWS
1. “Capitol Alert Blog: Lawmakers eulogize
long-time budget adviser A. Alan Post” (Sacramento Bee Online, March 31, 2011);
story citing
2. Robert Reich’s Blog: “Heading for a double
dip. Nobody in
3. “Revisionist art history as
4. “Why Small Nuclear Reactors Could Make Sense, but May Not Get Built” (Atlantic Magazine, March 27 2011); commentary by DAN KAMMEN; http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/03/why-small-nuclear-reactors-could-make-sense-but-may-not-get-built/73081/#
5. “Scrimping on regulators puts public safety at risk” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 27, 2011); op-ed by ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/26/IN6H1IGT7K.DTL#ixzz1HvCrsh60
6. “Former Gov. Granholm joins Pew Center as energy adviser” (Detroit Free Press, March 23, 2011); story citing Visiting Lecturer JENNIFER GRANHOLM; http://www.freep.com/article/20110323/NEWS15/110323021/Granholm-joins-Pew-energy-adviser
7. Robert Reich’s Blog: “Jobs, the deficit, and Republican whoppers” (Christian Science Monitor, March 23, 2011); commentary by ROBERT REICH; http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Robert-Reich-s-Blog/2011/0323/Jobs-the-deficit-and-Republican-whoppers
8. “Michigan Ex-Governor Granholm Said to Reject Consumer Bureau Job” (Bloomberg News, March 22, 2011); story citing Visiting Lecturer JENNIFER GRANHOLM; http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-22/michigan-ex-governor-granholm-said-to-reject-consumer-bureau-job.html
9. “East Contra Costa welcomes power plants in their backyard” (Contra Costa Times (*requires registration), March 22, 2011); story citing LEE FRIEDMAN; http://www.contracostatimes.com/growth/ci_17656302?nclick_check=1
10. “Op-Ed: Paddling of schoolchildren needs to end” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 21, 2011); op-ed by DAVID KIRP; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/21/EDC81I7KH6.DTL
11. “
12. As the Global Economy Trembles, Our Nation’s Capitol Fiddles” (Huffington Post, March 17, 2011); blog by ROBERT REICH; http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/as-the-global-economy-tre_b_837216.html
13. “The children of Reagan’ reshaping Congress. Many of the GOP freshman class elected to the House last year are members of Generation X: Their average age is 47, and many of them formed their political notions during the Reagan presidency” (Los Angeles Times, March 17, 2011); analysis citing HENRY BRADY; http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-new-congress-20110317,0,7668992.story
14. “
15. “Jobs growing slowly, wages falling fast” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 13, 2011); op-ed by ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/12/INQU1I6BPO.DTL#ixzz1GcDKJLmk
16. “Wisconsin Foes of Union Bill Weigh Response to Governor’s Win” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 11, 2011); newswire citing ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fg%2Fa%2F2011%2F03%2F10%2Fbloomberg1376-LHVDT60D9L3501-6122493IB4O3KRAA6M1BALAT6U.DTL
17. “Wisconsin Update” (Forum, KQED Radio, March 10, 2011); features commentary by ROBERT REICH; Listen to the program
18. “Green buildings make owners more cash” (TG Daily, March 9, 2011); story citing JOHN QUIGLEY; http://www.tgdaily.com/sustainability-features/54550-green-buildings-make-owners-more-cash
19. “The birth of the People’s Party” (The Berkeley Blog, March 8, 2011); commentary by ROBERT REICH; http://blogs.berkeley.edu/2011/03/08/the-birth-of-the-peoples-party/
20. “David Kirp: ‘Kids First’” (Forum with Michael Krasny, KQED Radio, March 8, 2011); program featuring DAVID KIRP; Listen to this program
21. “Women Keep House (and Maybe Senate?) Better Than Men” (New York Times Online, March 7, 2011); column citing newest faculty member SARAH ANZIA; http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/07/women-keep-house-and-maybe-senate-better-than-men/?scp=1&sq=Sarah%20Anzia&st=cse
22. “Democrats should start talking about GOP shakedown” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 6, 2011); op-ed by ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/05/IN2K1I1BBA.DTL#ixzz1FxLuqWPb
23. “Economist Robert Reich is driven to end income inequality” (Los Angeles Times, March 6, 2011); interview with ROBERT REICH; http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-himi-reich-20110306,0,4101014.story
24. “Democrats Smart from Attempts to Weaken Unions” (Morning Edition, National Public Radio®, March 3, 2011); features commentary by ROBERT REICH; Listen to the story
25. “Former Mich Gov. Jennifer Granholm, teaching at UC Berkeley, decries Wisconsin’s effort to ‘villify’ unions, collective bargaining” (San Francisco Chronicle Online, March 2, 2011); interview with JENNIFER GRANHOLM and citing DANIEL MULHERN and GOLDMAN SCHOOL; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/nov05election/detail?entry_id=83957#ixzz1FxDQDzaV
26. “How Democrats can become relevant again (and rescue the nation while they’re at it)” (The Berkeley Blog, March 3, 2011); commentary by ROBERT REICH; http://blogs.berkeley.edu/2011/03/03/how-democrats-can-become-relevant-again-and-rescue-the-nation-while-theyre-at-it/
27. “The New America Foundation (NAF) holds a
book discussion on ‘Kids First: Five Big Ideas for Transforming Children’s
Lives and
1. “CalSTRS reports big gap between assets, pension obligations” (Sacramento Bee, March 31, 2011); story citing ED DERMAN (MPP 1978); http://www.sacbee.com/2011/03/31/3517578/calstrs-reports-big-gap-between.html#ixzz1ICFRQQev
By Dale Kasler
CalSTRS
today reported a big leap in its unfunded liabilities—the gap between its
assets and its pension obligations to
In a report to its governing board, CalSTRS staff said the gap grew to $56 billion in the fiscal year that ended last June, an increase of $15.5 billion. That left the pension fund 71 percent funded. Most experts say systems should be at least 80 percent funded.
Even though CalSTRS earned a robust investment return of almost 13 percent in calendar 2010, the size of the gap is daunting and will require additional contributions, said Ed Derman, deputy chief executive officer at the California State Teachers’ Retirement System.
“We can’t invest our way out of it,” he said.
Previously, CalSTRS had talked about approaching the Legislature in 2011 for help. Derman said that’s unrealistic in light of the state’s budget mess. But CalSTRS’ funding shortfall can’t linger forever, he said.
“It doesn’t have to be this year, but ... the longer you wait, the more it will cost,” he said.
School districts contribute $2.3 billion to CalSTRS and teachers around $2.2 billion. The state currently contributes $573 million a year to the teachers’ fund.
The state’s contribution will grow next year by around $100 million because of an automatic trigger in CalSTRS’ funding mechanism, Derman said. But CalSTRS needs increased contributions in the hundreds of millions of dollars, he said, to make itself healthy.
2. “Consumer Protections: Patient’s Bill of Rights” (States News Service, March 31, 2011); newswire citing KAREN POLLITZ (MPP 1982).
Yesterday, I wrote about the Schley family who experienced first-hand the new consumer protections in the Affordable Care Act. There are a number of provisions that will move us towards a fairer, more affordable health insurance system—including the Patient’s Bill of Rights.
Because of health care reform, insurance companies:
Can no longer deny coverage to children younger than 19 because of a pre-existing condition (Protection for adults will go into effect in 2014).
Can’t take away your coverage based on an unintentional mistake you or your employer made on an application (also known as rescission of health coverage).
Must allow most children up to age 26 to stay on or be added to their parents’ family health plan.
Must stop putting lifetime dollar limits on coverage (annual dollar limits are being phased out between now and 2014.)
Must provide consumers their choice of any available primary care doctor or pediatrician in a plan’s network.
Must ensure access to out-of-network emergency care without prior authorization or higher cost sharing that would otherwise be charged.
Must meet certain basic standards when they review a consumer’s appeal of a denied claim. (The law also strengthens consumers’ rights to an independent “external” review when an insurer’s “internal review” upholds a claims denial.)
For most consumers, these protections kicked in sometime over the past few months at the start of a new plan or policy year. (Some plans in place when the Affordable Care Act was passed in March 2010 were “grandfathered” or exempt from some—but not all provisions. Always check with your plan or employer to find out if your plan is grandfathered.)….
3. “
By Chris Metinko –
“He epitomized what we all want from our public servants,” said county Supervisor Keith Carson. “He had the skills to be in private practice, but chose to be in the public sector.”
The county’s board of supervisors held a moment of silence for Winnie at their regular meeting Tuesday morning. Many county staff members attended the meeting as supervisors shared thoughts and memories of Winnie. Flowers were left at the table Winnie usually occupied at board meetings.
“I had grown very fond of Richard, as we worked together on legal issues, some thornier than others,” said Supervisor Scott Haggerty in a statement read by fellow Supervisor Nate Miley. “Richard was a dear, dear friend, mentor and confidant. I will miss him.” …
As county counsel, Winnie represented the county in a
variety of legal cases through the years, including the county’s fight to ban
gun shows at its fairgrounds and various legal clashes with local professional
sports teams—including a battle with the Oakland Raiders over costs associated
with their move back to
“He was one of the most ethical people I’ve ever met in government,” said Oakland City Attorney John Russo, who sometimes found himself opposing Winnie and the county in lawsuits. “He was a great listener, great diplomat and knew how to come to an agreement.” …
County officials are hoping to have a public memorial service for Winnie.
4. “Can Congress and the White House reach a deal before the latest round of funding for Uncle Sam expires?” (The Nightly Business Report [PBS], March 29, 2011); features commentary by MICHAEL LINDEN (MPP 2007).
… DARREN GERSH: Both Republicans and Democrats say they don’t want to shut down the government, but that can’t be ruled out when government funding runs out on April 8. It is possible Congress will keep adding one week or two week extensions of the deadline, trimming spending a few billion dollars each time. Former Republican Congressman Vin Weber says some budget hawks are pleased with the results of that strategy.
VIN WEBER, FORMER MEMBER OF CONGRESS: So the people that are arguing for the one-slice-at-a-time strategy have something to say. Hey, we cut a few billion here and a few billion there and if we keep on doing this, we will have made some significant reductions in the budget.
GERSH: The problem, Weber says, is that the easy slices are now gone, leaving more politically difficult cuts that may face a presidential veto. And many Republicans are refusing to extend government funding unless the package comes with special legislation called riders that strip funding for the implementation of health care, for EPA regulations and for abortion. The Center for American Progress’ Michael Linden says Democrats should push back, forcing Republicans to focus on the real fight.
MICHAEL
5. “GOP Has Put Itself into a Corner on the Budget” (Roll Call, March 29, 2011); commentary by STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976).
By Stan Collender
Budget-watchers
everywhere seem to be asking two questions this week as Congress returns to
A similarly tough budget
situation played out in the late 1970s when the federal budget process as we
know it was just getting started. The Republican members of the House Budget
Committee made it clear year after year to then-Chairman Bob Giaimo (D-Conn.) that there was no way they would vote for
any budget resolution that didn’t completely capitulate to GOP demands. Their
position forced Giaimo to move to the left with his
budget resolutions to win the support of enough Democrats so he could move the
bills to the House floor. That gave Democratic Reps. Elizabeth Holtzman of
... Nevertheless, he had no choice but to move in their direction because committee Republicans refused to consider a compromise. Because of this, the GOP always ended up with even less of what it wanted than otherwise would have been the case.
Today’s GOP budget dilemma is similar in many respects to the one it imposed on itself 30-plus years ago…. This has presented Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) with a Giaimo-like choice: Completely capitulate to the tea party or move toward the Democrats to get enough votes to pass a continuing resolution in the House….
Stan Collender is a partner at Qorvis Communications and author of “The Guide to the Federal Budget.” His blog is capitalgainsandgames.com.
6. “Broad and Bipartisan Support for Clean Energy and Job Creation” (States News Service, March 29, 2011); newswire citing LAURA WISLAND (MPP 2008).
BERKELEY -- In a bold move to
bolster one of the few bright spots in Californias
economy and set a precedent for strong renewable electricity standards
nationwide, the California Legislature today approved a bill that would require
utilities in the state to obtain at least 33 percent of their electricity from
clean, renewable sources, such as the wind and sun, by 2020. Promoted by the
governor and legislative leaders in both houses as part of a green jobs
stimulus package, the bill would create the most aggressive renewable energy
requirement in the country and position
“Today’s vote is not
just a victory for
Introduced by State Sen.
Joe Simitian (D-Palo Alto), the bill (SBX1 2)
garnered the backing of a broad range of electric utilities, ratepayer groups,
environmental organizations and renewable energy businesses. UCS advised the
Wisland said that the federal
government should follow
7. “Political Blotter: Lawmakers: Eat California grown, aid the economy” (San Jose Mercury News, March 28, 2011); column citing MIKE GENEST (MPP 1980); http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_17713738?IADID=Search-www.mercurynews.com-www.mercurynews.com
… March 23
Mike Genest, the finance director under Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, had a revealing comment in a wide-ranging budget discussion on Capital Public Radio today.
Genest, now a political consultant advising Republican senators who are in talks with Gov. Jerry Brown, was asked if Brown’s tax extension should be placed on the ballot. He said:
“As a Republican, I kind of hate to say it but our tax burden is less now because of recession. The amount of the economy going to state government is lower than it has been for several years. Except for right at the bottom of the recession, you go back 30 years to find tax revenues at this low a level. So, there is a case to be made that we might need to keep those taxes at a higher level for a while.”
He went on to say, however, that Republicans “shouldn’t lose the opportunity while contemplating doing this. We ought to take that opportunity to get serious reforms.” …
The question remains whether Democrats continue to view the Republican ask as an overreach—especially if it’s known that Genest considers the taxation levels just fine.
-- Steven Harmon
8. “
--Garance Burke, Noaki Schwartz, Associated Press
(03-26) 04:00 PDT
Federal officials say the
system of sensors has helped them to validate the impact of nuclear fallout
from the overheated
In
About 20 monitors of 124
nationwide were out of service earlier this week, including units in
EPA officials said the
program effectively safeguarded the country against a threat that did not
materialize. They said they put portable monitors in place as backups and
repaired the permanent ones in
“The network as a whole continues to detect even the slightest traces of radiation in the air,” the agency said in a statement to the Associated Press…..
9. “Budget cuts leave cops shorthanded” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 25, 2011); story citing DEBORAH LANDIS (MPP 2007); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/24/MNTA1IISVC.DTL#ixzz1Hw0aQ3M6
--John Wildermuth
As the green eyeshade
brigade wrestles over
When former Mayor Gavin Newsom asked every city department to cut 10 percent of its budget, the Police Department agreed not to replace the 100 or so officers who retired or left the force last year, saving their salaries and the cost of the police academy classes that would have trained their replacements.
Problem is, those savings today can end up shrinking the department for years to come, which isn’t what members of the Police Commission want to see….
There’s nothing quick about hiring and training a police officer. If a new academy class started in September, the recruits “wouldn’t be in the field until 2012,” the chief said.
Plus each 50-member academy class costs about $5 million, including $4 million in pay and benefits for the recruits, said Deborah Landis, the department’s budget guru….
10. “Twitter would move Tenderloin forward” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 24, 2011); column citing CARMEN CHU (MPP 2003); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/23/BAFE1II5UI.DTL#ixzz1HXHkK3mb
--C.W. Nevius
A proposed Twitter tax break to get the microblogging
site to move into
The battle over gentrification in the Tenderloin was fought in the 1980s.
The Tenderloin lost.
Today, looking at the shuttered restaurants and store fronts, wondering why there is no supermarket in the neighborhood and watching stores struggle, you wonder why it was so important to keep the place from changing.
Now the area—particularly the blighted strip of graffiti and plywood in Mid-Market—is getting a second chance. A vote by the Board of Supervisors could approve a deal to give the microblogging company Twitter and other companies that move to the area a six-year suspension of the city’s payroll tax on new jobs. The deal could be the beginning of a revival….
The city’s largest employee union pushed to have the payroll tax restricted to just Mid-Market. That died a quick death.
“Most of the folks from the Tenderloin we heard from were in favor of the tax break,” said Supervisor Carmen Chu, chairwoman of the Budget and Finance Committee, which had a hearing on the tax break Wednesday. “Besides, the reality is that you are not finding huge office buildings there that a big corporation could take over.” …
But the real issue is money. The premise is that Twitter has bushel baskets of money stacked around its offices, so it should hand some of it over. The idea is to create a Community Benefit Agreement to channel money to the neighborhood….
But forcing the issue and making unreasonable demands will backfire. Twitter has already said that it will move elsewhere if the tax break isn’t approved, although opponents pooh-poohed the idea.
“Is Twitter really going to risk its urban hipster image by moving to the suburbs?” [Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, who opposed moving the legislation forward] asked.
Maybe,
“Facebook is not here,” she said. “Google is not here. Those are companies with a generally hip Internet image.” …
11. “Report: Many Bay Area bridges and overpasses need more maintenance” (Contra Costa Times, March 23, 2011); story citing organization co-founded and directed by STUART COHEN (MPP 1997); http://www.insidebayarea.com/top-stories/ci_17677239
By Denis Cuff – Contra Costa Times
One in five Bay Area overpasses and bridges on
roads and freeways is designated by the federal government as needing repairs
or extra inspections, a coalition of transportation and environmental groups
reported Tuesday.
Calling for more
spending to repair the nation’s aging infrastructure, Transportation for
“We’re not saying the
bridges are in imminent danger of falling down,” said Seth Goddard, a Bay Area
spokesman for the Transportation for
Goddard, a spokesman for the Oakland-based group TransForm [co-founded and directed by Stuart Cohen], said the report was issued as Congress prepares to take up a federal transportation bill. The federal gas tax of 18.4 cents per gallon to pay for road and bridge maintenance has not been changed since 1993.
12. “The Planned Parenthood government shutdown” (Salon.com, March 23, 2011); analysis citing STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976); http://www.salon.com/technology/how_the_world_works/2011/03/23/planned_parenthood_and_the_budget_showdown/index.html
By Andrew Leonard
Demonstrators in
Could a successful defense of Planned Parenthood force a government shutdown?
The news that a handful of moderate Republican senators—Massachusetts’ Scott Brown, Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski and Maine’s Susan Collins—oppose cutting federal funding for the family planning nonprofit has defenders of the high-profile organization breathing a huge sigh of relief….
... But it’s a little too early to declare victory on any front. Because the real significance of Planned Parenthood’s reprieve won’t be apparent until we get hard numbers on the reaction of House Republicans to the likely Senate rebuff. Speaker of the House John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor may be willing to recognize reality and jettison the attack on Planned Parenthood, but rank and file Republicans—with special consideration given to the 86 freshman representatives—are likely to see surrender to the Senate as a call to revolt….
Longtime budget analyst Stan Collender recounted in his blog today the details of a talk he was asked to give on the debt ceiling to the Tea Party caucus in late February. Here’s the key section:
But the most interesting exchange came when the Tea Party state chairs openly threatened the reelection of the Tea Party supporting members of Congress who attended. This was anything but subtle. One of the chairs specifically pointed at the members and told them that the Tea Party had elected them and would run someone against them in the next election if they didn’t vote as expected. This was beyond a “passionate” exchange: It was angry with a strong take-no-prisoners attitude....
This presents the House Republican leadership with two very difficult choices on the federal budget.
On the one hand it can move further to the right to accommodate what the Tea Party wants. If it does that, however, it likely will adopt legislation that won’t pass in the Senate. By doing that the party will make the Tea Party happy but nothing will actually be accomplished.
On the other hand, as it did on the latest continuing resolution, the leadership can move toward the center and pick up enough Democratic votes to get something passed by Congress. Doing that will likely mean, however, that the GOP will lose the Tea Party not just on this issue but on most others at least until the next election. Given what I heard at the caucus meeting, Boehner and Cantor might both get primary challengers from Tea Party candidates in 2012.
As I’ve been saying for a while, all of this makes a government shutdown more likely to happen….
13. “We’re Not Broke: We Could Pay All Our Bills Without Borrowing a Cent” (On The Hill, March 22, 2011); analysis by MICHAEL LINDEN (MPP 2007).
--Scott Nance
This article was published by the Center for American Progress.
By Michael Linden, Michael Ettlinger
Really, we’re not broke.
The notion that the
But we’re not broke. Not at all. If we were, it would mean that we were out of
money, unable to pay our bills, or meet our financial obligations. We are none
of those things. A recent article by David J. Lynch of Bloomberg News points
out that, actually, the
Combining Canada-level
revenue with the spending levels in the presidents fiscal year 2012 budget plan
would produce an immediate budget surplus that would grow from about 0.6
percent of GDP in 2012 to 1.6 percent of GDP by 2021.* At that rate, debt as a
share of GDP would fall from 63 percent currently to under 40 percent 10 years
from now. In fact, we could even get to a balanced budget by 2015 with revenue
levels about 1 percentage point lower than
Instead, we are making a deliberate choice to borrow to pay for those obligations rather than to tax ourselves. And though conservatives begin to hyperventilate whenever revenue is even discussed, cutting services for middle-class families, the disadvantaged, and their political target du jour isn’t a great option either.
Michael Ettlinger is Vice President for Economic Policy at the Center for American Progress. Michael Linden is Director for Tax and Budget Policy at the Center….
14. “Daniel Borenstein: Our elected officials, not labor unions, are the real problem” (Oakland Tribune, March 21, 2011); editorial by DANIEL BORENSTEIN (MPP 1980/MJ 1985); http://www.insidebayarea.com/news/ci_17658575
By Daniel Borenstein – Staff columnist and editorial writer
THE SOLUTION is to stand up to public-employee unions, not bust them.
The misguided
conservative push to eliminate collective-bargaining rights for government
workers would, in
We shouldn’t blame labor unions for advocating for the best compensation they can get. Nor should we blame rich people and businesses for seeking tax breaks that unfairly advantage them. Blame elected officials, Democrats and Republicans alike, who sell out constituents and kowtow to special interests to preserve their political careers. They’re not leaders, they’re pawns.
Absent public outcry, our elected representatives listen first to those who finance their campaigns. Fortunately grass-roots discontent is growing louder. As voters learn of generous, guaranteed public-employee pension benefits while watching their own 401(k) plans shrink, they are outraged. As they see public schools disintegrating, the state’s prized university system collapsing, police and fire protection cut, and services for the needy imploding, they are speaking up.
The solutions are not easy. Going to war with workers by taking away their bargaining rights will only exacerbate the problem. With a reduced public service work force, we need more productivity and cooperation from those who remain….
A better alternative for all would be a reasoned mix of wage cuts and benefit concessions that might save some jobs. But that’s difficult without unions, especially when it comes to reducing public-employee pension benefits….
15. “AT&T to buy T-Mobile, creating wireless giant” (Los Angeles Times, March 21, 2011); story citing DEREK TURNER (MPP 2006); http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-att-tmobile-20110321,0,4651801.story
By David Sarno and Alex Pham
AT&T’s surprise $39-billion acquisition of T-Mobile USA Inc. could lead to more consolidation in the U.S. wireless industry, leaving the market with just two dominant providers—and the prospect of higher rates and fewer choices for consumers.
If approved by regulators, the newly expanded AT&T Inc. would have 130 million subscribers, allowing it to leapfrog arch-rival Verizon Wireless and its 94 million customers to become by far the nation’s largest wireless carrier. Sprint Nextel Corp. would be a distant third.
The potential market shift could force Verizon to consider making a large acquisition itself, analysts said, possibly including Sprint. But Sprint itself may snap up one or more of the many smaller providers, such as U.S. Cellular and MetroPCS….
AT&T asserted that the deal would increase competition and lower prices, citing a government study that said the average cellphone bill had dropped over the last decade, a period in which there were several large telecom mergers….
But critics of the deal warned that cheaper options could dry up if there were just three or fewer players left in the market.
“When you have two companies control almost the entire market, you’re almost back to reassembling the Ma Bell monopoly” when the old AT&T dominated local and long-distance service before it was broken up by federal regulators, said S. Derek Turner, research director for Free Press, a Northampton, Mass., nonprofit public interest group that focuses on media policy….
16. “Metro to lure bike-to-rail commuters” (The Washington Post, March 21, 2011); story citing HARLEY FRAZIS (MPP 1981/PhD); http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/metro-to-lure-bike-to-rail-commuters/2011/03/18/ABiJmZ3_story.html
By Ann Scott Tyson
With packs on their backs, reflective neon straps around their ankles and sometimes even headlamps, they are the proud few who brave traffic, rainstorms and thieves to bicycle to Metrorail stations.
Bike-to-rail commuters represent 0.7 percent of Metrorail riders—compared with about 40 percent who drive, 33 percent who walk and 22 percent who take the bus to stations.
But Metro’s long-range planners, desperate to avoid having to build 30,000 to 40,000 expensive parking spaces at stations to meet the projected surge in ridership over the next 20 years, have launched an initiative to quintuple the number of cyclists.
The Medical Center
Station in
Harley Frazis, 53, hops on a hybrid
mountain/touring bike at his
“If there’s intermittent rain, I’ll sweat it out,” he said….
Though their reasons for biking are different, Buchholz, Frazis and Harrington have all experienced what surveys show are the biggest frustrations of the pedaling crowd: Traffic dangers and theft.
... Frazis had two bikes stolen before he replaced his cable lock with a U-shaped metal bar lock….
All three voiced a strong interest in seeing more bike lanes and paths to make commuting safer….
17. “Production Networks
and Trade Patterns in
By Prema-chandra Athukorala
1. Introduction
Global production sharing—the break-up of the production process into geographically separated stages—has been an increasingly important facet of economic globalization over the past four decades. 1 With a modest start in the electronics and clothing industries, multinational production networks have gradually evolved and spread into many industries such as sports footwear, automobiles, televisions and radio receivers, sewing machines, office equipment, power and machine tools, cameras and watches, and printing and publishing. At the formative stage, the production sharing involved locating small fragments of the production process in a low-cost country and re-importing the assembled parts and components to be incorporated in the final product. Subsequently, production networks began to encompass many countries engaged in the assembly process at different stages, resulting in multiple border crossings by product fragments before they were incorporated in the final product. As international networks of parts and component supply have become firmly established, producers in advanced countries have begun to move the final assembly of an increasing range of consumer durables (e.g., computers, cameras, television sets, and automobiles) to overseas locations to be physically closer to their final users and/or take advantage of cheap labor (Brown and Linden 2005; Feenstra 2008).
References:
Brown,
Clair, and Greg Linden. 2005.
Offshoring in the Semiconductor Industry: A
Historical Perspective. In The Brookings
Trade Forum 2005: Offshoring White-Collar Work: The Issues and Implications, edited by Lael Brainard and Susan M.
Collins, pp. 270-333.
18. “Cultural Exchange:
‘Presumed Guilty’ turns the lens on
By Ken Ellingwood,
A young man is arrested off the street for a fatal shooting he did not commit. Never mind that he has an alibi and witnesses. Never mind that ballistics tests show no sign of gunpowder on his hands. Never mind that the young man who fingers him does so belatedly, and then can’t describe him.
Instead what ensues is a slow-motion train wreck of justice in which the suspect, Antonio Zuniga, is convicted — twice — by the same judge, even though investigators are discredited and the witness recants. Zuniga is sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Welcome to
The movie is “Presunto Culpable,” or “Presumed Guilty,” which, through
its tight focus on a low-profile throw-away case, offers a blistering
indictment of the country’s shrouded judicial apparatus. Architects of
The protagonist of
“Presumed Guilty” is Zuniga, an amateur hip-hop artist and seller of video
games who is grabbed by police in
Much of “Presumed Guilty’s” popular appeal lies in bolstering what many Mexicans already think about their nation’s legal system — that it is opaque, corrupt and unworthy of their trust….
19. “Insurer wants focus on what drives up health costs” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 19, 2011); story citing MARIAN MULKEY (MPP/MPH 1989); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/18/MNCE1I3D1T.DTL#ixzz1HG3uxmQZ
--Victoria Colliver, Chronicle Staff Writer
When health insurers notify members that rates are going up—often in the punishing double-digits—they typically blame rising medical costs.
They say the problem really isn’t theirs; it’s all the other pieces of the health-care puzzle that drive up costs that must be passed on to customers. This triggers a backlash of frustration and bad publicity….
Anthem Blue Cross,
Some critics say the rate increases look suspiciously like an attempt to pack them in before 2014, when most Americans will be required under the new federal health care law to buy coverage….
But the increases were
happening before the health legislation passed a year ago, said Marian Mulkey, a
director at the
Consumers’ premiums depend on age, coverage and the cost of care in their area, Mulkey said….
20. “Health Service Board blamed for SF’s rising costs” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 16, 2011); story citing CARMEN CHU (MPP 2003); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/15/MN361IBT07.DTL#ixzz1Gmb8QEgP
--Heather Knight, Rachel Gordon, Chronicle Staff Writers
Carmen Chu (Health Service System)
Eye-popping pension costs are the issue du jour
at City Hall these days, but city officials say skyrocketing health care
benefits are a far bigger concern—and some of them blame a little known group
of seven for exacerbating the problem.
They’re the members of the obscure Health Service Board, which meets monthly to select the medical and dental plans for employees and retirees, set the amount members pay for each plan, and set policy for the plans’ administration.
It sounds innocuous enough, but the City Charter requires that four of the seven be employees or retirees who are elected to their posts by the rest of the city’s employees and retirees. Two members are appointed by the mayor and one by the Board of Supervisors.
That means the majority of the board ensures that the 109,000 employees, retirees and family members who receive health care from the city have the best possible benefits—regardless of the effect on the city’s bottom line. It’s an extreme case of the fox guarding the henhouse, say some city officials who believe the setup has directly cost the city millions.
“It’s so much money, and it’s money nobody thinks about,” said Supervisor Sean Elsbernd, who served on the board for three years before quitting in frustration. “It felt like banging my head against a wall.” …
Supervisor Carmen Chu, who joined the board after Elsbernd quit, said the board could do a better job of cost containment and that she is not sure that the current makeup of the board sets that as a priority….
“It’s not so much how many labor seats and how many management seats there are as it is whether we can create a Health Service Board that values long-term solvency ... and cost management,” Chu said.
21. “Meanwhile in
By
Last week, as
Ginny Fang, executive director, ChinaSF
In the years since
Next week, I will travel
to
Although there will be challenges to navigate, I believe that there will be a net positive benefit to both American and Chinese businesses. With increased contact, there will be a greater level of understanding on both sides, enhancing the possibility of collaboration. And this, hopefully, will yield not only financial benefits, but also help drive the innovation needed to address the energy challenges we face together, as a planet….
22. “
--Rachel Gordon, Chronicle Staff Writer
A proposed housing development on
With the doomsday clock
ticking, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors rushed through approval Tuesday
to sell $70 million in tax increment bonds to fund redevelopment projects in
the emerging
The vote came one day before the state Legislature could decide to support Gov. Jerry Brown’s controversial plan to eliminate the redevelopment agencies in the state….
The Board of Supervisors
would have approved the issuance of the bonds for
Without the supervisors’ quick action, the city’s general fund, which pays for everything from police to recreation centers, could be on the hook to cover the financing costs….
“Given that there’s such a large level of uncertainty, we thought it was the most prudent thing to do, to make sure we got this completed and are fulfilling our obligations,” said Supervisor Carmen Chu, chair of the board’s Budget and Finance Committee.
23. “Investigating Farm Subsidies on a Global Stage. The collaborative effort among journalists to make the E.U.’s farm subsidies transparent is a striking example of how developing networks and providing support for reporters can result in important stories being told” Nieman Reports, Spring 2011); story citing JACK THURSTON (MPP 1999); http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/reports/article/102601/Investigating-Farm-Subsidies-on-a-Global-Stage.aspx
By Nils Mulvad
… When Farmsubsidy.org
was formed in 2005, its goal was to get access to information on who gets what
in farm subsidies from the E.U. and why. Already, in
Our investigative
network included people from various nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) along
with journalists. After we started to file legal challenges to get access to
this data in the
Our victory appeared total—and seemed to happen rather quickly….
But our good fortune lasted only briefly. In November 2010—just as the E.U. was negotiating the next seven-year plan for subsidies—the European Court of Justice ruled that it is a violation of human rights to publish the farm subsidy information to the extent now required of E.U. member states….
24. “Surgeon general
discusses preventive health in
By Elizabeth Pfeffer For the
Benjamin visited two
Benjamin also visited
the
In addition to cutting
costs and improving efficiency, electronic records provide a safeguard in the
event of a disaster, something Benjamin has experienced firsthand. Her coastal
“She comes from a unique perspective and wants to make sure people’s information is protected,” San Mateo Medical Center CEO Susan Ehrlich said.
25. “Health Reform: Lessons Learned During the First Year” (Congressional Documents and Publications, March 16, 2011); congressional testimony citing JANUARY ANGELES (MPP 2002).
Senate Finance Committee Hearing;
Testimony by Paul Water,
Ph.D., Senior Fellow, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities,
… Some Members of Congress have released a report that provides competing [to the CBO’s], and considerably larger, estimates of the cost to states of expanding Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. n8 That report is unreliable, however, and its estimates are overstated. As my colleague January Angeles has explained, the report cherry-picks worst-case scenarios from various studies that have widely varying scopes and time periods. n9 …
n9 January Angeles, Report on Costs to States of Expanding Medicaid Relies on Seriously Flawed Estimates, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, forthcoming….
26. “Polls Undercut Budget Demagogues’ Message” (Roll Call, March 15, 2011); commentary by STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976).
By Stan Collender
As anyone who spends any time trying to figure it out will tell you, the federal budget is exceedingly complex and difficult. Combine that with the increasingly emotional debate that surrounds federal deficits, the national debt, taxes and spending, and it’s not hard to understand how and why budget discussions almost always seem to involve misstatements, hyperbole and a word I use with increasing frequency these days when characterizing the budget debate—demagoguery.
I raise this because current polls continue to show that there’s a substantial disconnect between what’s being said about what people want on the budget and actual public opinion….
The most instructive of
the recent budget-related polls may well be from
… As a result, reliance on what some insist was THE message of Election Day 2010 is either an inadvertent or intentional misreading of voter sentiment. The first would be merely bad judgment; the second would require me to use that word—demagoguery—that has become an increasingly indispensable way to characterize the budget debate.
Stan Collender is a partner at Qorvis Communications and author of “The Guide to the Federal Budget.” His blog is capitalgainsandgames.com.
27. “Debt leaves no wiggle room for disasters” (CNNMoney.com, March 15, 2011); story citing STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976).
By Jeanne Sahadi, senior writer
Earthquakes.
Tsunamis. Nuclear crises.
Disasters are one reason why
The argument is straightforward, but not often discussed: Already high levels of debt leave the economy even more vulnerable in the wake of unexpected natural and man-made disasters.
“The
Indeed, the
“The classic example was [President Bush’s] response to Katrina when he channeled Lyndon Johnson and said he was going to spend whatever it takes to fix the problem.” …
28. “Lawmakers bet that
By Jim Sanders
Every smart phone,
laptop and personal computer in
Lawmakers are eyeing
potential revenue from two Senate bills that would make
The high-stakes issue
has attracted an army of lobbyists, with fighting spilling over into whether
At its core, the battle pits groups seeking to gain financially against others protecting their turf—turning some tribes against others, and Indian casinos willing to team with card clubs against those that are not.
One of the bills, Senate Bill 40, is sponsored by the California Online Poker Association, or COPA, a coalition of the Morongo Band of Mission Indians, the Commerce Casino, 28 other Indian tribes, and 13 other card clubs that are pushing to jointly offer Internet poker games….
A consulting group led by former state finance director Tim Gage concluded in a study funded by COPA that online poker in California would attract about 2.3 million players, create about 1,100 jobs and generate about $81 million per year for the state….
29. “Mideast crisis
fuels new debate on oil” (
… Roland Hwang, columnist, on AOL.com: “Solutions exist that can get
us off the oil market roller coaster, but they won’t be found in more domestic
oil fields. ...
30. “Western Colleges Commission Gives UCSF High Marks for Collaboration and Diversity” (Targeted News Service, March 11, 2011); newswire citing JOSEPH CASTRO (MPP 1990/PhD).
The WASC commission also praised the University for campuswide collaboration, citing the learning center and grant programs that require integrated efforts across UCSF’s four professional schools—dentistry, medicine, nursing and pharmacy. Collaboration was especially evident, according to the report, throughout the self-evaluation process led by the WASC Steering Committee and co-chaired by Joseph Castro, PhD, associate vice chancellor of Student Academic Affairs and Sally Marshall, PhD, vice provost of Academic Affairs.
“As they looked at UCSF, they didn’t see four separate professional schools and a graduate division,” Castro said. “They found one exceptionally strong health sciences campus that provides a quality education….
31. “The
… PARTICIPANTS: Jonathan Blum, deputy administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services; Juliette Cubanski, associate director of the Medicare Policy Project at the Kaiser Family Foundation; Mark Hayes of Health and Food and Drug Administration Business Practice Group at Greenberg Traurig; William Scanlon, consultant at the National Health Policy Forum; Tricia Neuman of the Kaiser Family Foundation; and Ed Howard of the Alliance….
32. “
By Adam Weintraub, Associated Press
... The Little Hoover
report estimated the shortfall at $240 billion for the 10 largest public
employee plans in
But the commission’s recommendations to address the problems have problems of their own, [Jack Ehnes, chief executive of the California State Teachers’ Retirement System] wrote. For one thing, he said, the legal obstacles to freezing benefits for current employees are nearly insurmountable and “would require a complete reversal of decades of judicial rulings.”
The commission also recommended coordinating pension benefits with Social Security, but Ehnes said such an approach could cost more than the current system. If teachers’ benefits were reduced to offset the benefit members would receive from Social Security, “the total cost of this coordinated benefit structure would be $1.8 billion more each year to the member and employer” because the same contribution has a higher return when invested in the pension fund than in the federal program, he said.
But that would depend on
how those payments are structured and how much the employees and employers are
asked to pay, said Stuart Drown,
executive director of the Little
Drown acknowledged that there is a long history of legal precedent limiting changes in pension benefits for current employees but said it still should be explored.
“Every change in pension plans is likely to lead to a lawsuit,” he said.
The fact remains, he said, that “contributions into the CalSTRS fund are not adequate to sustain the plan in the long term.” …
33. “S.F. ranked-choice mess looms for mayor’s race” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 10, 2011); column citing DAVID LATTERMAN (MPP 2002); http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/09/BALE1I7DCV.DTL#ixzz1GDp52KRe
--C.W. Nevius
We may be headed for a ballot box train wreck. November’s election will technically be the first mayoral election to be decided by controversial ranked-choice voting. (Gavin Newsom was essentially unopposed when he was re-elected mayor.)
Today’s Chamber of Commerce survey shows that voters find ranked-choice confusing and unsettling and would prefer a traditional two-candidate runoff. There’s even been talk of repealing ranked-choice voting at the ballot box….
While confusing, the system has stuck so far and it will almost certainly take a ballot box meltdown to galvanize voters—a crazy, unexpected outcome that leaves voters feeling bewildered and disenfranchised. If that’s what you want, the good news is all the factors—huge unwieldy field, no clear favorite, and lots of recognizable names with strong core support—are in place for that to happen.
The
“It’s going to be
District 10 on steroids,” said political
analyst David Latterman, who is advising mayoral
candidate David Chiu. “There were really only three candidates in
34. “Conventional gas-powered cars starting to match hybrids in fuel efficiency” (The Washington Post, March 10, 2011); story citing ROLAND HWANG (MPP 1992); http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/conventional-gas-powered-cars-starting-to-match-hybrids-in-fuel-efficiency/2011/03/08/ABcPYjP_story.html
By Peter Whoriskey
The new Chevrolet Cruze Eco can reach eye-popping fuel economy levels of more than 50 miles per gallon on the highway, which even in this era of hybrid-electric cars stands among the best.
But here’s the real trick: The Cruze Eco is neither a hybrid nor electric. It runs on that “old” technology, the conventional gasoline engine….
The new crop of
energy-efficient vehicles springs in many ways from the last time gas prices
spiked, in 2007. Sales of small cars jumped. Support for higher fuel economy
standards gathered momentum. And then during the automobile industry bailout,
congressional critics demanded to know why
“The near-death experience of the auto companies when they got hit with the last gas-price spike finally convinced them to get off the gas-guzzling business model,” said Roland Hwang, the transportation program director at the Natural Resources Defense Council. As a result, “we’re seeing 40 mpg become the new 30.” …
35. “California Wine Country Offers Environment Friendly Events for Earth Day Celebrations” (Travel Business Review, March 10, 2011); story citing ALLISON JORDAN (MPP 2004).
Wineries in the state of
Allison Jordan, executive director of the
[To learn more about
36. House Foreign Affairs
Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade Hearing; “
Testimony by Philip
Levy, Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute,
…
One such recent,
striking illustration of the source of
n5 Dedrick, Jason, Kenneth L. Kraemer, and Greg Linden, 2008, “Who Profits from Innovation in Global Value Chains? A Study of the iPod and notebook PCs,” Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Industry Studies, http://web.mit.edu/is08/pdf/Dedrick_Kraemer_Linden.pdf. Table 4, p. 21....
37. “Release: The Real Heroes of the 1998 Budget Surplus: Clinton and His Economy” (States News Service, March 7, 2011); analysis by MICHAEL LINDEN (MPP 2007).
By Michael Linden
When Bill Clinton took office in January 1993, the federal budget deficit was projected to be $310 billion that year, or about 5 percent of GDP. The Congressional Budget Office was also projecting that five years later, in 1998, the federal budget would still be in the red to the tune of $357 billion, or 4.5 percent of GDP. At the time, the CBO called the deficit outlook, grim.
Five years later, the
There are, indeed, two main heroes in the story of the remarkable budget surplus of 1998, but neither of them are Newt Gingrich or his Republican Congress. It turns out that their contribution to deficit reduction did more harm than good. No, the true heroes of deficit reduction were, first, President Clinton, whose 1993 budget passed without a single Republican vote, raised taxes on the wealthy and dramatically altered the nations fiscal path, and second, a steadily improving economy. Those two factors, and particularly the interaction between them, account for virtually the entire fiscal improvement. Contrary to the Gingrich assertion, legislation passed by the Republican-led Congress of 1995 through 1997 combined to actually worsen the fiscal situation, albeit slightly.
In order to assign credit (or blame) for shifts in the country’s fiscal fortunes from 1993 to 1998, we scoured Congressional Budget Office reports from that period. Usually, over the course of a single year, the CBO releases three projections of the federal budget, each revised from the previous release to account for changes in legislation, economic conditions, and technical assumptions, and describe each change in some detail. We can see clearly what actually defeated the deficit by compiling and studying the changing CBO estimates of the 1998 budget….
Michael Linden is the Associate Director for Tax and Budget Policy at American Progress.
38. “Latest not
‘greatest’” (The Sunday Mail (
By Carly Hennessy
CONSUMERS are paying thousands for upgrades as IT companies snare buyers in a “refresh cycle’’.
Televisions, PCs, tablets and phones are tweaked annually to boost profits. But experts say newest doesn’t always deliver.
The iPad 2 is weeks away from its Australian launch, with predictions it will inspire the same long queues as when the first version debuted a year ago….
Apple itself has discounted the soon-to-be-superseded model, now starting at $449, down from more than $600. Companies constantly introduced new features to get people to buy the latest release, www.gizmodo.com.au editor Nick Broughall said….
Other experts say consumers are “not being duped’’ by a refresh cycle.
“We’re not being
compelled (to buy), we want it,’’ Associate
Professor of marketing Frank Alpert from UQ’s
“For many consumers, we love to learn about new technology. It’s like retail therapy,’’ he said….
39. “A Free Man Still Looks Over His Shoulder in Mexico” (New York Times, March 5, 2011); story citing LAYDA NEGRETE (MPP 1998/PhD candidate) and ROBERTO HERNÁNDEZ (PhD candidate); http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/05/world/americas/05mexico.html?_r=1&emc=eta1
By Elisabeth Malkin
Absurd, indeed, because
in the past couple of weeks, hundreds of thousands of Mexicans have watched Mr.
Zúñiga’s ordeal unfold on movie screens, turning him
into a reluctant symbol of the failings of
As the star of a documentary, “Presumed Guilty,” that has become a hit here, Mr. Zúñiga, 31, tells much of his own story as the camera tracks his time in prison and records the retrial that ultimately led to his release.
The film puts
But while the documentary “lends itself to heroes and villains,” the “real challenge is for people to understand that the villain is the system and the institutional design,” said Layda Negrete, one-half of the husband-and-wife team of lawyers who made the film. “To understand that we shouldn’t fire the judge, but change the whole structure in which the judges operate.”
Lucid and introspective,
Mr. Zúñiga is a sympathetic protagonist. But the film
has also resonated here because its depiction of the police and courts lays
bare the weak links in
That is supposed to be
changing. In 2008, as part of the government’s battle against drug cartels,
Legal experts hope that Mr. Zúñiga’s case will give the efforts new energy, though Roberto Hernández, Ms. Negrete’s husband and co-filmmaker, said the reforms needed to go further, particularly with police investigations.
“You can’t combat crime with corrupt police,” Mr. Hernández said. “You had better have a clean police, so at least you know that those few who get caught really did it and also that those few who get caught can’t buy their way out.”
Mr. Hernández and Ms. Negrete have proposed several measures aimed at making trials more transparent: videotaping police interrogations and trials; conducting lineups; and ending the practice of placing the defendant behind a barred window during the trial….
40. “Next up for Senate: votes on two budget plans, more than $50 billion apart” (The Christian Science Monitor, March 4, 2011); story citing STAN COLLENDER (MPP 1976); http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2011/0304/Next-up-for-Senate-votes-on-two-budget-plans-more-than-50-billion-apart
By Gail Russell Chaddock, Staff writer
Vice President Joe Biden arrives to meet with House and Senate
leaders to discuss the federal budget, at the Capitol in
The Senate is gearing up for head-to-head votes on two budget plans—more than $50 billion apart—to fund the last seven months of the fiscal year. Without agreement, funding runs out on March 18.
One of the plans is the measure passed by House Republicans, which cuts nearly $62 billion from fiscal 2010 levels. It’s also $100 billion less than President Obama’s fiscal 2011 budget proposal. The GOP measure makes cuts in virtually all elements of nondefense, discretionary spending.
The other measure up for a vote was unveiled Friday by Senate Democrats. Their “counterplan” contains a targeted $6.5 billion in cuts, along lines proposed by the White House.
Neither bill is expected to win the 60 votes needed to pass major legislation in the Senate. But it gives both sides a sense of where the votes are and a road map for going forward….
Votes on the competing measures are expected as early as Tuesday, which would then give lawmakers 10 days to come up with a deal for seven months or another short-term measure like the one passed this week. Budget-watchers say that a long-term agreement on spending is unlikely.
“I don’t see the elements in place,” says Stan Collender, a leading budget analyst and partner in the D.C. office of Qorvis Communications. “I don’t think the Republicans feel they have to compromise. They have to score political points with their base. The only way you get a grand deal is if there is a general agreement that the deficit needs to be reduced. You don’t have that kind of agreement now.” …
41. “They’ve started, but will they finish?” (The Times Higher Education Supplement, Pg. 38 No. 1988, March 3, 2011); story citing NANCY BOROW SHULOCK (MPP 1978).
By Zoe Corbyn
… Like many in the
community college system in the
Completion rates are “a huge national problem”, Shulock says. “You have got wonderful anecdotal success stories of people who went to community colleges, and the institutions themselves are still highly regarded, but when you look at the statistics and you aggregate it all up there is not enough for this country to get where it needs to go.”
Shulock does not blame the institutions for low completion rates. They have been doing extremely well at “exactly what they have been asked to do” for decades, she says, which is providing access to higher education to people who would not otherwise have it.
“But our nation is realising that we have got a more serious problem than access right now and that is college attainment,” Shulock says.
What is desperately needed, she argues, is a more effective range of policies designed to help students finish.
Institutions need to change in order to focus more on completion. Shulock agrees that community colleges need more money, but believes that there are improvements that can be made using the resources available. For example, every college should set goals for improving their graduation rates, and significant milestones that will help students reach graduation, such as completing English and maths courses.
A particular problem,
she explains, is that there is little fiscal incentive for any of this. Shulock
recommends that
42. “
By Jon Ortiz
Stuart Drown, executive director of the Little Hoover Commission, at Wednesday’s legislative hearing on pension reform. (Hector Amezcua/Sacbee.com)
Lawmakers on Wednesday reacted skeptically to a controversial new proposal to lower public employee pensions throughout state and local government.
“Frankly, I just don’t see this happening,” said Sen. Alex Padilla during a joint meeting of Assembly and Senate committees that oversee public employee compensation.
The Los Angeles Democrat was referencing a week-old report by the bipartisan Little Hoover Commission that calls for radical changes to public pensions to keep them from “crushing” government.
The commission’s most controversial – and legally uncertain – suggestion would let state and local officials unilaterally freeze current employees’ pension benefits and then reduce pension credit earned for future years on the job.
Until now, even outspoken pension-change advocates such as former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and defeated GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman have believed that the law protects benefits granted from the beginning of a government worker’s public service.
But the crisis is so
dire and growing so quickly, the Little
Little Hoover’s report acknowledged that moving current workers into a new pension plan would trigger lawsuits, but it didn’t predict which way the courts would rule.
“The commission made a policy analysis, not a legal analysis,” Stuart Drown, the commission’s executive director, said during the Wednesday hearing. The conclusions were based on nearly a year of research and testimony from a wide variety of pension experts and interest group representatives.
“Well, while we appreciate (the report), policy recommendation without legal analysis doesn’t always do us a whole lot of good,” Padilla said.
Usually the joint hearing is a little-noticed annual primer on civil service issues for members of the Assembly Public Employees, Retirement and Social Security Committee and the Senate Public Employment and Retirement Committee.
But with the Little Hoover report on Wednesday’s agenda, the hearing chamber was packed and an overflow crowd spilled into the hallway….
43. “Lake Tahoe Restoration” (KQED public radio, March 3, 2011); features commentary by PATRICK WRIGHT (MPP 1987); Listen to the story
Reported by Stephanie Martin
Senator Dianne Feinstein
is pushing for a renewed federal effort to save
Patrick Wright is the executive director of the California Tahoe Conservancy. He says the bill will protect thousands of local jobs.
PATRICK WRIGHT: “And clearly with the decline of the casino-based economy in the basin, it’s even more important now to be investing in environmental infrastructure to draw tourists and to support the basin’s economy.” …
44. “State Duals-Demo Plans Vary, but Sharing Medicare Savings a Commonality” (Inside Health Reform, Vol. 3 No. 9, March 2, 2011); story citing TOBY DOUGLAS (MPP 2001/MPH 2002).
-- John Wilkerson
States are exploring a variety of approaches as they seek CMS funding for demonstrations that integrate care of residents who are dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid, according to interviews with people involved in planning the integrated care initiatives. The proposals includes approaches that rely on private managed care insurance, accountable care organizations (ACOs) and medical homes—and there is even a state-run integrated care plan suggested by Vermont. But there are also commonalities: States want CMS to share Medicare savings, with several suggesting Medicare and Medicaid funding streams be combined to avoid cost shifting. Many states also want to automatically enroll Medicare beneficiaries, with several suggesting an opt-out approach….
Many states do not know which approach they will eventually take—the grant is for designing the duals demo, not the duals demo itself. For instance, Toby Douglas, from the California HHS, told Inside Health Policy that his state is still mulling over its options and hopes the grant will help determine which approach would work best….
45. “Making Immigration Work for American Minorities” (Congressional Documents and Publications, March 1, 2011); congressional testimony citing JULIA BIXLER ISAACS (MPP 1985).
House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and Enforcement Hearing;
Testimony by Frank Morris, Progressives for Immigration Reform ….
… We also exclude from the immigration and American jobs debate factors such as how the loss of past manufacturing jobs, especially in industries such as steel, automobile manufacturing and even rubber have resulted with little, if any access to middle class jobs which do not require post secondary educational credentials. The manufacturing job losses plus the likely pending great reductions coming in state and local government employment are a double whammy against jobs to the middle class that had been especially important to African American workers. This is reinforced by the latest data which shows a disappointing downward, not upward mobility, of African American children, even those from middle class homes in our land of the Horatio Alger story. Among children raised in black middle income homes, in 2008 45% of children moved to the poorest quintile as adults compared to 16% of white children n12….
n12
Ron Haskins, Julia Isaacs and Isabel
Sawhill. 2008. Getting Ahead or Losing Ground:Economic Mobility in
46. “Why Not Try a
By Stan Collender
Enough threatening body language, vocal recriminations and political posturing over a possible government shutdown at the end of this week or later in March. They are nothing more than sideshows to the budget debate that really needs to be taking place….
My suggestion is simple: The GOP should trade the inconsequential fight it’s waging over fiscal 2011 appropriations for an agreement by the White House and Congressional Democrats to participate in a summit on addressing the federal deficit. The summit should begin on the same day that the president signs a continuing resolution for the rest of 2011. Everything the federal government does should be open for discussion.
This would work for a number of reasons. The GOP would be trading an ultimately insignificant short-term win over appropriations and the risk of a huge political loss over a shutdown for the possibility of what it says it really wants—a big change in the deficit. Republicans would also retain their ability to deal with appropriations for fiscal 2012 if the negotiations break down. Democrats and the White House would make three major gains: They wouldn’t have to worry about who would get blamed for the shutdown, they would have the whole scope and breadth of federal activities on the table, and they would be in a position to get Republicans who so far this year haven’t shown much willingness to negotiate, to do so. Wall Street would view the focus on the long-term deficit as a positive. And the budget debate would benefit from the needed negotiations that have taken a back seat to the nation’s almost pathological preoccupation with a shutdown.
Stan Collender is a partner at Qorvis Communications and author of “The Guide to the Federal Budget.” His blog is capitalgainsandgames.com.
47. “Pay for California’s 72 community college district chancellors varies widely” (Sacramento Bee, February 27, 2011); story citing NANCY BOROW SHULOCK (MPP 1978); http://www.sacbee.com/2011/02/27/3433947/pay-for-californias-72-community.html
By Laurel Rosenhall
A Bee review of the
employment contracts for leaders of
Compensation for
chancellors of the state’s 15 largest community college districts ranges from
$228,000 in
Even retirement benefits vary greatly, with some districts providing chancellors the same pension other administrators get and others piling on extras like tax-sheltered annuities or reimbursements for the chancellor’s employee contribution to a pension plan….
“When you have 72 boards
making their own decisions you probably have quite unexplained variability,” Nancy Shulock,
director of the Institute for Higher Education Leadership and Policy at
“It’s explained only by the fact that you have local boards making their own decisions.”
Shulock also spoke at a hearing in the Capitol last week where a bipartisan watchdog committee began a review of the state’s community colleges. Testimony before the Little Hoover Commission hearing did not touch on compensation. But several speakers voiced concern about the colleges’ fragmented governance….
48. “Merging administrative costs could save Bay Area transit agencies $100M” (San Francisco Examiner, February 21, 2011); story citing STUART COHEN (MPP 1997); http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/transportation/2011/02/merging-costs-could-save-transit-100m#ixzz1HRKnzXtn
By: Will Reisman – Examiner Staff Writer
Parked: Bay Area transit agencies duplicate costs such as those for vehicle maintenance yards. (Examiner file photo)
Bay Area transit agencies spend significantly more in administrative costs than their peers across the nation, expenditures that knowledgeable observers believe could be slashed by merging some functions of the region’s 28 different operators.
Area transit agencies spend nearly 20 percent of their collective budgets on administrative functions such as purchasing, planning, dispatching and marketing, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the Bay Area’s lead transportation group.
Nationally, such costs are just 15 percent of operating budgets so, by that logic, Bay Area transit agencies should be able to slash 5 percent of their collective $2 billion annual budgets, or about $100 million, each year, said Steve Heminger, executive director at the MTC….
Stuart Cohen, executive director of the local transit advocacy organization TransForm, said that while outright agency mergers might be cost-prohibitive, a merger of specific functions would be worthwhile even if it only saved one-tenth of what Heminger estimates, because that total could be used to avert service cuts.
Both Cohen and Heminger are involved in the MTC’s Transit Sustainability Project, a long-term outlook for the Bay Area’s public transportation agencies.
While talks of consolidation often bring up concerns of job layoffs, Cohen said that with local transit agencies facing massive budget deficits, the alternative could be worse.
“Doing nothing will result in layoffs,” Cohen said. “Doing nothing is no longer an option.”
49. “Schools Sacrificing Gifted Programs to Balance Budgets” (The New York Times, February 20, 2011); story citing EDGAR CABRAL (MPP 2005); http://www.baycitizen.org/education/story/schools-sacrificing-gifted-programs/
By Jennifer Gollan
Fifth-grader Teela Huff,
left, during recess at Silver Oak Elementary in
When she was just 3, Teela Huff understood how to add numbers. By third grade, she was tutoring her peers.
‘‘She can explain the problems to you without making you feel stupid,’’ one of Teela’s classmates wrote of her, according to her father, Tom.
But Teela’s quick mind—she is now a 10-year-old fifth grader but reads at a 12th-grade level—meant her classes at Silver Oak Elementary in San Jose were often boring and frustrating. She finally enrolled in a program for gifted children, where students wrestled with things like mind-bending math riddles and thought-provoking questions like how to survive on a desert island. And she loved it.
Her new adventures in
learning ended in September, however, when the
Budget problems, combined with policies and programs like the No Child Left Behind Act focused on improving overall educational performance in public schools, have put gifted programs in the expendable category. Local school districts, with permission from the Legislature, have been systematically taking money from the programs to cover budget shortfalls. School officials say they have no choice—but exceptionally talented pupils like Teela are paying the price….
‘‘In a time when you are making steep reductions, the Legislature is trying to figure out the core activities that should be preserved in school districts,’’ said Edgar Cabral, senior fiscal and policy analyst with the Legislative Analyst’s Office. ‘‘This is the most flexibility that school districts have been given over the last 10 years in terms of eliminating restrictions for GATE funding.’’ …
50. “
--
The Obama administration’s response to political upheaval in the Middle East has been distressing to several key allies in the Arab world, but none more so than Saudi Arabia….
Experts concur that the
Obama administration’s treatment of Mubarak and its plan to use the “Egyptian
model” as a guide for handling the unrest spreading across the Middle East is
particularly problematic if applied to
… Since the two
countries began diplomatic relations in 1933,
Where does that leave Obama?
Some believe he should take a stronger line on reform. “If he is to change his
image in the region as a hypocrite, he will have to demand that the Saudis and
other totalitarian Arab regimes—besides
51. “Snow barriers;
wheelchair users often struggle to navigate
By Kristin Czubkowski
… While [Madison] does well on many of the big mobility issues, including providing paratransit service beyond what is required by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and making mainline buses more accessible, most often it’s the small things that make winter much harder to navigate: sidewalks that haven’t been shoveled or plows that deposit piles of snow in front of the curb cuts used by people in wheelchairs to cross the street.
Not knowing what they’ll face when they leave their homes can make navigating the city mentally and physically draining for those with a disability. For many, it’s easier to stay in during the winter whenever possible….
For instance, when bus stops haven’t been cleared of snow, the alternative is to drop off riders in a driveway or in the street, leaving the riders vulnerable to dangerous traffic.
“That’s an obvious safety issue,” says transit advocate Susan De Vos, who uses a wheelchair. “Not only am I sitting there in the street waiting for it, but the bus has to stop and let out the ramp. We just have to cross our fingers” that no one comes by….
De Vos is far from what the average
person would consider inactive, even in the winter, as she regularly travels to
all parts of
For example, she says, the city has installed traffic islands to help pedestrians cross at intersections, but in the winter, the plows cannot adequately get around the narrow concrete barriers or in the crosswalks that cut through them, which leads to piles of snow at the curb cuts intended to allow access for wheelchairs.
“I live on one side of Midvale (Boulevard) and I can’t cross to the other side of Midvale” in the winter, she says. “A lot of these devices for traffic calming and everything have been tested in climates that do not have the winters we have.”
Rather than just adopt
technology out of
De Vos adds that in terms of clearing walkways and access points for pedestrians and transit users, the city has created limitations for itself with too little staff and increasing miles of roads.
“In a way, it’s not that I want to take issue with the snow-clearing people because they work incredibly hard, but things are set up to fail,” she says. “If people cannot walk around in the winter, they get in cars and create even more demand for roads and it’s a vicious cycle.” …
52. “Growing Push to
Make It in
“Nearly 60 percent of
This was the message of Apollo Policy and Program Director Chris
Busch when testifying before the House Subcommittee on Power and Energy for
the Energy and Commerce Committee. Busch’s
full testimony can be found on our website, www.apolloalliance.org … and comes
as Apollo push’s in 2011 for large scale investment in public transit and “Make
it in
Later that same day,
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi recognized the Apollo Alliance’s “Make it in
53. “Classroom cash: Educators, researchers clash on school spending report” (Santa Cruz Sentinel, February 7, 2011); story citing JANNELLE LEE KUBINEC (MPP 1997); http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/ci_17315045?IADID=Search-www.santacruzsentinel.com-www.santacruzsentinel.com
By Donna Jones,
The report, released
this week by
But the report has come under fire from state education leaders, who challenge both its methodology and its conclusions.
“They very narrowly define what is classroom spending,” said Rick Pratt, assistant executive director of the California School Boards Association. “Most people think that a library is a good thing for a school to have.”
But libraries aren’t included in classroom spending. Nor is the custodian who maintains the classroom, the principal who supervises the teacher or the bus driver who brings the student to school….
According to the report,
44 percent of
Jannelle Kubinec, associate vice president at School Services of California—a private financial consulting company that advises school districts across the state—said there can be legitimate variances in the way school districts categorize expenses by accounting codes that also could distort comparisons. The study’s authors picked out the expenses they included by accounting code….
54. “Report:
By Mindi Westhoff
Officials in
Speaking at a meeting of
the Chattanooga Association of Health Underwriters, Brian Haile, director of insurance exchange
planning at
55. “
By Canan Tasci, Staff Writer
WALNUT - A Mount San Antonio College Board of Trustee will be one of 21 people appointed to the California Community Colleges Students Success Tasks Force that will be in charge of making sure students do not just attend college but complete it.
The task force—selected by the community college’s Board of Governors—includes academic, research and business leaders from across the state….
The task force will examine strategies for promoting student success, including improving student assessment, delivering remedial instruction, increasing access to financial aid and academic counseling as well as identifying national funding models to incentivize completion rates.
Members of the task force will meet on a regular basis in 2011 to develop best practices to help students succeed.
For every $1 invested in higher education, an additional $3 is generated in tax revenue, but studies indicated educational attainment is declining nationally with each younger generation.
Therefore, the task force was created….
2011 Student Success Task Force members ….
Nancy Shulock
Professor/director, Institute for Higher Education Leadership and Policy, California State University
1. “Capitol Alert Blog: Lawmakers eulogize
long-time budget adviser A. Alan Post” (Sacramento Bee Online, March 31, 2011);
story citing
Posted by Dan Walters
A. Alan Post works on
perfecting his painting, “French Fireman, No. 4” at his studio in
As state lawmakers eulogized A. Alan Post, the
long-time legislative budget analyst, on the floors of both legislative houses
today, his family established a website to solicit contributions to a
Post, who served as the analyst for 28 years
through five governorships, died last Saturday at his
The website invites visitors to submit personal remembrances, photos and other tributes to Post, who was also a renowned artist, and to donate in his name to the A. Alan Post Fellowship in Public Policy at UC-Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy.
2. Robert Reich’s Blog: “Heading for a double
dip. Nobody in
By Robert Reich, Guest blogger
Why aren’t Americans being told the truth about the economy? We’re heading in the direction of a double dip – but you’d never know it if you listened to the upbeat messages coming out of Wall Street and Washington.
Consumers are 70 percent of the American economy, and consumer confidence is plummeting. It’s weaker today on average than at the lowest point of the Great Recession.
The Reuters/University of
Add two other ominous signs: Real hourly wages continue to fall, and housing prices continue to drop….
Republicans, for their part, worry that if they tell it like it is Americans will want government to do more rather than less. They’d rather not talk about jobs and wages, and put the focus instead on deficit reduction (or spread the lie that by reducing the deficit we’ll get more jobs and higher wages)….
Robert Reich is chancellor’s professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Clinton. ...
3. “Revisionist art history as
Reuters
Maine Gov. Paul LePage laughs
with supporters after unveiling an “Open for Business” sign beneath the
“Welcome to
Governor Paul LePage, a Republican, has said through spokesmen that he received complaints about the artwork in the Department of Labor offices from business owners because it was too pro-labor.
Also in the works are plans to rename conference rooms at the department building now named after labor leaders….
The 36-foot-long (11-meter-long) work contains 11
panels with images including shoemakers, child labor, textile workers and
strikers, as well as Frances Perkins, U.S. Labor Secretary and the first
Another former
“The governor’s spokesman explains that the mural
and the conference-room names were ‘not in keeping with the department’s
pro-business goals,’” Reich, wrote
on his blog. “Are we still in
4. “Why Small Nuclear Reactors Could Make Sense, but May Not Get Built” (Atlantic Magazine, March 27 2011); commentary by DAN KAMMEN; http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/03/why-small-nuclear-reactors-could-make-sense-but-may-not-get-built/73081/#
By DANIEL KAMMEN – Daniel Kammen is chief technical specialist for renewable energy and energy efficiency at the World Bank. He’s on leave from the University of California, Berkeley, where he’s a professor in the Energy and Resources Group.
Before the nuclear accident in
Small and medium reactors are an interesting technology. At roughly 100-300 MW each, they are a very different sort of creature from the 1,000-1,400 MW units that are the standard for the commercial power industry today. Several companies are pursuing small modular reactors, that in fact are not so different in size from the reactors powering submarines and some nuclear powered ice-breakers.
It is on the commercial front, however, where many investors are particularly excited about small modular reactors (SMRs). This is because SMRs lend themselves to standardization in manufacturing, so that if contracts for reactors come in, leaning-by-doing should rapidly take place. The value in this standardized production and replication is that cost declines would be expected to rapidly take place. In many mass-produced technologies, the cost declines are dramatic: about a 20% decline for each doubling of production (Duke and Kammen, 1999). This means that if the cost per megawatt of, say, a 200 MW small reactor is comparable to large reactors then just to build a “standard” 1,000 MW nuclear power plant, five more units worth of experience and cost declines should result while the traditional reactor industry produced just one unit….
At this point the nuclear industry faces a range of issues; resilience of backup systems; waste management; cost; and public trust. While SMRs offer potentially attractive approaches to a number of design issues, many of the most pressing issues facing the nuclear industry today are not technological.
5. “Scrimping on regulators puts public safety at risk” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 27, 2011); op-ed by ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/26/IN6H1IGT7K.DTL#ixzz1HvCrsh60
--Robert Reich
In the real world, corporations exist for one purpose and one purpose only—to make as much money as possible, which means cutting costs as much as possible.
General Electric marketed the Mark 1 boiling water
reactors that were used in
Yet American safety officials have long thought the smaller design more vulnerable to explosion and rupture in emergencies than competing designs....
The national commission appointed to investigate
the giant oil spill in the
Here’s the problem: Profit-making corporations have every incentive to underestimate these probabilities and lowball the likely harms. This is why it’s necessary to have such things as government regulators and why regulators need enough resources to enforce the regulations.…
It’s also why regulators have to be independent of the industries they regulate. When there’s a revolving door between regulatory agency and industry, officials are reluctant to bite the hands that will feed them….
Finally, the tendency of corporations to understate the probabilities of public harms requires that limits be placed on corporate political power. The public cannot not be adequately protected as long as big corporations–GE, BP, Halliburton, Massey and all others–are allowed to bribe legislators with campaign donations and boondoggles.…
© 2011 Robert Reich Robert Reich, former U.S. secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at UC Berkeley and the author of the new book “Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future.” …
6. “Former Gov. Granholm joins Pew Center as energy adviser” (Detroit Free Press, March 23, 2011); story citing Visiting Lecturer JENNIFER GRANHOLM; http://www.freep.com/article/20110323/NEWS15/110323021/Granholm-joins-Pew-energy-adviser
By Chris Christoff,
Former
Gov. Jennifer Granholm will lead a campaign for a
national clean energy policy that promotes and funds research and manufacturing
for wind, solar and advanced battery industries in the
Granholm said today she
has joined the nonpartisan Pew Charitable Trusts as a senior adviser on energy,
and will visit states twice monthly to promote clean energy to create jobs and
reduce the
The campaign is in addition to a teaching job she will begin in April at the University of California-Berkeley Goldman School of Public Policy. Granholm also is a paid contributor to NBC’s television show “Meet the Press.”
Granholm said she’ll
use
7. Robert Reich’s Blog: “Jobs, the deficit, and Republican whoppers” (Christian Science Monitor, March 23, 2011); commentary by ROBERT REICH; http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Robert-Reich-s-Blog/2011/0323/Jobs-the-deficit-and-Republican-whoppers
By Robert Reich, Guest blogger
House Majority Leader Eric
Cantor of
“And if all others accepted the lie which the party imposed – if all records told the same tale – then the lie passed into history and became the truth.” – George Orwell, 1984 (published in 1949)
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor was in town yesterday (specifically, at Stanford’s Hoover Institute where he could surround himself with sympathetic Republicans) to tell this whopper: “Cutting the federal deficit will create jobs.”
It’s not true. Cutting the deficit will create fewer jobs. Less government spending reduces overall demand. This is particularly worrisome when, as now, consumers and businesses are still holding back. Fewer government workers have paychecks to buy stuff from other Americans, some of whom in turn will lose their jobs without enough customers….
What worries me almost as much as the Republican’s repeated big lies about jobs is the silence of President Obama and Democratic leaders in the face of them. Obama has the bully pulpit. Republicans don’t. But if he doesn’t use it the Republican’s big lies gain credibility.
Here are some other whoppers being repeated daily:
“Cutting taxes on the rich creates jobs.” Nope. Trickle-down economics has been tried for thirty years and hasn’t worked. After George W. Bush cut taxes on the rich, far fewer jobs were created than after Bill Clinton raised them in the 1990s….
Robert Reich is chancellor’s professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Clinton. ...
8. “Michigan Ex-Governor Granholm Said to Reject Consumer Bureau Job” (Bloomberg News, March 22, 2011); story citing Visiting Lecturer JENNIFER GRANHOLM; http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-22/michigan-ex-governor-granholm-said-to-reject-consumer-bureau-job.html
By Carter Dougherty and Robert Schmidt
Jennifer Granholm, the
former
Granholm, who left office
on Jan. 1 after two terms as governor, is an instructor in law, public policy and business at the
Liz Boyd, a spokeswoman for Granholm, declined to comment on any discussions about the consumer bureau. She said the ex-governor has “put her plans in place for the year,” which include her teaching and book-writing….
9. “East Contra Costa welcomes power plants in their backyard” (Contra Costa Times (*requires registration), March 22, 2011); story citing LEE FRIEDMAN; http://www.contracostatimes.com/growth/ci_17656302?nclick_check=1
By Paul Burgarino and Hannah Dreier, Contra Costa Times
While much of the Bay Area has fiercely opposed new power plants proposed in their backyards, communities in eastern Contra Costa have welcomed them with open arms.
Over the past 15 years, regulators have approved
three power plants that are now operating in the area. Three more planned for
While the state has recently begun emphasizing renewable energy resources, the boom in power plants is in part a response to the energy crisis of the early 2000s, according to UC Berkeley professor of public policy Lee Friedman.
“The state’s reaction was it should never again let the supply of electricity be so constricted that future shortages could again arise,” he said....
[This story also appeared in the <a href=“http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_17656302?nclick_check=1“>San Jose Mercury News</a> and <a href=“http://www.insidebayarea.com/oaklandtribune/localnews/ci_17656302“>Oakland Tribune</a>]
10. “Op-Ed: Paddling of schoolchildren needs to end” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 21, 2011); op-ed by DAVID KIRP; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/21/EDC81I7KH6.DTL
--David L. Kirp
Multiple choice question: In 20 states it’s legal to hit (1) an animal, (2) a prisoner, (3) a soldier or (4) a schoolchild. The right answer is—astonishingly—No. 4.
Keep your hands off Fido, the law says, and don’t
manhandle convicts, but from
The rationale for paddling comes straight from
the Biblical injunction to spare the rod and spoil the child. But the author of
that particular proverb didn’t know a thing about child development, for
there’s no evidence that kids turn into angels once they’ve been hit. The
David L. Kirp,
professor of public policy at UC Berkeley, is the author of “Kids First: Five Big Ideas for Transforming
Children’s Lives and
11. “
--Robert Reich
Former
That will make a government shutdown look like child’s play.
Republicans vow they won’t vote to raise the debt ceiling without far greater cuts in the federal budget for the rest of this year. But such cuts would imperil the fragile recovery.
President Obama should be doing everything he can to create jobs right now instead of cutting this year’s budget. But will he go to battle? Don’t count on it. He’s more likely to “triangulate,” like Bill Clinton.
Many of President Obama’s current aides worked
for
They’re wrong.
Obama’s challenge in 2012 has nothing to do with
© 2011 By Robert Reich
12. “As the Global Economy Trembles, Our Nation’s Capitol Fiddles” (Huffington Post, March 17, 2011); blog by ROBERT REICH; http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/as-the-global-economy-tre_b_837216.html
ROBERT REICH – Former Secretary of Labor; Professor at
Why isn’t
The world’s third largest economy suffers a giant
earthquake, tsunami, and radiation dangers. A civil war in
Even before these global shocks the
So you might think our elected representatives would want to avoid a repeat of what happened the second half of 2010 when the fragile recovery began tanking. They’d certainly want to prevent a double-dip recession....
Amazingly, the big debate in
The
13. “The children of Reagan’ reshaping Congress. Many of the GOP freshman class elected to the House last year are members of Generation X: Their average age is 47, and many of them formed their political notions during the Reagan presidency” (Los Angeles Times, March 17, 2011); analysis citing HENRY BRADY; http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-new-congress-20110317,0,7668992.story
By Kathleen
Reporting from
When voters elected 87 new GOP members to the House last year, they chose a crop of young, conservative politicians — more than half in their 30s and 40s — whose perspective differs dramatically from many of their older colleagues. Their arrival has sped up the generational shift in Congress, where baby boomers and their elders are gradually being replaced by members of Generation X.
These politicians belong to the first modern generation of Americans not expected to earn more money than their parents. ... The average age of the GOP freshman is 47, meaning many probably cast their first presidential vote when Reagan was reelected in 1984.
“These are the children of Reagan,” said Henry Brady, a political scientist at UC Berkeley....
Having raised taxes and boosted federal spending, Reagan would not have met many of the hard benchmarks now being set by this class of the lawmakers.
“Often, the children are more strident than the parent,” Brady said....
14. “
SAN FRANCISCO, March 14, 2011—Arizona reduced the number of unauthorized immigrants in the state by requiring employers to verify workers’ legal status with the national E-Verify system. But while the Legal Arizona Workers Act—which took effect in 2008— has so far achieved this intended goal, it has also had unintended results. It has pushed a substantial number of unauthorized immigrants into informal employment, as measured by increasing rates of self-employment. These are the results of a study released today by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC).
The study estimates that
Using an analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data, the
PPIC study finds that as a result of the law, employment fell 11 percentage
points among less-educated Hispanics in
“
15. “Jobs growing slowly, wages falling fast” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 13, 2011); op-ed by ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/12/INQU1I6BPO.DTL#ixzz1GcDKJLmk
--Robert Reich
Banners hanging at the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce building in
… The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports 192,000 new jobs in February (220,000 new jobs in the private sector and a decline in government employment), and a drop in the overall unemployment rate from 9 to 8.9 percent.
But here’s the big story, and it’s especially worrying: Most of the jobs we’ve gained pay less than the jobs we’ve lost….
The biggest losses during the Great Recession were jobs paying $19.05 to $31.40 an hour. By contrast, the biggest gains over the past year have been jobs paying an average of $9.03 to $12.91 an hour….
For several years now, conservative economists have blamed high unemployment on the purported fact that many Americans have priced themselves out of the global/high-tech jobs market. So if we want more jobs, they say, we’ll need to take wage and benefit cuts.
And that’s exactly what Americans have been doing….
Conservatives say it’s not enough. That’s why unions have to be busted—and why some governors are seeking to abolish laws requiring workers to become dues-paying union members in order to get certain jobs. Hence the confrontations over the future of labor unions, especially in Midwestern states with Republican governors…..
© 2011 Robert Reich Robert Reich, former U.S. secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at UC Berkeley and the author of the new book “Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future.”
16. “Wisconsin Foes of Union Bill Weigh Response to Governor’s Win” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 11, 2011); newswire citing ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fg%2Fa%2F2011%2F03%2F10%2Fbloomberg1376-LHVDT60D9L3501-6122493IB4O3KRAA6M1BALAT6U.DTL
--Bloomberg
Drum-pounding, pro-labor demonstrators marched around the Wisconsin Capitol well into the night, carrying signs that read “Rebellion” and “We’re Not Licked” after lawmakers passed curbs on government unions.
Hours after the Assembly gave final approval yesterday to a bill that limits collective bargaining to wages for most government workers, though, it was clear to some that a sea change had occurred....
Unions may be the first to pay. The
Unless the bill is nullified, either in the courts or through voter recalls of Republican senators, it will embolden governors in other states to push similar legislation, Reich said by e-mail....
17. “Wisconsin Update” (Forum, KQED Radio, March 10, 2011); features commentary by ROBERT REICH; Listen to the program
Host: Michael Krasny
By a vote of 18-1, Republicans last night in the Wisconsin State Senate approved legislation sharply curbing collective bargaining rights for government workers. Members of the Senate’s Democratic minority, who strongly oppose the legislation, had fled the state in an effort to block the vote. But Republicans, led by Governor Scott Walker, separated the bill from a broader budget measure that would have required a larger 20-member quorum. [The state assembly later also passed the measure with no Democratic support.]
Guests:
...Robert
Reich, professor at the Goldman School of Public Policy, UC Berkeley,
author of “Aftershock: The Next Economy and
ROBERT REICH: … Here’s my potted history of unions in a minute: The minimum wage, Social Security, the forty-hour workweek with time-and-a-half for overtime, Medicare, unemployment insurance, family and medical leave, worker safety, OSHA, almost all of the things we now take for granted are there because America’s working people and unions got behind them—most of the benefits that many working people enjoy right now—who are not unionized—are there because of the efforts of unionized people….
18. “Green buildings make owners more cash” (TG Daily, March 9, 2011); story citing JOHN QUIGLEY; http://www.tgdaily.com/sustainability-features/54550-green-buildings-make-owners-more-cash
Posted by
Susan
DeFreitas, EarthTechling
We all know that green buildings are good for the
environment. But how well do they perform financially?
According to a new report by RICS, a U.K.-based
consultancy, entitled “Sustainability and the Dynamics of Green Building: New
Evidence on the Financial Performance of Green Office Buildings in the
The authors of the report are Piet Eichholtz and Nils Kok of
The report was presented on February 22 of this
year at the
The research presented was based on a follow-up to a study carried out by the same research team before the onset of the financial crisis, and confirms that even in tough economic times, office buildings with green ratings tend to command rents substantially higher than those of otherwise identical buildings (even those of similar quality and in similar locations)….
19. “The birth of the People’s Party” (The Berkeley Blog, March 8, 2011); commentary by ROBERT REICH; http://blogs.berkeley.edu/2011/03/08/the-birth-of-the-peoples-party/
Robert Reich, professor of public policy | 3/8/11
Look at the outrage in
Hear what they’re saying: Stop attacking unions. Stop making scapegoats out of public employees. Stop protecting the super-rich from paying their fair share of the taxes needed to keep our schools running.
Stop gutting the working middle class.
Are we finally seeing average Americans stand up
and demand a fair shake in an economy now grotesquely tilted toward the wealthy
and the privileged? Are Americans beginning to awake to the fact that our
economy now delivers a larger share of total income to the very top than at any
time in living memory? That big corporations are
making more money and creating more jobs abroad than in the
Now we may be seeing the birth of a genuine
populist movement. Call it the People’s Party. Like the Tea Party, the People’s
Party doesn’t have a clear organization or hierarchy or single address. It
doesn’t have lobbyists in
20. “David Kirp: ‘Kids First’” (Forum with Michael Krasny, KQED Radio, March 8, 2011); program featuring DAVID KIRP; Listen to this program
After
serving on President Obama’s transition team in 2008, author and professor David Kirp
asked what a realistic policy agenda—that put the needs of children first—would
look like. K-12 education was too focused on testing and boosting reading and
achievement scores, and not focused enough on the lives of children. In his new
book, “Kids First: Five Big Ideas for Transforming Children’s Lives and
Guest:
David L. Kirp, professor and former acting dean at the Goldman School of Public Policy at UC Berkeley
MICHAEL KRASNY: … You talk about early childhood programs that can generate up to $17 dollars of benefits for society and these individuals from every $1 invested….
DAVID KIRP: Let me say something about that 17-to-1 figure which is based upon a pretty optimistic calculation of a very very good program which it’s hard to imagine would be applied nationwide and get that kind of return. Let’s assume it’s inflated by a factor of two; let’s assume it’s inflated by a factor of four. So I’ve got a four-plus return on investment. I can’t think of a government program that gets a four to one return on investment. So rather than fixating on the number, which some people do, let’s focus on the fact that people across the spectrum—economists and political scientists—recognize that this is a smart investment for us to engage in.
If parents were as organized as seniors, they’d be getting the resources they’re entitled to, not the $1 per child for every $6 per senior….
If you ask people who work with kids what’s the most important thing you can give a child it’s not some program, it’s getting a stable, caring adult in their lives, a kind godfather or godmother who can really help them navigate childhood and the shoals of adolescence….
We are 15 million mentors short, according to one pretty conservative research estimate, in terms of how many kids can benefit from mentoring. I think there’s a huge failure of social marketing. A lot of people don’t know what mentoring is….
Everyday, 8 thousand people turn 60 and when you ask them what they want to do, mahjong typically doesn’t come at the top of the list. They want to give back and … have a living legacy and that means supporting their own churches (activity one) and supporting kids (activity two)…. There’s a huge disconnect between that potential market out there, the grandparent market….
21. “Women Keep House (and Maybe Senate?) Better Than Men” (New York Times Online, March 7, 2011); column citing newest faculty member SARAH ANZIA; http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/07/women-keep-house-and-maybe-senate-better-than-men/?scp=1&sq=Sarah%20Anzia&st=cse
By Catherine Rampell
Also in honor of International Women’s Day (which is Tuesday): A new study finds that Congressional representatives who are women outperform their male counterparts, perhaps because the bar is higher for them to get elected in the first place.
Here is the abstract of the paper, which is by Sarah Anzia
of
If voters are biased against female candidates, only the most talented, hardest working female candidates will succeed in the electoral process. Furthermore, if women perceive there to be sex discrimination in the electoral process, or if they underestimate their qualifications for office, then only the most qualified, politically ambitious females will emerge as candidates. We argue that when either or both forms of sex-based selection are present, the women who are elected to office will perform better, on average, than their male counterparts. We test this central implication of our theory by studying the relative success of men and women in delivering federal spending to their districts and in sponsoring legislation. Analyzing changes within districts over time, we find that congresswomen secure roughly 9 percent more spending from federal discretionary programs than congressmen. Women also sponsor and cosponsor significantly more bills than their male colleagues….
22. “Democrats should start talking about GOP shakedown” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 6, 2011); op-ed by ROBERT REICH; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/05/IN2K1I1BBA.DTL#ixzz1FxLuqWPb
--ROBERT REICH
You can’t fight something with nothing. But as long as Democrats refuse to talk about the almost unprecedented buildup of income, wealth and power at the top—and the refusal of the superrich to pay their fair share of the nation’s bills—Republicans will convince people it’s all about government and unions….
Nothing could be further from the truth, but for some reason, President Obama and the Democrats aren’t responding with the truth. Their response is: We agree, but you’re going too far….
The truth that Obama and Democrats must tell is that government spending has absolutely nothing to do with high unemployment, declining wages, falling home prices and all the other horribles that continue to haunt most Americans….
But a strong recovery can’t be built on the purchases of the richest 5 percent.
The truth is, if the superrich paid their fair
share of taxes, government wouldn’t be broke. If Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker
hadn’t handed out tax breaks to corporations and the well off,
Robert Reich, former U.S. secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at UC Berkeley and the author of the new book “Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future.” … © Robert Reich
23. “Economist Robert Reich is driven to end income inequality” (Los Angeles Times, March 6, 2011); interview with ROBERT REICH; http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-himi-reich-20110306,0,4101014.story
By Alana Semuels,
Economist Robert Reich. (Robin Utrecht AFP / Getty Images / Jan. 14, 2008)
The gig: Reich,
who was Labor secretary under President Clinton, is a nationally known
economist and political commentator. Much of his work focuses on
Galvanized by the 1960s:
Reich’s mentor was Michael Schwerner, a young civil
rights worker whose family vacationed in the
Getting published: Reich has written 13 books, “some relegated to the dust heap of history weeks after they
were published,” he said. Others were bestsellers, including “Aftershock: The
Next Economy and
Has he made it? Reich said he doesn’t think he
has “made it” because the nation’s income gap keeps growing and so many
American families are struggling. “I don’t feel particularly successful in
terms of what I set out to do,” he said. “Average working people are not in
good shape in the
24. “Democrats Smart from Attempts to Weaken Unions” (Morning Edition, National Public Radio®, March 3, 2011); features commentary by ROBERT REICH; Listen to the story
By Mara Liasson
The move by Republican governors to get rid of public sector unions’ collective bargaining rights isn’t just a response to runaway pension obligations on the part of state governments. It’s also a way to defund one of the Democratic parties most important interest groups
… LIASSON: A group of conservative think tanks has been working the public union issue for a long time, drafting legislation and preparing the intellectual arguments against collective bargaining. The underlying fiscal problem is urgent: $3 trillion of unfunded state government pension liabilities. But for Ralph Benko of the conservative American Principles Project, the solution isn’t just to cut wages and benefits. The unions have already agreed to that.
Mr. RALPH BENKO (American Principles Project): We need to get down to the root of the problem: collective bargaining. You’re talking about government money being paid out as salaries, which then gets picked up by the union, which then gets put into the political process directly. And then that’s taxpayer money being used to lobby officials for special interests. And to me, that’s a closed loop.
LIASSON: Benko insists this is not a partisan argument, but its application has a partisan result.
Mr. ROBERT REICH (Former Labor Secretary): The Republican strategy clearly is to disempower the Democrats.
LIASSON: That’s former labor secretary Robert Reich.
Mr. REICH: What we will see is not only gradual erosion of wages and benefits over time, but we will also see the decline of public employees as a political force, particularly a political force in the Democratic Party and for the Democratic Party….
25. “Former Mich Gov. Jennifer Granholm, teaching at UC Berkeley, decries Wisconsin’s effort to ‘villify’ unions, collective bargaining” (San Francisco Chronicle Online, March 2, 2011); interview with JENNIFER GRANHOLM and citing DANIEL MULHERN and GOLDMAN SCHOOL; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/nov05election/detail?entry_id=83957#ixzz1FxDQDzaV
Posted by Carla Marinucci
Gov. Jennifer Granholm met with then-SF DA Kamala Harris in 2005. (Lacy Atkins/The Chronicle)
Democratic former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm,
who this week kicks off a two year teaching stint at U.C. Berkeley, says the
push to “villify” unions and collective bargaining—as
seen in
“Everybody’s got to give,’’ Granholm told the Chronicle/SFGate.com in a telephone interview as she prepared to begin her new post Wednesday at U.C. Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy, where she’ll deliver a 6 p.m. address called “Cracking the Code: Creating Jobs in America.”
Asked her reaction to the current situation in
“You don’t (balance the budget) by going after
collective bargaining,’’ she said. In
But “it’s infuriating to see what’s happening on the national level, when you see those leading states are not going about it in the way that will achieve the ends in the best fashion,’’ she said. “If you ask any CEO of a private company, they’ll tell you that you want to work with your employees; you don’t want to villify them.’’
Granholm and her husband, leadership coach Daniel Mulhern, plan to move to the Bay Area as they both begin teach at the Berkeley campus in the school of business, law, business and public policy….
26. “How Democrats can become relevant again (and rescue the nation while they’re at it)” (The Berkeley Blog, March 3, 2011); commentary by ROBERT REICH; http://blogs.berkeley.edu/2011/03/03/how-democrats-can-become-relevant-again-and-rescue-the-nation-while-theyre-at-it/
Robert Reich, professor of public policy | 3/3/11
Republicans offered Democrats two more weeks before the doomsday shut-down. Democrats countered with four. Republicans held their ground. Democrats agreed to two.
This is what passes for compromise in our nation’s capital.
Democrats have become irrelevant. If they want to
be relevant again they have to connect the dots: The explosion of income and
wealth among
But wait. The American economy is more than twice as large now as it was thirty years ago. So where did the money go? To the top. The richest 1 percent’s share of national has doubled – from around 9 percent in 1977 to over 20 percent now. The richest one-tenth of 1 percent’s share has tripled. The 150,000 households that comprise the top one-tenth of one percent now earn as much as the bottom 120 million put together….
Then came the Great Recession – and with it, lower tax revenues. That means all levels of government are squeezed. Obviously, the middle class can’t pay more in taxes. But because the Democrats seem to lack the intestinal fortitude to suggest the obvious – that taxes need to be raised on the super rich – we’re left with a mess….
Here’s what Democrats should be saying: …
Do this and we can afford to do what we need to do as a nation. Do this and you prevent Republicans from setting the working middle class against itself. Do this and you restore some balance to a distribution of income and wealth that’s now dangerously out of whack.
Do this, Democrats, and you have a chance of being relevant again.
27. “The New America Foundation (NAF) holds a
book discussion on ‘Kids First: Five Big Ideas for Transforming Children’s
Lives and
… PARTICIPANTS: author David Kirp, professor of public policy at the University of California-Berkeley; and Lisa Guernsey, director of NAF’s Early Education Initiative….
March 10 Dean Henry Brady moderated the Berkeley
City-University Forum, “How Can
March 23-24 Robert Reich was featured speaker at the “Ideas Economy: Innovation entrepreneurship for a disruptive world” conference hosted by UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business.
March 28-29 Robert Reich’s talk at the World Affairs Council annual conference—”World Affairs 2011: Challenges to American Power”—was broadcast on “It’s Your World” (KQED public radio); view video.
Recent new video:
“Politics, Policy and
the Great Recession” – A Conversations
with History interview with Robert
B. Reich (taped on March 22, 2011); see
the video
To view a complete list
of GSPP videos, visit our Events Archive at: http://gspp.berkeley.edu/events/webcasts
Recent events viewable on UC Webcast: http://webcast.berkeley.edu/events.php?group=The+Richard+%26+Rhoda+Goldman+School+of+Public+Policy
If you would like further information
about any of the above, or hard copies of cited articles, we’d be happy to
provide them.
We are always delighted to receive your material for inclusion in the Digest. Please email the editor at wong23@berkeley.edu .
Sincerely,
Annette Doornbos
Director of External Relations and Development