Published on Wednesday, November 18, 2009

In his op-ed "Maryland must consider tax increases," Maryland Budget & Tax Policy Institute Director Neil Bergsman says Maryland has no other choice but to raise taxes. Mr. Bergsman is two years too late; the Maryland General Assembly voted in a 2007 special session to raise and expand the state's sales tax, create a new income tax bracket, raise the state's corporate tax, establish new taxes on property transfers, increase the state tobacco tax, expand the amusement tax and permit state-taxed slot machines. The new taxes were intended to raise an extra $1.4 billion each year for state government. But the new money has not kept up with Annapolis' spending. Only by cutting spending and growing the tax base can Maryland's budget problem be solved.

Published on Monday, April 13, 2009

The recently passed federal stimulus bill is supposed to put the nation back to work and make it more competitive in years to come. But as Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley noted recently, it also will burden taxpayers with nearly $1 trillion in new federal debt. The question is, will the economic boost we get, if any, from the stimulus bill justify the debt? Consider, for instance, that $329 million of the $3.8 billion the stimulus bill directs toward Maryland is slotted to pay for increases in teacher retirement benefits. Those increases were approved by the Maryland General Assembly in 2006. But, in typical Annapolis fashion, state lawmakers neglected to identify how they would pay for the new spending, which must be financed every year in perpetuity.

Published on Thursday, August 30, 2007

BALTIMORE - Is forcing Americans to purchase health insurance the way to address the fact that millions of Americans are uninsured? Politicians from both political parties seem to think so. This type of mandate was central to former Gov. Mitt Romney’s health insurance plan in Massachusetts. Now Maryland Sen. Ben Cardin is proposing similar legislation on a national scale. Such a mandate, however, would require Americans to accept a level of unprecedented government monitoring without addressing the real problem — government policies have made health insurance unaffordable for millions. Underlying these legislative efforts is the notion that there is a large “crisis” for those lacking health insurance. Does a crisis truly exist? Contrary to the impression left by most media reports, the uninsured are a diverse group. For instance, while many people want insurance but cannot afford it, a significant number of the uninsured can afford it but choose to go without. In Maryland, for instance, over a third of the uninsured have incomes in excess of 300 percent of the federal poverty level. Others (perhaps as high as two-thirds of the uninsured population) only lack insurance for part of the year. Furthermore, uncompensated care for the uninsured only accounts for 3 percent to 5 percent of medical spending in this country.

Published on Tuesday, May 15, 2007

BALTIMORE - In 1999, the Children's Scholarship Fund announced it would provide private-school scholarships to low-income families across the country. In Baltimore, 46,000 families applied for scholarships - approximately 44 percent of the eligible student population. Since the number of available scholarships was scarce, only 430 lucky students received scholarships that year. Where are those thousands of children? Most likely many dropped out of high school before graduation. According to one recent study in Education Week, the graduation rate in Baltimore City's public schools could be as low as 39 percent - one of the lowest among major cities in the country.

Published on Wednesday, August 09, 2006

A proposed federal subsidy for the Washington Metro would top Alaska's Bridge to Nowhere and Mississippi's Train to Nowhere for excess. And if enacted, it would require the two Maryland counties where Metro operates to come up with a "dedicated funding match" - in other words, a tax increase. Rep. Tom Davis, a Virginia Republican, got the House of Representatives to pass an amendment to a bill that would divert $1.5 billion of federal revenues from offshore drilling to subsidize the deeply troubled Metro transit system that serves the nation's Capital, his Northern Virginia district and other Washington suburbs. If enacted, the amended bill would be one of the largest pork-barrel earmarks in history. And it would compel Montgomery and Prince George's counties - which account for 40 percent of Metro's riders - to contribute about $55 million a year to the system, most likely through dedicated taxes.

Published on Sunday, November 14, 2004

It seems that you can hardly pick up a newspaper today or turn on the local TV news in Maryland without reading more doom-and-gloom about the condition of education in the state.

Published on Friday, April 02, 2004

In a second attempt to legalize slot machine gambling in Maryland, Governor Ehrlich’s new proposal includes two “non-racetrack” slot-machine palaces along the I-95 corridor. This compromise would satisfy House Speaker Busch, who doesn’t believe slots are “good public policy” - except if they’re state-owned and state maintained.

Published on Friday, March 05, 2004

The Baltimore City Public School System’s $75 million (and growing) deficit should be a wake-up call to lawmakers in Annapolis.  Gov. Ehrlich now has the extraordinary opportunity to bring long overdue education reform to a system that desperately needs more than just a quick-fix infusion of taxpayer money.

Published on Saturday, August 30, 2003

Congressional lawmakers will soon vote on legislation to allow Americans to purchase prescription drugs from pharmacies in Canada and other countries where prices are much lower. This “re-importation” seems like a good idea, especially for seniors who are anxious to lower their prescription drug bills. But the legislation raises two important questions that lawmakers need to address: How can the safety of re-imported drugs be assured, and how can the U.S. bring lower drug prices to its own pharmacies?

Published on Saturday, May 04, 2002

The 2002 Maryland General Assembly recently considered legislation to lower prescription drug costs by forcing drug manufacturers to pay supplemental rebates for inclusion of their drugs in Maryland's Medicaid formulary. The law's defeat was a blessing because its implementation would have been a curse. Instead of lowering drug prices for the neediest state residents, the price controls imposed by such a law would have put Maryland's hemorrhaging state Medicaid program in intensive care and on indefinite life support.