Economic Policy News

Houston schools will offer free meals to all students this year, but there’s no guarantee that will help more families who are still recovering from Hurricane Harvey, which struck a year ago this week. Nearly all Houston students were eligible for subsidized free meals last year, so this move just expands an already sizable federal…

A new metastudy by Serbian think tank Libek confirms that countries wishing to increase their economic growth—and reap the many rewards that come from doing so—need to focus on advancing the economic freedom of their people. Libek looked at 92 scholarly research studies that considered the relationship between economic freedom and economic growth. Eighty-six of…

In February 2017, U.S. House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady remarked at a conference on international tax competition, “Our blueprint delivers a tax code built specifically to leapfrog America from dead last among our global competitors back into the lead pack of the most pro-growth tax systems on earth.” Fast forward to August…

The collapse of the U.S. steel industry in the 1980s sent once-thriving Pittsburgh into a severe economic depression. Pittsburgh has struggled to rebuild and rebrand itself for decades. Yet the city today is not the crumbling, desolate place one might expect. The city has been transforming itself from an industrial economy based on steel to…

A congressional select committee on reforming the budget process recently held another public hearing, supposedly with the ultimate aim of designing a more transparent, accountable, and responsible budgetary process. Any such changes should also re-establish and enhance Congress’ power of the purse. But if those are the goals of the Joint Select Committee on Budget and…

Economic freedom enables the sharing economy, and in a groundbreaking new multinational study, the Swedish think tank Timbro finds a strong relationship between free markets and the sharing economy. The Timbro Sharing Economy Index is the first global index of the sharing economy, estimating the size and usage of the sharing economy in each country….

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Congress is once again looking for more ways to avoid responsibility. On Wednesday, June 27, the Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process Reform held a member day meeting that included testimony from Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and other lawmakers. Center-stage at the…

Despite rampant speculation that President Donald Trump’s trade policy might increase some car prices, how his regulatory relief agenda may lower sticker prices and increase safety goes largely ignored. How did this happen? The Trump administration is revising the Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards imposed on automakers during the Obama era. In particular, they are…

The Republican Study Committee, a conservative caucus of 158 Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives, releases an annual budget called “A Framework for United Conservatism.” Its aim is to unite conservatives in Congress behind a long-term fiscal plan. This year’s Framework builds on the RSC’s fiscal year 2018 budget both of which embody conservative…

The House Budget Committee last Thursday approved a budget resolution for fiscal 2019. The House budget, dubbed “A Brighter American Future,” would achieve balance in 2027. Importantly, the House budget proposes about $300 billion in spending reductions by using a powerful fiscal tool called reconciliation. The Senate needs to follow suit to unlock those savings…

The House Budget Committee this week unveiled its fiscal 2019 budget proposal, and the most important aspect is that it provides reconciliation instructions to authorizing committees to find more than $300 billion in mandatory spending cuts. More than two-thirds of the federal budget consists of mandatory spending, which is not subject to the annual appropriations…

With reported growth of 7.7 percent in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2017 and 6.7 percent annual growth projected for 2018, India now boasts the world’s fastest-growing economy. The question now becomes how to preserve the momentum. First and foremost, India must recognize that the growth enjoyed for the past two decades came largely…

An economic crisis has engulfed Puerto Rico. The Financial Oversight Management Board, a federally-mandated advisory group, has worked to help Puerto Rico deal with its financial crisis and establish policies that will lead to long-run growth. The board says Puerto Rico must reform its labor market to have a bright future. While the oversight board…

In April, the Congressional Budget Office released its updated budget projections, and the outlook is grim. The annual federal deficit is projected to rise to over $1 trillion by 2020 and to top $1.5 trillion by 2028. In the next decade, debt is projected to skyrocket to over 96 percent of the economy. This is…

The Senate Budget Committee met May 23 to consider the Government Accountability Office’s annual report on government efficiency and effectiveness, which identifies areas of unnecessary overlap, fragmentation, and duplication among federal programs. The Government Accountability Office supplements that identification of waste with recommendations of what to do about it, presenting specific proposals upon which Congress…

A provision in the House version of the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2019 would delay by at least two years a much-needed new round of Base Realignment and Closure. That delay would represent billions of taxpayer dollars that could have been saved, but instead would have to be allocated to infrastructure that isn’t fully…