A Look at Who Pays Connecticut’s Income Tax

Posted on May 20, 2009 in Research, Tax and Budget by Fergus Cullen, MPA, Executive Director of the Yankee Institute for Public Policy Published on May 20, 2009 by the Yankee Institute for Public Policy EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: As Governor M. Jodi Rell and the General Assembly seek to close the existing state budget deficit and adopt a balanced budget for the next fiscal biennium, various proposals call for increasing taxes on the affluent. Several...
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A Penance for Using Plastic

Posted on May 4, 2009 in Press You’re sensitive to the environment. You reduce, reuse, and recycle. But to a group of radical environmentalists and state legislators, you are an ecological sinner if you carry your groceries home in a plastic bag. As penance, they want you to pay a “plastax” of 5 cents on every bag you use. This new tax should be rejected. “We can solve the plastic bag crisis,”...
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Smart, Dumb, and Fraudulent School Technology Spending

Posted on May 4, 2009 in Press As we enter the season in which many towns are voting on their budgets, more schools than ever are asking for increases to cover school technology spending. Some parents are delighted by the prospect of turning classrooms into “high tech” learning facilities, but not all experts are convinced. As far back as 2000, Stanford University education professor Larry Cuban compared the value of...
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Dairy Problem: Too Many Cows, Farms

Posted on May 1, 2009 in Press by Fergus Cullen Originally published in the Hartford Courant They say sacred cows make the best hamburger, so here goes: To save Connecticut’s dairy industry, we need to slaughter cattle instead of subsidizing farmers. Dairy farmers are hurting. The federally mandated price of milk has dropped 40 percent since last June. Today it costs Connecticut farmers about $1.90 to produce a gallon of...
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