As the country continues to return to normal from the Covid pandemic, issues of public policy arise and call for the attention of lawmakers to address. School policy has become one of those issues.
John Kristof of EdChoice has released a report that offers insight into the opinions and attitudes of a nationally representative sample of parents regarding schooling and its relation with Covid currently.
For one, the data suggests that parents are becoming more comfortable with sending their kids back to school for in-person learning. According to the report, 63 percent of parents polled showed that they were either “very comfortable” or “somewhat comfortable” with sending their kids back to school in person. Moreover, that number has risen from the previous month by 6 points.
Two possible explanations can come from this. Either parents see that the Covid situation is improving and, therefore, are becoming more comfortable, or they see no change and are gradually becoming more comfortable with sending their kids anyway. While the former is more likely, either option demonstrates that government simply cannot stick with the status quo. Something has to change to promote the education of children. Therefore, this issue ought to be a top issue for state legislatures.
Additionally, the data shows that parents view government institutions as the worst entities to respond to the pandemic. Even state governments rank similarly with national institutions such as the federal government, media, and national corporations. A third of those polled found state government as an obstacle rather than an aid to an individual’s way of life.
As things gradually return back to normal, people as a whole may become impatient with the government education system's inability to get closer to normal as well. Unfortunately, government is often an obstacle to meaningful change, so the default should allow more individuals and their families to make their own choices. This promotes true educational freedom.
It is important to note that the slight increase in support of mandatory masks does not necessarily provide a direct correlation with support for government mask mandates in schools. As time moves on and children continue to remain either out of school or in some Covid-related alternative, parents are gradually going to show support for any requirement for in-school learn as their desire to return to in-school learning increases.
The prospect of masks protecting children at school is inconclusive at best, and some have suggested that they do more harm than good. However, if parents are given a choice between in-school learning with masks or some temporary solution that they think can no longer work, they will likely show support for masks. However, it is possible that such support is given as a concession rather than a preference.
The greatest takeaway from this report is that children have been severely affected by the pandemic. If a child was required to quarantine from school, most had to be quarantined from school multiple times. The average number of quarantines per child was about 2.54. This is a massive disruption to the development and education of the child.
Ultimately, as it approaches K-12 education policy, the state should adopt a philosophy of freedom and choice for families. Seventy-four percent of parents support school choice programs such as Educational Savings Accounts (ESAs). Additionally, parents desire to expand and promote programs such as school vouchers and charter schools to open up options for students as we exit the pandemic. These programs should be expanded to promote more options for families. Government often has a track record of inhibiting freedom. School choice reforms are an opportunity to change this trajectory and provide educational opportunities to families in the state.
When it is shown that a policy is good and effective, it is often necessary to branch out that policy to other areas that need it. For more than five years in Mississippi, the state has benefited from Educational Savings Accounts program. However, despite existing for so long and having shown to be beneficial, only a very small portion of students are eligible. Mississippi should revisit and expand this program.
An Education Savings Account assesses the funds that the state has already allocated to each student. Then, the fund allows that student’s parents to use those funds for sanctioned educational costs such as private school tuition, online learning programs, and private tutoring. Conventional education funding models apportion taxpayer dollars to the exclusive control of government education boards and bureaucrats. On the other hand, ESAs allow parents to choose the best way to use their child’s public education funds, if they decide to use it outside of public school administration.
However, across the United States, Educational Savings Accounts have been implemented differently, bringing various results. As it stands currently, there are eight states that have implemented Educational Savings Accounts into their educational systems: Arizona, Florida, Indiana, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Mississippi. States such as Indiana have broadened the eligibility of their Educational Savings Accounts program to a need-based system for students. Other states like Mississippi have limited eligibility only to those students with special needs.
Mississippi has certainly taken the right steps in providing this opportunity for students with special needs. However, broadening the eligibility for Educational Savings Accounts would give more students these alternative education options. Despite Mississippi’s Educational Savings Accounts program existing for more than five years, it still only makes up for about 0.06 percent of the state’s K-12 revenue. Additionally, only 19 percent of Mississippi students are eligible for the program, and only 0.1 percent of students across the state actually use this educational choice program.
In Mississippi, the problem goes beyond merely increasing awareness. Instead, the Educational Savings Account program in Mississippi is limited to only a small group of students. Mississippi would do well to expand the program, as other states have done.
For instance, in addition to providing accounts to special needs students, Arizona has expanded its program eligibility. This expansion now applies to those who attended a “D” or “F” ranked school, have been adopted in the state’s foster care system, and those whose parents were killed in the line of duty. This has aided a little less than a quarter of Arizona students, and the program continues to grow.
In West Virginia, the state has expanded its ESA eligibility to 93 percent of its student population. This policy has given West Virginian students and parents the ability to determine where their allocated education funding will go instead of leaving those decisions exclusively in the power of education school boards and bureaucrats. Students can attend public schools if they opt to do so, but the funds follow the student if they decide to pursue other educational options.
Mississippi has taken good steps in providing school choice to its students, but the policy is too limited in scope to be more than five years old. Expanding Education Savings Account eligibility would give Mississippi parents the choice to decide where their student’s education funding should best be spent.
The need for medical care has been highlighted by the pandemic more than ever before. As a way to expand their coverage and reach as many patients as possible, doctors from across the country poured into Mississippi over the internet. While this effort was successful, some long-term reforms can be made so that doctors can continue to serve their patients using this technology.
Like many technologies, the growth of telemedicine has been both a growth in innovation and growth in adoption. While the basic technology itself has existed since the 1990s, innovation and advancement have allowed for the technology to offer more and more to patients every year. During Covid, the technology has seen exponential development and growth.
In light of COVID-19, the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure allowed out-of-state physicians to perform telemedicine even if they do not possess a Mississippi medical license. However, these physicians were only allowed to serve patients “with whom they already have a pre-existing doctor-patient relationship.” Furthermore, even this limited exception was allowed only “until action is taken to lift the [COVID-19] emergency.”
Given the expansive potential for telemedicine, official state policy should permit doctors to serve Mississippians regardless of the doctor’s geographic location and regardless of whether or not there is a pandemic ongoing. Under current law, an individual must be licensed in Mississippi to practice telemedicine in the state. Doctors from 29 other states can already have their medical licenses reciprocated and practice in Mississippi through the Interstate Medical Licensure Compact (IMLC). Despite this, current state policy does not permit telemedicine practice by doctors from the remaining 20 states.
Such a policy inhibiting Mississippians from receiving telemedicine care from these 20 states is a boundary to healthcare access. Several medical institutions with world-renowned expertise are located in states that are currently not included in the IMLC. Such institutions include Weill Cornell Medicine (New York), Cedars-Sinai Medical Center (California), H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center (Florida), and others. Yet, unless a doctor from these institutions happened to be directly licensed in Mississippi, they could not offer their services via telemedicine in the state.
Meanwhile, states like New Mexico enacted legislation all the way back in 2001 that instructs the state medical board to issue “a telemedicine license to allow the practice of medicine across state lines to an applicant who holds a full and unrestricted license to practice medicine in another state or territory of the United States.” (emphasis added). New Mexico saw the importance of telemedicine even in 2001 when the technology was far less developed and proven. Telemedicine proved its effectiveness during Covid. There is no reason why the Mississippi legislature should not enact the same policy -despite the unfortunate fact that it would be doing so over 20 years after New Mexico.
Mississippi's telemedicine policies are behind the technological curb. The state is long due for a reform that allows for the leverage of this modern technology so that no matter where they are in the country, doctors can serve Mississippians.
California once epitomised all that was good about the United States. Those living in the Golden State enjoyed a standard of living and quality of life that was the envy of America, if not the world. It was a state of opportunity in a land of opportunity.
Silicon Valley in the 1960s was the cradle of the digital revolution. It was there that computers went from something owned by a handful of hobbyists to the smartphone in your pocket. The Golden State saw social revolution, too. From same sex marriage to billion dollar tech start-ups, things that might be regarded as outlandish elsewhere began in California before going mainstream everywhere else. It was a magnet for talent, and one of the most dynamic places on the planet. Where California led, America – and the world – followed. Or at least aspired to.
Let us hope that this is no longer the case because, if California is indicative of where the rest of America is going, the US is heading towards disaster.
California has been catastrophically mismanaged by a succession of Leftist leaders. Its personal state income tax is now the highest in America. While southern states like my own Mississippi are planning to abolish income taxes entirely, Leftist politicians in California have drawn up plans for a new wealth tax.
Once full of freewheeling entrepreneurs, California is now the most regulated state in the country, according to the Mercatus Center. Permits and licensing are required for almost everything. It is not just big name entrepreneurs, like Elon Musk, who have had enough. Hundreds of thousands of ordinary people and businesses are fleeing, moving to Texas, Utah, Arizona and elsewhere. Last year, California’s population fell for the first time in recorded history.
Having served as an emblem of modernity, there is something almost pre-modern about the California that progressive politicians have created.
For a start, the lights sometimes go out. In pursuit of a renewable energy policy, California has not built enough power generating capacity. This has made energy prices among the most expensive in America. The supply is often so unreliable that the state government has been reduced to pleading with residents to switch off the power to avoid blackouts. (Boris, please take note).
Around one in ten Americans are Californian, yet the state has about a third of the country’s welfare recipients. San Francisco might be the richest post code in the country, but outnumbering the tech zillionaires is a growing army of low paid menial workers who can barely get by. The kind of wealth inequalities that exist in parts of California today are the kind you might have expected to see in Medici Florence or Tsarist Russia, not in a modern Western society.
Progressive politicians have managed to restrict the supply of new housing and at the same time imposed state-wide rent controls. The result is that California is now “home” to about a quarter of America’s homeless population. Iconic Venice beach has hundreds of people living in makeshift shelters.
California is also a warning of what happens when “woke” politicians are put in charge. Yes, they pursue policies that inhibit innovation and economic growth. Far worse is the effect they have on what it means to be American.
The United States was founded on the idea that each of us is defined as an individual in possession of what Thomas Jefferson called “inalienable rights”. Those that run California today would rather that we were defined instead by our immutable characteristics. Instead of being free individuals, equal before the law, Californians are increasingly governed by a woke elite that has an almost apartheid style obsession with not merely race, but gender and sexuality. The danger is that this will tear America apart.
“But why”, I hear you ask “if things are really that bad don’t Californians do something about it?”
Last week, Californians were given the opportunity to sack their current governor, Gavin Newsom, in a recall election. The motion to eject Newsom was not only defeated. Faced with a Trumpish Republican challenger to the incumbent, Californians elected to keep him by an overwhelming margin of two to one.
A Left-wing incumbent with a disastrous record was, it seems, preferred to a Trump-type alternative. If California shows us how Left-wing politicians can destroy a state, it also shows us how a certain type of conservatism can unwittingly let them get away with it.
Douglas Carswell is the president and chief executive of the Mississippi Center for Public Policy, one of the leading free market advocacy organisations in the US.
This opinion piece originally appeared in The Telegraph
Happy Constitution Day! As we celebrate one of America’s founding documents, it’s worth asking: what made America so great?
When we declared our independence in 1776, America was just a fledgling experiment in self-government which the rest of the world expected to fail miserably. All of the wealth and power was in the Old World, with its palaces, empires, and powdered wig-wearing aristocrats. America was considered the boondocks, full of log cabins and fur cap-wearing farmers, trappers, and frontiersmen.
A few years later, America had fielded a Continental Army that defeated the largest military power in world history, and had become the freest and most prosperous country in the world.
America became great because the Constitution limited the power of government and empowered individuals to lead their lives as they saw fit. The framers of the Constitution did not know what America would look like 230 years in the future. But they knew they were tired of being subject to the whims of a king. They carefully constructed a government that had just enough power to impose civil order, protect citizens from foreign invaders, and secure individual rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, but not enough power to violate those rights itself. To achieve this, the framers confined the powers of the federal government to those specifically listed in the Constitution and divided that power among three branches of government.
The framers also took a belt-and-suspenders approach to protecting the rights of the people. They added a Bill of Rights to the Constitution to ensure that certain important rights were never violated, even though the framers themselves said that the Constitution had not granted the federal government the power to violate those rights to begin with. Additional amendments were later added to the Constitution to extend its protection of rights to all people, regardless of race or gender, and to keep state and local governments from violating the people’s rights.
If you don’t recognize this strictly limited government, you would be forgiven. Today, politicians say they can do just about anything they want, except what is explicitly forbidden by the Bill of Rights, and even that is up for debate. When asked where the Constitution authorized a proposed law, one congressman admitted, “I don’t worry about the Constitution on this to be honest.”
The rest of Congress appears to feel the same way. Every detail of our lives is subjected to government rules. The Federal Register, which contains all proposed and final regulations issued by federal agencies, has published over 3.2 million pages. If it were printed and stacked, it would be taller than the Washington Monument. This does not take into account all the laws passed by Congress, or by state and local governments.
Because of all these rules, the cost of doing business in America is staggering, and startups and small businesses are at a competitive disadvantage to big businesses that can easily afford it. Those large companies can also afford to pay lobbyists to convince lawmakers to pass even more laws that keep new competitors at bay. All the while, countless Americans are prevented from pursuing their version of the American Dream.
Where did we go wrong? The framers envisioned the judiciary as the guardians of individual rights. But over time, the courts have become more interested in picking and choosing which rights to protect or neglect. In the process, they have invented government powers that do not exist. The result is that our government is far more powerful than the founders ever intended. You may have heard the term “activist judges.” We certainly don’t need those. But we do need an engaged judiciary that takes seriously its role in the system of checks and balances so carefully designed by the framers.
The good news is that we can all play a part in restoring the American vision. Courts will only take our constitutional rights seriously if we do. We need citizens who are willing to stand up for their rights, and attorneys who are willing to advocate for those people, simply because it is the right thing to do. At the Mississippi Justice Institute, we have made that our mission.
Economics policy and strong political leadership are not different worlds but rather two sides of the same coin. Political leaders must use wisdom to strike the right balance.
In 2011, a study was conducted by J. Brian O’Roark and William C. Wood that found that when it came to discussing (and eventually voting on) topics like the minimum wage, “members who majored in economics…were less likely to vote for the minimum wage increase than their colleagues. No other major had a consistent influence.”
It is interesting to consider this theory that ideas that Congress comes up with as a whole may not even be supported by the ones that are trained in that particular sphere. This is especially truth with handling economic policy like taxes, wages, tariffs, and the like.
The truth of the matter is that most politicians that support flawed changes to our economic system are likely not skilled in understanding or communicating the reason for the change. Rather, they simply stand as puppets for those that supposedly know how economics works. While advice is certainly a welcome help, following such instructions blindly can only lead to disaster.
Many leaders not very adept at learning about complex economic principles and communicating the rationale of their policy decisions. Perhaps the reason for this is that the theoretical world of economics is somehow conflicting with the pragmatic pursuit of politics. The reality is that many politicians just simply do not know or do not care about how various economic principles operate within the purview of their profession.
The issue is that economics and studying the language of markets is critical to run any political system. Markets are the backbone of any society. If someone is running a government structure and is not literate in how various policies like tax reform, tariffs, and other issues affect these markets, there can be damaging effects. Economic literacy is a key ingredient to establishing good policy.
Imagine how effective the government would be if most of our leaders were economically wise with their decisions and were able to communicate that wisdom with clarity and poise. The current situation is quite alarming, especially on the federal level, as politicians make decisions and spend money without any fiscal restraint as to how they might impact the economy and individuals down the road.
Economic literacy in the political sphere cannot inherently be achieved by some government policy. Rather, it is up to voters to elect leaders that are fiscally wise and understand the repercussions of their actions.
In fact, if good economic policy is what people want, there’s no better policy than allowing the free market to just grow the economy on itself through Reaganite trickle-down economics. The economy will boom if government just stands out of the way. That does not take any rocket science.
Mississippi’s defense industry is in a position for growth. However, as the industry grows, it is important to consider the landscape of this sector and consider the key public policy reforms that can help it move forward.
According to the Department of Defense, Mississippi has the 10th highest defense spending as a percentage of state GDP. This works out to about 5.3 percent of the state’s total GDP. Some of the top entities to be awarded this spending include Huntington Ingalls, Olin Corporation, Seemann Composites, and Mississippi State University.
While the defense industry is unique in that it services a very specific market, the industry does not operate in a vacuum. Much of the defense industry is directly affected by the policies of the states they operate in. Like other industries, the defense industry is subject to regulatory policies, labor laws, business filing requirements, taxes, environmental regulations, and many other elements.
Thus, it is important for public policy to directly recognize the economic importance of the nation’s military-industrial complex. But at the same time, one of the most significant ways that states can support the development of the defense industry is to pass industry-agnostic policies that encourage free-market productivity and growth. Lower taxes, a lower regulatory burden, and a friendly business climate all contribute to the development of states so that they are better prepared to encourage defense companies to come to their states.
Currently, California has the highest level of total defense spending, followed closely by Texas. But the amount of companies willing to stay in California’s high tax and regulation environment is shrinking. The defense sector is no exception. One glaring example is Lockheed Martin, which has the highest amount of defense spending of any company in the nation. The company’s Fleet Ballistic Missile Headquarters, formerly based in Sunnyvale, California, moved to Titusville, Florida. On a smaller level but still significant level, Mississippi has also seen some defense sector migration from California. OceanAreo, an underwater drone development company with work in the defense and commercial sectors, recently announced its relocation from San Diego to Gulfport.
Mississippi has made many great strides in creating a friendlier business climate, but much work remains to be done. According to the Fraser Institute, Mississippi still ranks 41st for economic freedom. While states larger populations and financial investments might have more reasons for companies to relocate to them, Mississippi does not always have that same negotiating power. If the state wants to get more competitive and see defense industry growth, economic freedom reforms through lower taxes and regulatory reform are key ingredients to creating that environment.
The defense industry is the economic foundation for America’s defense of liberty against its enemies. Mississippi has an opportunity to see the growth of this sector in the state, but in order to see stronger growth in the sector that helps defend liberty, the state should start by expanding its own economic liberty. That’s the American way.
Mississippi has been in a precarious constitutional problem for the last couple of months as it has tried to deal with ballot Initiative 65, an initiative that would allow the use of medical marijuana in the state. The initiative was passed by a wide margin. However, the Mississippi Supreme Court shot down the initiative due to a discrepancy in the Mississippi State Constitution.
During the 1990s, Mississippi passed Section 273, an amendment to the state constitution that establishes the ballot initiative process. The process requires that a certain number of signatures be gathered from each of the five districts in the state. The problem is that Mississippi no longer has those five districts. Due to the 2000 Census, Mississippi now has four districts, and the state legislature never passed anything to resolve the matter. Thus, when the issue came around as to the legality of the ballot initiative, the Supreme Court ruled that it was illegitimate. This did not happen on account of the people of Mississippi. Rather, it was a legislative oversight. This was a massive omission in Mississippi’s legal and democratic framework.
Many may ask, what’s the big deal? It’s not even a difference in the number of signatures but the number of districts. There ultimately is no mathematical difference when we analyze the situation. The nature of laws is that there is no room for exception, and if there is a bad law in place (or worse, a vague law), proper procedure must be in place in order to remedy it. The problem is that for the last 20+ years, the state legislature has neglected to do its job and come to a resolution regarding the nature of ballot resolutions, and due to their hesitancy, unintended consequences have arisen.
However, the situation may be even more sinister. The very nature of the legislature and supreme court keeping a technically erroneous ballot initiative system gives them the extra power to strike down any ballot initiative they dislike. And yet, who are the ones responsible for fixing the problem? The very people that have that power: the legislature. Regardless of personal views of marijuana usage, Mississippi's government should not portray itself as being accountable through ballot initiative and yet keep a technicality on the books that renders the process ineffective.
Last month, lawmakers claimed that they are soon to be resolving the issue with medical marijuana. However, what continues to be the discussion is how to resolve the problem with ballot initiatives and Mississippi’s constitutional discrepancy. Mississippi needs to decide if they want to be a ballot initiative state or not. Right now, it is simply in a state of limbo, acting like it is a ballot initiative state when in reality, it is not. Accountability needs to be in place at some level. Mississippi needs decisive action to settle on what that looks like.
Jimmy Carter’s presidency is starting to look not so bad after all.
The 39th US President’s four years in the Oval Office were not a happy time for America. Abroad, the United States was humiliated by a series of foreign policy debacles. At home, energy costs and inflation soared. Things got so bad under Carter people started to believe in America’s inevitable decline.
Japan, they said in the late 1970s, was going to overtake America economically. The Soviets were supposed to prevail around the world. America had lost her sense of direction, and her enemies were emboldened.
Something very similar is happening right now.
Whether you agree with the US withdrawal from Afghanistan or not, it is hard to imagine a worse way of handling it than the Biden administration managed last week. Artificial deadlines for the US departure were announced. Precious few plans for an orderly evacuation were made. Tons of US taxpayer military equipment was left for the Taliban.
A recent arrival in the United States, over the past seven months I have often found it hard to find any objective news or analysis about the Biden administration. Mainstream journalists seem so partisan that what they tell us often says more about their own personal preferences than it does about the achievements of this administration.
Last week that changed. Not even the most partisan apologist for this administration could ignore the images of the disaster unfolding in Kabul.
If Washington’s politicians are so inept at extricating the US from Afghanistan, what about their judgment on everything else? What confidence can we have, for example, in the billion-dollar boondoggle Biden & co have conjured up known as the Green New Deal?
Having spent eye wateringly large amounts of money, the government has caused inflation. This inflationary effect, officials insist, is only transitory. Really? How can we have confidence that an administration unable to see two weeks ahead in Afghanistan knows what lies on the economic horizon in the months and years ahead?
Wealth taxes, the radical progressives insist, are essential. Only by redistributing America’s wealth, Washington insiders say, can they provide us with the public services we want. I am not sure I would trust this lot to run a bath, let alone to know what public services people in Mississippi want.
At times like this, it is easy to give in to despair. Federal officials seem so hopeless and those that preside over public policy seem so inept, it is easy to become despondent. But remember this; no one ever won by betting against America.
If we feel that the American Republic is under pressure at home and abroad, imagine what it must have felt like in the 1940s or the late 1970s? Then the challenges America faced must have seemed overwhelming. Yet the United States came through.
America will find a way through these challenges. Foreign policy drift will be replaced by resolve. High tax and spend policies will pave the way for a return to good economic housekeeping.
The key to reviving America’s standing in the world and overcoming the legion of domestic problems created by big government intervention is to stay true to America’s Founding ideals.
America is unlike any other country in the world because she is, and she remains, an experiment in self-government. Under the US Constitution, government remains limited, power is constrained. Those that make public policy are held accountable to the people.
Provided the United States stays true to those principles, this period will pass. It will be morning in America again.
This opinion piece by Douglas Carswell, President & CEO of the Mississippi Center for Public Policy, originally appeared in the Northside Sun