Author: James A. Bacon
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Americans Still Moving to the Sun Belt
State-to-state migration within the United States has slowed dramatically since the 2000s, but foot-loose Americans are still moving to sprawling Sun Belt cities, maintains urban geographer Joel Kotkin in the New Geography blog. Drawing upon 2010-2011 data, he writes: “The weak recovery has slowed migration, but expensive, overregulated and dense metropolitan areas continue to lose…
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A Respite from the Culture Wars?
by James A. Bacon It sounds like Virginia Republicans have learned a lesson — at least temporarily — from the shellacking they took in the November elections. All the talk of “legitimate rape,” rape-induced pregnancy as a “gift from god” and, earlier this year, trans-vaginal ultrasounds has poisoned the Grand Old Party in the minds…
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Liberty U Fights for Our Freedoms, Too
Liberty University has renewed its challenge to the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) on the grounds that it violates the school’s religious freedom. Read the details in FoxNews. Personally, I’m a big fan of birth control. I’m all in favor of insurance companies paying for it. Birth control prevents unwanted pregnancies. I wish…
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We’re No. 12! We’re No. 12!
by James A. Bacon Virginia may be holding onto its sterling AAA credit rating, but global asset manager Conning & Co., gives it a so-so No. 12 credit ranking in its latest State of the State report. For reasons not explained in the white paper, the Old Dominion fell from a No. 6 perch in…
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Public-Private Transportation Act Needs Reform
Virginia’s reliance upon the Public-Private Partnership (P3) process to build large bridge, rail and highway projects has led to the centralization of decision making in the hands of the governor’s office with little effective oversight, contends James J. Regimbal Jr. with Fiscal Analytics, Ltd., in a report sponsored by the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC).…
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Another Free Market Innovation for the Age Wave
America’s population is aging rapidly, and so is the number of elderly who require assistance in daily living. Baby Boomers, to many of whom has fallen the responsibility of caring for aging parents, often find the alternatives unattractive. Nursing homes can be either too impersonal or too expensive. Caring for the parent at home is…
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Breaking the Cycle of Poverty
Communities in Schools aims to boost graduation rates for inner city Richmond students by helping them surmount a deep-rooted culture of poverty.
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VDOT to Study Potomac Crossings
by James A. Bacon Three days ago the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) issued an innocuous press release announcing that it would sponsor and fund a study of future travel demand across the Potomac River. Specifically, the study will focus on cross-river traffic and demand between the Route 15 crossing north of Leesburg to the…
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Black Friday, Internet Retailing and the Tax Base
by James A. Bacon As millions of Americans plot their insane Black Friday retail rush, trampling over one another to reach the best deals in Wal-Mart and Target, millions of other Americans are planning to sit at home and shop online. Who needs the risk of getting crushed like a fallen participant in the Pamplona…
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IG of the Day: Projecting Virginia’s Age Profile
As the massive Baby Boomer generation achieves senior citizen status, as people live longer and as birth rates stagnate, Virginia’s demographic pyramid won’t look very pyramidal anymore. In the future there will be a whole lot more old people, transforming the pyramid into more of a column. Yup, the geezers will be out there, driving…
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Inquisitor, Investigate Thyself
The Southern Commission on Colleges has far better subjects for its oversight activities than the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors. by Reed Fawell III Despite the fracas last summer between University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors and President Teresa Sullivan, or perhaps because of it, the university has charted a bold new course, as…
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Solid Thinking about Richmond’s Future
by James A. Bacon Richmond’s Future, a regional think tank founded by former Virginia Commonwealth University President Eugene Trani, is spear-heading the most interesting conversations taking place today about the future path of the region’s economic development. It’s a welcome change from the regional leadership’s old habit of touring other cities in the search of…
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A Market Alternative to Regulating Payday Lenders
by James A. Bacon As Chesterfield County continues to debate how extensively to restrict payday lending — a classic manifestation of the do-gooders’ proclivity for imposing their exquisite sensibilities upon the population through government coercion — it is nice to be reminded of a positive experiment to help Virginians with short-term lending needs. Under former…
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Reform Juvenile Treatment: Save Money, Save Lives
The tab for holding juvenile offenders in secure state facilities averages $221 per day per youth over a stay of 14 months. That amounts to almost $100,000 per kid. The result? Seventy-four percent of those confined in state facilities are convicted of another offense within three years. Writes Mike Thompson in the latest edition of…
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Another Income-Inequality Study Stating the Obvious
by James A. Bacon Along comes another study demonstrating that income inequality in the United States is getting worse and worse. The wrinkle this time is that it breaks down the growth in inequality by state. Virginia, it turns out, ranks 15th in the country for income inequality in 2008-2010, with the top fifth of…