Tag: Guest contributors
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Dems Win Big on Renewable Energy, But Issues Remain
by Jane Twitmyer In the 2019 election, Virginia voters finally figured out the one weird trick that allows any jurisdiction to pass good climate and clean-energy legislation, according to Dave Roberts at VOX. “They put Democrats in charge.” Virginia is the first southern state in the U.S. to set a goal of sourcing 100% of…
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Surviving COVID-19 with Video Chat, Netflix and Amazon Prime
Northern Virginia reader Allen Barringer responded to my request yesterday for readers to describe how they are coping with COVID-19. He started writing this piece as a comment, but it became so comprehensive that we decided to publish it as a full-fledged post. — JAB by Allen Barringer We live in a surreal moment: On…
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Collective Bargaining in Schools: a Prescription for Problems
by Chris Braunlich Joseph Ocol is the kind of teacher most parents would fight to have teach their daughter. His Englewood, Chicago, girls’ chess team won the national championship in 2016 against 60 other schools, an achievement noted in the Congressional Record, by news media and by the mayor and city council. And the girls…
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Is Carbon Capture Technology Scalable?
by Jane Twitmyer When talking about the future of Dominion Energy in a recent TV interview, Dominion Energy CEO Tom Farrell mentioned carbon sequestration as an approach for reducing greenhouse gas emissions as the company moves toward a “zero net” carbon energy mix. In the past, carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) seemed to be going…
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Virginia Values Act: Trial Lawyers Win, Business Climate Loses
by Hans Bader Both houses of the Virginia legislature passed the Virginia Values Act yesterday. Media coverage of the bill has focused on the fact that it will add sexual orientation and gender identity (transgender status) to state laws against discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations. As the media note, this is the first…
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Update: Geriatric Prison Release Bill Advances
The Virginia Senate has voted 21-to-19 to make prison inmates (including many murderers) eligible for “geriatric release” as early as age 50. The vote was largely along party lines, with all Democrats except Lynwood Lewis voting for the bill, and all Republicans except Emmett Hanger voting against it.
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Bill Broadens Definition of Sexual Harassment
by Hans Bader On January 30, a subcommittee in Virginia’s House of Delegates voted 5-to-2 to adopt a revised version of HB 1418, a bill to expand employers’ liability for sexual harassment. The bill originally applied to employers with six to 14 employees. Now it applies to all employers with more than five. Originally, while…
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Rocket Fuel for Health Care Costs
James C. Sherlock Elections have consequences. Democrats won fairly at the ballot box the right to pass anything they wish. I simply request that they consider the costs of legislation to their constituents, to business balance sheets, and to jobs before submitting health insurance-related bills. Virginians who get their health insurance both at work –…
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Senate Committee Votes to Raise Minimum Wage
by Hans Bader The Virginia Senate’s Commerce and Labor Committee has voted to raise Virginia’s minimum wage. As NPR notes, “business groups maintain that Virginia will lose jobs — and its business-friendly reputation” — as a result. The Virginia chapter of the National Federation of Independent Business estimates that the increase would slash 130,000 jobs in Virginia over 10 years.…
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Governance Nightmare: Integrating Hospitals and HMOs
by James C. Sherlock Del. Sally Hudson, D-Charlottesville, has introduced a terrific piece of legislation, HB 1731. The bill tackles for the first time an increasing threat to competition, cost, availability, consumer choice and quality of health care in Virginia — the vertically integrated carrier. The combination of hospitals and insurance carriers has captured the…
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Lawmakers Coddling Hospital Monopolies
by Jim Sherlock My last essay, “Runaway Costs and Hospital Monopolies,” discussed the fact that Virginians who get their health insurance at work and through the Affordable Care Act website pay the highest premiums in the country. We traced those costs to a number of sources, including the Certificate of Public Need (COPN), Virginia Department…
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Runaway Costs and Hospital Monopolies
by James C. Sherlock Healthcare costs are crowding out other spending by citizens and governments. All Virginians know this. Few understand, though, that their elected leaders in Richmond, who are recipients of huge campaign contributions from hospital interests, bear a significant share of the blame and some are actively working to increase costs further. Virginia…
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Early-Release-For-Murderers Bill Advances
A Virginia Senate committee voted Friday 9-to-5 (largely along party lines) to make many murderers eligible for release when they reach age 50. SB 624 effectively reinstates parole for many long-time inmates, even though the Virginia legislature abolished parole in 1995. The bill also guts Virginia’s three-strikes law, which required life without parole for offenders…
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Will Middle-Aged Killers Get Early Release?
by Hans Bader A Virginia bill, SB 624, would make middle-aged murderers and rapists eligible for “geriatric release.” It would do so even though “geriatric” is precisely about being old. It is defined in the dictionary as “old, elderly,” or “relating to, or appropriate for elderly people.” Under SB 624, a prison inmate would be eligible for…
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Virginia Death Tax Would Be Fairly Narrow
by Hans Bader A few days ago, I wrote about legislation to reinstate Virginia’s estate tax. The Tax Foundation has informed me that the tax contained in the bill would affect fewer households than in most of the states that still have an estate tax. (Most states no longer have an estate tax at all).…