War in Iraq... Consequences in Alaska
According to the National Priorities Project, Alaskans soon will have collectively paid $780,600,000 for the war in Iraq. In other words, every individual Alaskan owns a $1,500 share in the Iraq War.
How about the town of Valdez? Residents of Valdez are into the Iraq War to the tune of $5,800,000, which is enough money to pay for nearly 800 children in Valdez to attend a year of Head Start.
The good citizens of Anchorage have collectively paid about $312,000,000 to fund their share of the war in Iraq. That amount could have paid for 15,133 four-year university scholarships.
The share of war belonging to the hardy souls in Fairbanks is well over $26,000,000. That sum of money could have purchased nearly 16,000 annual health insurance policies for the uninsured children of Fairbanks.
Public policy choices. Life and death consequences.
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Public Policy Advocacy Tools
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We Squeeze the Volunteers
and the interns to contribute all they can to the work of the nonprofit Alaska Center for Public Policy, and they contribute mightly. Will you contribute to the work of the Center? Consider a donation equal to an evening at the movies (with popcorn and drinks!), or dinner for two. We'll squeeze every dollar you send "till the eagle screams." We promote public policy that benefits low and moderate income families and individuals in Alaska.
Please send your check to: ACPP, POB 210490, Anchorage AK 99521.
A hearty thanks in advance.
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New Alaska Retirement Security Resource
SB 141 became legislation that dramatically weakened retirement benefits for nearly all state and municipal public employees in Alaska. The bill was rushed through in a special session which was characterized by no public hearings, a lack of objective factual data, and extreme pressure applied to legislators. The result was a disaster for all Alaskans. For more information, see the ACPP retirement security website.
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Dear Colleague:
Our mission is to support public policies that benefit low and middle-income Alaskan families. Because we are a nonprofit organization, we accomplish our mission by depending on a tenuous combination of volunteers, interns, contracts, grants, and donations.
I would like to personally thank some of our recent generous donors who include Kevin Morford, Donna Elliott, Kay Rollison, and Lauren Bruce. And I have to say that nothing would give me greater pleasure than to have the opportunity to put your name here.
Your donations make possible ACPP Newsletter #18, and we are pleased to send it to you. Your comments and constructive criticisms are appreciated--actually, are crucial. However, if you would prefer to no longer receive this newsletter, simply click on "SafeUnsubscribe" at the bottom of the Newsletter.
Lawrence D. Weiss
Executive Director, Alaska Center for Public Policy |
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Property Taxes: Is Business Paying a Fair Share?
Late February of this year I sent the following letter to the Anchorage Daily News editor:
I am baffled by the Daily News' righteous indignation expressed in the Feb. 14 editorial, "Tax shift no answer." The Fairbanks City Council approved a resolution asking legislators to shift more property tax responsibility to commercial properties and away from residential properties. The Daily News response was "shifting the tax burden from residential property owners to commercial property owners . . . is not fair and is not the answer."
I would respond, "How would you know? You offer no analysis."
I am also mystified why the Daily News editorially dabbles in the property tax affairs of Fairbanks when we have property tax issues here in Anchorage that demand real analysis. A study by UAA's Institute for Social and Economic Research, "Anchorage Budgets and Property Taxes," found:
"By any measure the growth in commercial assessed value has not kept up with residential. The total assessed value of commercial property is less today than it was in 1980, after adjusting for inflation." And, "In the early 1970s the shares were 33 percent commercial and 50 percent residential (with personal property the balance). By 1999 the shares were 24 percent commercial and 65 percent residential."
It appears that here in Anchorage businesses have been transferring their share of property taxes to homeowners for decades. How about a nice editorial on the "fairness" of that?
Bottom line: Facts, rather than blather.
[Visit the ACPP Blog to see two responses...]
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Limit Greenhouse Gas Emissions For Alaskan Businesses?
The Center for Advancing Faculty Excellence invites you to take part in a public debate and discussion, "Should the state impose limits on greenhouse gas emissions by Alaskan businesses and government agencies?" The event is Tuesday April 17, 7-9 pm, UAA/APU Consortium Library, Room 307, University of Alaska Anchorage. Admission is free.
Come hear the award-winning UAA speech and debate team lay out the issues on this important topic, followed by a panel of faculty respondents and public discussion. This event is part of a series of debates sponsored by UAA since 2003 to provide forums for Alaskans to participate in discussions of policies and issues affecting their future.
For information: aner@uaa.alaska.edu or 786-4605
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HR 800 Employee Free Choice Act
These are the concluding paragraphs of "The Right to Organize: Freedom and the Middle Class Squeeze," testimony before the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, U.S. Senate March 27, 2007. Presented by Larry Mishel, President, Economic Policy Institute, Washington, DC.
I have shown that the decline in union representation has been a major cause of two disturbing trends in our economy: the rise in inequality and the failure of average working Americans to share in the benefits of rising productivity. By reducing the opportunity for employers to intimidate and discourage workers from unionizing after they have reached a collective decision to do so, the Employee Free Choice Act [HR 800] can help restore and spread the benefits that unions bring to workers and the economy.
Employees understand the benefits unions bring. Research by Harvard economist Richard Freeman (that I have attached to this testimony) shows that a majority of nonunion non-managerial workers in 2005 would have voted for a union if given the opportunity. If even half of the 58% of employees who want a union had one, the entire economy would be transformed, and I have no doubt that the result would be a much fairer distribution of the economic wealth our nation produces.
The authors of the Wagner Act understood perfectly well that individual employees cannot strike a fair bargain with much more powerful employers. They knew, as Sen. James Webb says, that employees need an agent. Their conclusions are still part of the National Labor Relations Act's Findings and Declaration of Policy:
The inequality of bargaining power between employees who do not possess full freedom of association or actual liberty of contract, and employers who are organized in the corporate or other forms of ownership association substantially burdens and affects the flow of commerce, and tends to aggravate recurrent business depressions, by depressing wage rates and the purchasing power of wage earners . . .
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