2015+AAI+Action+Plan.Pdf

ACTION PLAN FOR ARKANSAS 2015 Dan Greenberg and Alexander Cartwright, editors i “For many years now, you and I have been shushed like children and told there are no simple answers to the complex problems which are beyond our comprehension. Well, the truth is, there are simple answers; they just are not easy ones.” – Ronald Reagan ©2014 Advance Arkansas Institute ii Introduction The citizens of Arkansas face large challenges – challenges that arise not only from our sputtering recovery from one of the longest recessions in our nation’s history, but also from a legacy of bad decisions by Arkansas policymakers. The difficulties that we face are temporary, but the ideas and values that will enable us to triumph over our difficulties are eternal. If our leaders’ choices are inspired by the American traditions of individual liberty, free markets, lower taxes, and limited, transparent, and accountable government, those choices will pave the way for the kind of economic growth and job creation that will ensure our continued advancement. Such traditional values are at the center of American civilization; they remain as timely as the ideas that animated the American Revolution. In much of the world today, political change is only achieved through violence. But in Arkansas and in America, we can trust the counsel of the Book of Isaiah: “Come, let us reason together.” Our Action Plan for Arkansas is a sourcebook of solutions for those who believe that bedrock American values should inform policymaking in Arkansas. Each chapter of the Action Plan for Arkansas reviews a specific problem that our state faces today and explains how traditional American values can provide a solution. Many chapters provide examples of draft legislation that have already been proposed in previous legislative sessions; those chapters without draft legislation could easily be submitted as bill draft requests for the upcoming legislative session. iii Introduction Dr. Larry Reed, who now serves as president of the Foundation for Economic Education, once gave a famous speech to the Detroit Economic Club entitled “Seven Principles of Sound Public Policy.” Any policymaker who hopes to improve governance in Arkansas should become familiar with Reed’s seven principles. Here they are: • Free people are not equal, and equal people are not free. • What belongs to you, you tend to take care of; what belongs to no one or everyone tends to fall into disrepair. • Sound policy requires that we consider long-run effects and all people, not simply short-run effects and a few people. • If you encourage something, you get more of it; if you discourage something, you get less of it. • Nobody spends somebody else’s money as carefully as he spends his own. • Government has nothing to give anybody except what it first takes from somebody, and a government that’s big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you’ve got. • Liberty makes all the difference in the world. It is difficult to distill principles into a few brief words; in fact, Reed’s entire speech deserves careful study. (That speech is available on the Advance Arkansas Institute’s website.) Reed closed his speech by quoting Benjamin Franklin, who noted that “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” That maxim teaches two valuable lessons: that legislative decisions often imply trade-offs – exchanges of one value for another – and that some trade-offs simply are not worth making. We hope this book will serve as a resource for any freedom-oriented legislator, candidate, or activist who is serious about solving the problems of the Natural State and iv Introduction transforming Arkansas into a Land of Opportunity. Though the path to progress is often steep, it is far from insurmountable. The Advance Arkansas Institute is pleased to present you with these ideas for a better Arkansas: we now pass the torch to you. v Table of Contents Advancing the Arkansas Economy Tax Policy Should Create Jobs, Investment, and Economic Growth.........1 Tax Relief Without Revenue Loss....................................................................6 How Budget Hawks Can Save Taxpayer Money............................................9 Job Creation Through Occupational Freedom.............................................13 Getting Lawsuits Under Control....................................................................18 Shrinking Arkansas’s Lawsuit Exposure........................................................27 How to Bring Down Health Insurance Costs...............................................31 Avoiding the Fiscal Catastrophe of the “Private Option”..........................35 Making Medicaid Better, Not Just Bigger......................................................41 Arkansas’s Best Economic Development Plan: Cutting Corporate Welfare.............................................................................................................50 How a Federal Exchange Can Block an Obamacare Tax Hike..................57 Ending Overpriced Government Contracts..................................................61 Strengthening Education Through the Power of Choice...........................66 A Higher Education Plan for the 21st Century............................................73 Restricting Arkansas’s Budget Growth...........................................................77 Protecting Arkansans’ Rights The Right to Record Public Events................................................................81 The Right to Know about Criminals in Government.................................88 The Right to Know When Government Is Discriminating by Race..................................................................................................................93 vi Table of Contents The Right to Have Attorney General Settlements Benefit the Public......97 The Right to Prescription-Drug Privacy.......................................................102 The Right to Your Property: Forfeiture Reform........................................105 The Right to Your Property: Eminent Domain Reform...........................110 The Right to Comprehensive Elections.......................................................114 The Right to Be Free From Crime................................................................117 The Right to Freedom of Information........................................................127 The Right to Buy and Sell Tickets.................................................................133 The Right to Trade During Emergencies....................................................136 The Right to Know Health Care Costs........................................................139 The Rights of Students...................................................................................142 The Right To Know Legislative Votes.........................................................150 Improving Our Constitutions Amending Our State Constitution.................................................................155 Amending Our Federal Constitution.............................................................165 Ending the Risk of a “Runaway Convention”............................................171 Preventing Mistakes The Dangers of a “Buy American” Mandate............................................174 The Dangers of the Equal Rights Amendment.........................................177 The Dangers of Suspicionless Drug Testing..............................................184 The Dangers of Taxpayer-Subsidized Business.........................................190 Three Mistakes Legislators Should Avoid...................................................193 Appendices The Basics of Arkansas’s Legislative Process.............................................195 Further Reading...............................................................................................198 Acknowledgments...........................................................................................200 About the Editors............................................................................................201 vii Tax Policy Should Create Jobs, Investment, and Economic Growth Every session, Arkansas legislators file bills to reduce Arkansas’s tax burden, but enacting all of those tax-relief bills would likely be impossible. Any tax reduction deserves some praise, but legislators should note that some tax cuts are better than others. Writing second-rate tax relief into law will threaten the passage of first-rate tax policy. Legislators should keep the following principles of tax policy in mind, and not only because every one of these principles – if established in law – will both reduce taxes and increase revenue. Among the principles that an ideal tax system encourages and embodies are: Simplicity. Taxes should be easy to administer and comply with, in order to encourage voluntary compliance and discourage tax shelters and disguised income. Transparency. Taxes should be obvious and apparent: they shouldn’t be hidden from consumers by being lumped in with the price of the purchased good. Neutrality. The tax code should not micromanage the economy, encourage people to make decisions for tax reasons, or otherwise distort price signals that affect individual choice. Stability. Frequent changes in the tax code make planning and investment difficult. Economic growth and prosperity. A broad-based, low-rate tax best encourages job creation, capital investment,

Load more