Taxes
NPRI on TV; Update: Video added
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Updated: Video Added
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Pay attention to those facts behind the stats
Taking a closer look at tax and spend rankings
The big-spending crowd in Nevada continues to base its arguments on the assumption that the way to measure government efficiency is to focus on inputs - how many dollars we channel into government. But how much we fund government isn't a performance measure.
You gotta spend money to waste money
Las Vegas CityLife recently printed an article on how to produce $1 billion in revenue for the state. Most of it would result from legalizing certain industries like prostitution, online gambling, marijuana and gay marriage. But what kind of philosophy justifies legalizing something just for the sake of taxing it?
Goal: Actually educate children
The State of Nevada Controller's Office released its "Report to the Citizens" on Tuesday, and beyond the obvious (Nevada spent more money in FY2008 than in FY2007 despite the recession), what are most interesting are the "Performance Measures" Controller Kim Wallin reports.
Mythbusting economies of scale
Dr. Elliot Parker, an economist at the University of Nevada, Reno, has written a memo (in addition to two newspaper columns) to Nevada System of Higher Education Chancellor Jim Rogers on Nevada's budget, giving reasons why Nevada needs to raise taxes. NPRI has been researching the validity of his claims, and we have already made several counterpoints.
The untenable nature of NV state employee pay raises
The ongoing recession has drawn attention recently to the lavish pay raises enjoyed by Nevada's state government workers. However, what has been lost on many observers is that the pay structure for state workers suffers from a systemic problem. Pay raises for state workers are far out of line with what workers in the private sector earn even during periods of robust economic growth.
How do you do math?
Still no word – after multiple requests – from the Gibbons administration on how the state is getting the 34 percent budget-cut figure it's been giving the media.
Media pundits still confused
In "Ostriches are isolated" Jon Ralston attacked the Nevada Policy Research Institute for its criticism of how the government and the media both have handled the discussions and coverage of the state budget-cutting issue. We had the temerity to ask how the alleged "34 percent cut" was calculated – a critical question to which we never received an answer.
Ralston Math
In the second phase of Ralston's missive, Ostriches are isolated, he criticizes NPRI's math with some pretty bogus reasoning. On at least three occasions Jon Ralston has claimed that Nevada currently faces a $2.5 billion shortfall. Ironically, it's a claim only he has made.
