Vance Ginn, PhD, is chief economist at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, nonpartisan research institute in Austin.

Texas’s public higher education systems can withstand a temporary tuition freeze. SB 167 would freeze tuition for 5 years in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and tuition would be adjusted by the previous year’s change in the consumer price index (CPI). This sort of freeze will be a step in the right direction, and the temporary nature of the freeze will allow for the results of this action to be evaluated to determine if it is working better than the current flawed approach. Tuition freezes have been successfully instituted by other public colleges.

Testimony in Support to the Texas Senate Committee on Higher Education

https://www.texaspolicy.com/senate-bill-167-government-failure-in-higher-ed/

In Texas, we dream big. That’s what House Bill 59 does—it imagines a Texas that lightens the tax burden on Texans, upholds property rights and ensures that education is properly funded.

Authored by Rep. Andrew Murr, R-Junction, the bill would eliminate the school maintenance and operations portion of your property tax bill on Jan. 1, 2024, and would create a legislative commission that would use the intervening time to study the best way to replace that revenue. This bill would cut local property taxes nearly in half while adhering to the state’s constitutional responsibility of funding government schools.

The key to achieving this, of course, is restraining government spending at the state and local government levels.

The fact is that the skyrocketing local property tax burden remains one of the state’s most pressing policy challenges. Property taxes have been growing faster than the average taxpayer’s ability to pay for them. Any growth over population-plus-inflation represents a growth in government above our ability to pay. For more on this formula, which we call the Conservative Texas Budget, click here.

According to the Tax Foundation, Texas has the seventh most burdensome property tax on homeowners. Using a different calculation, Fox News ranks Texas third-worst.

Too many have been forced out of their homes and businesses because of rapidly rising property taxes.

It would be great to eliminate all property taxes, which tend to hurt lower-income earners the most, so Texans can stop effectively renting from the government forever.

A good start in that process would be to eliminate school district M&O property taxes, which account for nearly half of the total property tax burden on Texans. Eliminating just the school district M&O property taxes is rather straightforward because the state determines the funding formulas for the school finance system, and it represents nearly half of the property tax levy across the state.

The question is how to replace this revenue. That’s easy—with a broader-based sales tax.

State sales taxes have grown far less than property taxes, less than personal income, and more closely with population growth plus inflation. This indicates that moving to a system based on the sales tax better aligns with the average taxpayer’s ability to pay for these taxes that fund government spending over time.

There are some important reasons why a sales tax is the better way to fund schools.

First, property taxes are inefficient. Property taxes in Texas are based primarily on subjective valuations by appraisal review boards and tax rates determined by local tax entities with little to no feedback from citizens, creating a highly inefficient collection mechanism.

Next, property taxes are more regressive than sales taxes. Sales taxes are paid once at purchase, yet property taxes are paid annually, hurting low- and fixed-income Texans the most because the costs compound over time. A high property tax also prevents many low-income earners from purchasing their first home and forces many others who do purchase to struggle to keep their home—they may even lose it.

Finally, during recessions (like the recent pandemic), lower-income earners tend to face the highest levels of unemployment and are least able to shoulder a tax burden. Their property tax burden, however, would increase relative to their income, while their sales tax burden would fall more proportionately with their income.

The sales tax is money that comes directly from the choices of consumers. It ensures that all financial power remains within their control, whereas property taxes are a burden that is forced upon all taxpayers with little means of working around it.

It would work—and result in fully funding schools based on the state’s school finance system.

Economists of the Baker Institute at Rice University studied the economic effects of replacing property taxes with sales taxes over time. They found that just a 3.6% decrease in school district M&O property taxes could contribute to a $14.3 billion increase in economic output and 217,000 new jobs after just the first year of reforms and more thereafter. Imagine if we eliminated that burden!

By combining property tax reductions and reform with spending limitations, Texas could shift to a more efficient and fairer sales tax system. In this way, Texans can be assured meaningful, lasting, property tax relief and an improved Texas Model that will sustain economic prosperity for generations.

https://thecannononline.com/dream-big-we-can-eliminate-school-district-mo-property-taxes/

​Texas’s economy continues improving from the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and forced business shutdowns by government since spring 2020. This includes robust job creation in March 2021 as state restrictions ended on March 10, which should further improve economic growth and job creation this year.
To help overcome the challenges still facing many struggling Texans and the assault on prosperity by those in D.C., Texas should commit to the Foundation’s Responsible Recovery Agenda.
More on the data and how Texans can get back to work as quickly and safely as possible ⬇️

A recent Wall Street Journal article highlighted the devastating mental health effects of the pandemic on children. Kids have been subjected to stifling lockdowns even though there has been overwhelming evidence that children are at low to no risk of experiencing severe symptoms or transmitting COVID-19. While the article is certainly correct to emphasize the terrible state of America’s youth, it wrongly places the blame—the pandemic did not do this to our children. Government-imposed lockdowns did.

Isolation has taken its toll on everyone, but most especially the very young and very old.

A study conducted at a pediatric emergency department in Texas found that suicide ideation among 11- to 21-year-olds as well as suicide attempts are up significantly from 2019. Mental health-related emergency department visits for minors jumped 11.3% in the first quarter of 2020 and then another 44.1% through October 2020. Remote learning has negatively affected the mental and emotional health of one in four children.

Instead of normal, healthy human interaction, children have been left to their own devices—literally. These include phones, tablets, gaming consoles, and computers, all of which are poor substitutes for human relationships and interpersonal connections.

But the toll on children goes beyond deteriorating mental health and retrograding social skills. Children are falling behind in the classroom, especially in math. Remote learning and so-called hybrid learning have proved a poor substitute in educating many of the young.

Almost half of parents in a study of low-income families reported experiencing food insecurity. Given the sky-high unemployment caused by government-imposed lockdowns, this is not surprising, especially because low-income earners were more heavily affected by this forced unemployment. Parental angst due to economic issues adds to a child’s already increased anxiety.

Like the isolation imposed on children, the source of the nation’s unemployment also has not been a virus, but government-imposed lockdowns.

The proof of this is the comparison between states that implemented lockdowns and those that did not. The lowest unemployment rates are found in states that have essentially returned to normal, or never imposed restrictions in the first place. The highest unemployment rates are found in states that implemented the harshest lockdowns.

While the tightest lockdowns were all in Democrat-run states, this is not strictly a political issue. Among all Republican trifecta states, (where Republicans control the entire legislature and the governorship) Texas has the worst unemployment, as Texas imposed some of the tightest and longest restrictions. Texas must now catch up to states like South Dakota and Florida, which both returned to normal long before Texas.

Just as unemployment has been highest in states with harsher lockdowns, school closures have been the worst in those same states. And yet, despite the severe costs which the lockdowns have imposed upon children, those lockdowns were seemingly ineffective at slowing the spread and reducing the death rate of COVID-19. (New cases and deaths in Texas are continuing their downward trend since the statewide mask mandate was lifted on March 10.) In fact, the chart below shows a slightly positive, although statistically insignificant, relationship between government-imposed lockdowns and state death rates.



In contrast, there is a strong relationship between the severity of government-imposed lockdowns and both school closures and state unemployment rates. Unsurprisingly, the states that forced businesses and schools to close suffered, and continue to suffer, the highest unemployment.



So, while the government-imposed lockdowns failed to achieve their primary stated objective, those lockdowns succeeded in crashing the best economy in half a century and inflicting our children with low-quality educational experiences and mental-health afflictions. Sadly, even after the government-imposed lockdowns end, children are more likely to have depression and anxiety because of this artificial isolation.

The lockdowns were a mistake, but where do we go from here?

First and foremost, we need to return to normal, and not some kind of Orwellian “new normal.” Families need to be allowed to practice personal responsibility rather than be told how to act by politicians or bureaucrats.

Second, our children will need more mental and emotional support, which starts with healthy and robust families, and is buttressed by private organizations (both for-profit and non-profit) that cater to these family issues at the local level.

Finally, this last year has been a massive case study demonstrating why educational freedom is essential. Giving parents more options in how their children are educated is a powerful way to improve educational outcomes because of the competition that arises when students are not forced to attend a particular school but rather choose one that meets their unique needs.

None of these strategies involve growing government or bureaucracy. In fact, they involve limiting or reducing the roles of governments by strengthening institutions and freeing local communities to help children and families prosper. And given how far many children have fallen behind in the last year, they need all the help we can give them.

https://thecannononline.com/lockdowns-hurt-our-kids-futures/

Overview:
Free-market capitalism is the best path to prosperity.

The Tax Code should not pick winners and losers but rather fund limited roles for government.

Unfortunately, Chapter 313 property tax abatements do pick winners: Big businesses are favored over small businesses.

Businesses that may not be in operation for the long term receive long-term tax breaks.
Nearly two thirds of Chapter 313 projects are for renewable energy, which would likely locate in Texas anyway given Texas’s geography of open lands, a lot of sun, and wind in specific regions.
A third of those renewable energy projects are for foreign companies, like those affiliated with French and Chinese governments.
These agreements can result in increased property values in certain areas, which reduces housing affordability, and decreased property values in others.
Chapter 313 tax breaks socialize the cost of those local school districts’ deals to the rest of the state’s taxpayers by holding school districts harmless.

https://thecannononline.com/let-markets-work-by-ending-chapter-313/