BadgerPundit

Regularly Scheduled Programming Will Return

BadgerPundit apologizes for the limited blogging so far this month.  Here at BP Central, we have been very busy with midterms and house hunting.  Should any BadgerPundit reader have a house for sale on Milwaukee's East Side, please email and maybe we can work something out.  Regular blogging activity should resume by Friday.

Vintage Reagan

I've been reading through some of Ronald Reagan's old speeches recently.  Now that he's gone, it's easy to forget what a great man he truly was.  It is also easy to lose sight of the clarity and depth of his political philosophy, which drew upon the purest springs of the Western liberal tradition, from Locke, Smith, and Mill to Hayek and von Mises.  I was particularly struck by these excerpts from one of Reagan's earliest public speeches in 1964:

You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down. Up to man's age-old dream -- the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order -- or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path. Plutarch warned, "The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits."

Are you willing to spend time studying the issues, making yourself aware, and then conveying that information to family and friends? Will you resist the temptation to get a government handout for your community? Realize that the doctor's fight against socialized medicine is your fight. We can't socialize the doctors without socializing the patients. Recognize that government invasion of public power is eventually an assault upon your own business. If some among you fear taking a stand because you are afraid of reprisals from customers, clients, or even government, recognize that you are just feeding the crocodile hoping he'll eat you last.

It's time we asked ourselves if we still know the freedoms intended for us by the Founding Fathers. James Madison said, "We base all our experiments on the capacity of mankind for self-government." This idea that government was beholden to the people, that it had no other source of power, is still the newest, most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man. This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.

Reading these words, I recognize how fortunate America was to have found its voice in Ronald Reagan in the 1980s.  He was the right man for a historic moment, and the right man to remind us all of what America means.  May he rest in peace...at BadgerPundit, he will not soon be forgotten.

With Republicans Like These, Who Needs Communists?

Wednesday, the Journal Sentinel reported the efforts of one Rob Kreibich (surprisingly identitifed as a Republican representative from Eau Claire) to introduce caps on the growth of tuition at the University of Wisconsin system.  Kreibich wants to be a hero with the college crowd by capping tuition and fees increases at 3% for this year and next.  BadgerPundit is always disappointed to meet a Republican who believes that by favoring one constituency, the state can magically avoid robbing another.  If one caps fees at the UW system, the burden will inevitably shift to the income and property taxpayers of Wisconsin.  Kreibich may be spoiling the kids with his proposal, but he's socking it to the taxpayers.

Others have noted the fact that UW tuition is currently well below the Big Ten average.  The Journal Sentinel article also appropriately notes that the median family income for entering freshmen at UW-Madison is a healthy $71,000 a year. (Remember that median per capita income in Wisconsin is just north of $28,000 per year).  Many students in the UW system are comfortably middle class; John Kerry, looking down from the lofty perch of his wife's G5 The Flying Squirrel, might even venture to call them rich.

What interest does the state have in subsidizing the education of these people?  Reams of economic research (by Nobel Prize winner Gary Becker, among others) have demonstrated that the present value of lifetime earnings for college graduates is vastly higher than for high school graduates.  The individual economic returns to graduate education (e.g. pursuing a Ph.d, medical, or law degree) are higher still.  The crucial point is that young students have a powerful financial incentive to pursue higher education.  An early investment in one's human capital yields lifetime financial dividends (quite apart from intangible benefits which are hard to value) which in most cases dwarfs the initial financial outlay, even at the most expensive private schools.

Students (especially students from well-off households) do not require state incentives to pursue higher education.  They know such education will benefit them substantially, whether it is subsidized or not.  In many respects, education beyond the K-12 level is not a public good.  Higher education is a valuable private good which belongs to the student.  Students reap most of the benefits from their education; it is also portable, and can be easily removed from Wisconsin.  The argument for subsidizing public higher education is that it creates positive externalities- having an educated population leads to higher incomes (and thus tax revenue), enhances economic development, and spurs entrepreneurship.  These are indeed desirable public policy objectives.  However, as Adam Smith famously noted, such beneficial side effects will follow naturally from private citizens pursuing their own self interest. 

It is also important to observe that Wisconsin's scheme of funding higher education is inefficient in subsidizing these public policy objectives (assuming such government intervention is necessary).  Wisconsin may be a net exporter of knowledge workers.  Although the state heavily subsidizes the production of college educated residents, many of these in-state students graduate, pack their bags, and move off to another state which offers better job opportunities.  As such, Wisconsin taxpayers are actually subsidizing investment in human capital in other states.  This education export is due to perverse incentives, as excessively cheap education encourages residents to stay for their student years, while high income and property taxes encourage them to move once they begin earning income (thereby defeating the public policy rationale for subsidized higher education).

Like most states, Wisconsin charges out-of-state students significantly higher tuition to attend the state's public universities.  But who is more deserving of a subsidy- the in-state teenager who leaves the state for good after 4 riotous years in Madison, or the California teenager (who pays full tuition) who decides to stay in Wisconsin after college and contributes tax revenues for the next 30 years?  If Wisconsin's higher education subsidies were rational, they would both encourage and reward UW system students who choose to stay in Wisconsin.  Subsidizing those who leave is pure waste.

How might the subsidy situation be improved?  For starters, charge all UW students a market rate by tripling the current tuition and fees at UW, and dramatically scaling back taxpayer funded transfers from the state treasury to the university system.  Let the students who will benefit fund more of their education.  Because accessibility and fairness are valid concerns, offer all students a state backed loan program to fill the gap between the new higher tuition and the old subsidized levels.  For students who avail themselves of this state loan pool, offer the following deal. The state of Wisconsin will offer a $0.75 credit against the outstanding loan balance for every $1.00 in Wisconsin state income tax paid by the student in the 10 years following graduation.  Thus, if a graduating student stays in Wisconsin after graduation and contributes $16,000 in state taxes to the state treasury over the next decade, he will receive $12,000 in loan forgiveness against his student debt.  If the student instead skips town with his diploma and Bucky Badger T-shirt to hang out in California, he receives no loan forgiveness and must repay the full amount.  This is fair, because the student has contributed nothing to Wisconsin's economy and public finances during his productive phase; therefore, he is not entitled to a state subsidy during his educational phase.

Adjust the plan however you wish.  The important principle is that only UW graduates who remain in Wisconsin should receive a state subsidy.  All other students should be expected to pay full freight.

There are other economic arguments as to why UW fees ought to be much higher than they currently are.  Anytime state subsidies hold the price of a good below its true price, consumers will demand more of that good than they would in a natural market-determined equillibrium.  Because of state subsidies, it is probable that students in Wisconsin and elsewhere consume too much of certain types of higher education.  An artificially low price encourages students to make educational choices without  carefully considering the productive possibilities of their human capital investments.  When tuition is high, and significant debt is incurred, students are forced to confront what they hope to gain from their education, and how that education will help them achieve those goals.  BadgerPundit has attended two of the most expensive private universities in the United States- the horrendously high cost does provide a powerful reality check.

High tuition will also have a beneficial effect on governance of the university system.  The more students are forced to pay, the more they will monitor and challenge the administrative bloat, irresponsible union contracts, and wasteful spending which currently drive up costs at all universities, but particularly public ones.  Students have no reason to care about wasteful institutional spending as long as Wisconsin's taxpayers are picking up the tab.

The University of Wisconsin system, and particularly UW Madison, are real and important assets to the state.  They provide world class research facilities, and spawn the growth industries of tomorrow.  I strongly endorse continued investment in attracting the top faculty and students to the system, as well as investment in infrastructure and industry partnerships.  Economic sense dictates, however, that more of this investment be shouldered by the private individuals who benefit most from the system - namely its students and graduates.  The success of America's many great private universities provide overwhelming proof that educational excellence is possible without public funds.

The current system provides inefficient subsidies and is also a regressive tax- in many cases forcing the poorest and least educated in the state to subsidize the education of ambitious world-beaters from River Hills, who might then leave the state to go work on Wall Street.  BadgerPundit readers should know that I am a committed anti-tax warrior; nevertheless, pointless regressive taxes such as the low UW fees are bad public policy.

So, Representative Kreibich, if you really support the Republican beliefs in free markets, lower taxes, and accountability in public institutions, the problem is that UW fees are much too low, not that they are too high.  It is time to raise them, substantially.

What Are Public School Teachers Really Worth?

BadgerPundit’s friends at Boots & Sabers have taken the bull by the horns and addressed the politically contentious issue of how much public school teachers deserve to be paid.  Owen & Co. are brave indeed to ask this important question, because they will invariably be criticized for hate speech against teachers, and belittling the importance of “investments” in the future of Wisconsin’s children.  Although it is politically incorrect, the question of what teachers really deserve is necessary, because it bears directly on the level of Wisconsin’s education spending and the optimal level of taxation.  The capos of Wisconsin’s Education Mafia don’t want to have this discussion, of course.  They simply expect the taxpayers to hand over the cash and shut up.

BadgerPundit believes that public school teachers in the United States, and Wisconsin, are on average overcompensated relative to their private market equivalents, skill levels, and opportunity costs.  Perversely, the union pay scale which leads to all teachers being overpaid, on average, also causes many fine and accomplished individual teachers to be underpaid relative to their productivity and opportunity costs.

Let’s begin by forthrightly confronting some uncomfortable truths.  Uncomfortable Truth #1 is that public school teachers, on average, just aren’t that smart or well-educated.  As University of Chicago economist Thomas Sowell observes in his book Inside American Education, public school teachers are drawn from the lowest achieving pool of American college students:

Whether measured by Scholastic Aptitude Tests, ACT tests, vocabulary tests, reading comprehension tests, or Graduate Record Examinations, students majoring in education have consistently scored below the national average.

In 1980-81, students majoring in education scored lower on both verbal and quantitative SATs than students majoring in art, music, theater, the behavioral sciences, physical sciences, or biological sciences, business or commerce, engineering, mathematics, the humanities or health occupations. Engineering students tend to be lopsidedly better mathematically than verbally, but nevertheless their verbal scores exceed those of education majors, just as art and theater majors had higher mathematics scores than education majors. 

At the graduate level, it is much the same story, with students in numerous other fields outscoring education students on the Graduate Record Examination--from 91 points composite to 259 points, depending upon the field. The pool of graduate students in education supplies not only the teachers, counselors, and administrators, but also professors of education and other 'leaders' and spokesmen for the education establishment. [Therefore], educators are drawing disproportionately from the dregs of the college-educated population. ... In short, some of the least qualified students, taught by the least qualified professors in the lowest quality courses supply most American public school teachers.

Uncomfortable Truth #2 is that public school teachers, on average, are poorly trained in their subject areas.  Despite elaborate credentialing procedures, extensive required education, and highly bureaucratic certification schemes, America's public school teachers know remarkably little about the material we actually expect them to teach our children.  This recent article in USA Today recounts the frustration of one of the few well-intentioned educators in the public system who values quality over union solidarity:

To create the illusion of having "qualified teachers," states and individual school systems have tried to get the public to believe that "qualified" and "certified" are synonymous. Any parent who has seen some of the pathetic "certified" teachers, protected by tenure and the teacher unions, and allowed to draw taxpayers' dollars year after year, knows that state certification does not even rise to a minimum competency level.

In some states, the verbal pass rate on The Praxis Series test used to license teachers is set below the 25th percentile. In Kentucky, for instance, the verbal pass rate on the Praxis is set at the 20th percentile, even though a teacher's verbal ability is crucial to a child's learning.

Several years ago, I graded the essay section of the National Teachers Exam administered by the Educational Testing Service. For the most part, the writing was wretched, far below the quality of the papers of high school seniors I had read while grading the Advanced Placement English exam. Yet the standards were so minimal that even candidates who appeared to be semiliterate had to get passing scores. I couldn't help but think to myself that these horrible students would soon be in the classroom, stamped "state-certified" because they had taken the right education courses.

Lest you buy into the WEAC spin that such horror stories are anecdotal and unrepresentative of public school teachers as a whole, consider the following facts from Wisconsin.  Wisconsin only last year began to require new teachers to take the PRAXIS II subject exam (designed to assess competency in the subject a beginning teacher will teach), and just look at all the complaining from Wisconsin's teachers of tomorrow.  To add insult to injury, for those future teachers who can't pass the PRAXIS subject tests, the state has provided an alternative certification mechanism so that even the most incompetent aspiring teachers can begin drawing a paycheck at our children's expense.  Amazingly, the state only began requiring PRAXIS I, a basic reading and math skills assessment, in 1998.  Wisconsin's career educators, entering service before 1998, are presumably exempt from even these minimal standards.  To decide for yourself whether an education degree is entitled to the same consideration as one in law, computer science, mathematics,business, or medicine, try these sample PRAXIS I questions out on your own.

Further, the lack of fundamental subject area comptency is well known in the public education system, particularly in mathematics, the physical sciences, and history.

How did we get to this sorry pass in teacher education? This report provides the post mortem, but as surely as Colonel Mustard struck with the candlestick in the library, we know that teachers' unions are to blame.

The purpose of all of these citations is to advance the contraversial notion that for many existing public school teachers, their demonstrated human capital is simply not as valuable as the incumbent teachers think it is.  For many public school teachers, particularly in underperforming districts, there is no alternative occupation in the private sector which would be more remunerative.  For teachers who are underqualified to begin with, studies show that years of experience and pointless "continuing education" don't make a difference.

Not that teachers in Wisconsin are all that poorly paid to begin with.  The average teacher salary in Wisconsin, according to the most recent data, is $41,056 per year.  Given that teachers get at least 2 months more of vacation per year than a private sector worker, you can gross that up to about $49,300 for comparison purposes.  On top of that, the state estimates the average benefit package for Wisconsin's teachers at about $12,699 per year (the 3rd most generous benefit package in the U.S.)  Thus, an average Wisconsin teachers all-in annualized compensation works out to nearly $62,000 per year- not bad for a job from which it is virtually impossible to be fired.  This compensation seems all the more generous when you consider that the median per capita personal income in Wisconsin is just over $28,000 per year.  Making a generous allowance of $5,000 per year for skimpier private sector benefits, the average Wisconsin teacher makes 88% more on an annualized basis than does the average Wisconsin taxpayer who pays his salary.

The purpose of my analysis here is not to belittle teachers.  A central tenet of a free labor market is that if you want more productive, higher skilled employees, you must be willing to pay more (up to the marginal product of labor).  This economic principle is as true of education as it is of any other industry.  The reason for the relatively low level of human capital we observe in America's (and Wisconsin's) public schools reflects the absence of market forces in rewarding the most productive teachers.  The irony is that competition would likely substantially raise the wage of the best teachers above current levels, while brooming the very worst out of the system.  However, union  pay scales which reward only meaningless Ed-School certifications and seniority prevent the public education system from discovering, and adequately rewarding, the most productive teachers.  As such, the most talented candidates either avoid the teaching profession altogether, or soon leave it in frustration.  This negative selection process operates forcefully to reduce the average quality of the existing teacher stock, resulting in a state education establishment which is less productive, underskilled, and almost certainly overpaid.

If schools are forced to compete for students (through a voucher system or other means), schools have an incentive to reward productivity and to pay good teachers what they are worth.  They also lose the ability to keep the incompetent deadwood on the payroll.  Properly rewarding productive teachers would mean substantial liberalization of teacher work rules and curtailment of teacher collective bargaining rights.  While these changes would benefit the best teachers, they would be bad news for the worst.  And since the WEAC membership primarily comprises several decades worth of accumulated deadwood, you can expect them to fight meaningful education reform all the way.

However, even the WEAC parasites know that something is rotten in the state of public education.  A recent study shows that nationwide, public school teachers are more likely to send their own children to private schools than the population at large. In Milwaukee, 29.4% of public school teachers send their children to private schools, versus just 23.4% of the general Milwaukee population.  It is revealing that those with the best information about the state of America's public schools are opting out of the system at a higher rate than the rest of us suckers...er, I mean taxpayers.

What are public school teachers worth?  Potentially a lot, if properly incentivized.  But the current crop is assuredly not worth what we have paid for it.  So to WEAC, I say, not another dime for teachers in Wisconsin until the teachers unions and their stranglehold on the system have been smashed.

EU Announces Reduced Private Property Rights Edition

BadgerPundit has never much cared for antitrust law, either in the U.S. or abroad.  Antitrust enforcement is arbitrary and capricious at best, and a conspiracy against consumers at worst.  Usually, these laws are just an excuse for self-important regulators to get their names in the paper, while imposing burdensome requirements on business activities which pose no threat to the public.  Most insidiously, the antitrust laws are frequently employed by weak competitors (such as Sun Microsystems or the corner mom-and-pop drugstore) against stronger competitors like Microsoft or Wal-Mart who are relentlessly driving costs down and providing a surplus to the consumer.  Weak competitors will never complain about a truly anticompetitive merger (in which combining companies conspire to raise prices), because this benefits the marginal players even more than the big guys.  No, the mom-and-pops only cry and wail if the merged entity intends to push prices down through efficiency gains (the old "predatory pricing" canard), which will of course put the mom-and-pops out of business.  However, that is a good thing, in BadgerPundit's view, as long as consumers benefit.  History shows that most of the great "monopoly" boogeymen, from Standard Oil to Microsoft and Intel, have prospered precisely by driving prices lower and lower.  For this antitrust law brands them public enemies?

Thus, it was with great amusement that I read about Microsoft's response to the European Union's most recent attempts to interfere with the company's business.  The EU has ordered Microsoft to unbundle its Media Player from Windows, on the theory that European consumers are somehow better served if they are forced to separately purchase or otherwise obtain a media player from some other source.  While Microsoft litigates the highly dubious legality of this order in front of the World Trade Organization,  the company has come up with a hilarious response to the EU.  The Wall Street Journal reports:

The European Commission's antitrust authority has expressed concern to Microsoft Corp. about the name it has chosen for its new stripped-down version of Windows, say people familiar with the ongoing negotiations over the software company's business practices.

Microsoft said last month it would offer a new "Windows XP Reduced Media Edition" to comply with European regulators' orders to make its ubiquitous operating system available without its Windows Media Player already attached.

But regulators fear that the unappealing name could turn away consumers, potentially undermining the order, say the people familiar with the negotiations.

Kudos to Microsoft for helping European consumers understand how the bureaucrats in Brussels are "protecting" their interests.

Great Moments In 2nd Amendment History

Wisconsin has long imposed unconstitutional restrictions on the freedom of its citizens to keep and bear arms for their personal defense.  The state's 134-year old concealed weapons ban is so egregious that, following an extremely ill-advised prosecution of a Milwaukee shopowner for keeping a gun in his own store,  the Wisconsin Supreme Court was forced to invalidate the statute and beg the legislature to pass a more reasonable law.  While the legislature dithers and Governor Doyle denies law abiding citizens their constitutional rights, criminals in Wisconsin continue to have it easy (since armed robbery is a considerably lower risk occupation when the victims don't shoot back).  How different is the situation in Georgia, where criminals get what they deserve:

ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) -- \When two men walked into a popular country store outside Atlanta, announced a holdup and fired a shot, owners Bobby and Gloria Doster never hesitated. The pair pulled out their own pistols and opened fire.

The armed suspect and his partner were killed. The Dosters won't be charged, according to local officials, because they were acting in self-defense.

"I just started shooting," said Gloria Doster, 56. "I was trying to blow his brains out is what I was trying to do." . . .

Police arrived about five minutes after receiving Gloria Doster's call; the suspects died a short time later at a hospital.

The bloodshed, nevertheless, startled Gloria Doster, who has been around guns all her life, and has used them for target shooting. "But I never figured I'd have to use them on anybody," she said.

(Link courtesy of Instapundit)

Any time two perps get taken down during the commission of a crime, society is the winner.  Two scumbags are off the street, the government has been spared the expense of a trial, and an effective message has been sent to those tempted to believe that violent crime pays.

Taxation Without Representation Still OK in Wisconsin

Among the more outrageous features of Wisconsin's unaccountable public sector is the funding of the state's technical college system.  BadgerPundit has always been suspicious of technical colleges in any state- that they are necessary at all seems to make a prima facie case for the failure of public high schools.  After 12 years of publicly funded education, why should more state-subsidized education be necessary for those students who do not continue on to college, or who plan to work in lower skill occupations?

But whether the technical college system is just a giant boondoggle is a subject for another essay.  What concerns me today is how this public spending behemoth is funded.  During the 2002-2003 year, Wisconsin's technical colleges levied a total of $542 million in local property taxes across 16 state districts, accounting for approximately 50% of the system's operating budget (state transfers and tuition and fees make up the rest of the budget).  In fact, technical college levies account for nearly 2% of the total state and local tax burden shouldered by Wisconsin taxpayers.  Even to BadgerPundit, $542 million is a lot of money.  You would think that any public entity with the authority to extract such a large sum from the people of the state would periodically have to face voters and taxpayers in an election to account for its actions.  In Wisconsin, however, you would be wrong.

As this legislative summary indicates, the Wisconsin Technical College System is one of the last refuges of taxation without representation in the United States.  The system's district governing boards (of which there are a typically inefficient number of 16) have the statutory authority to levy a property tax of up to $1.50 per $1,000 of assessed value in each district.  For debt service, they can levy even more.  The district boards unilaterally set each technical college's budget, and the corresponding property tax levy, each year.  Despite their taxing power, technical college district boards are not elected.  Indeed, they face no direct oversight from voters- they are not voted into office, nor can they be voted out.  They have the authority to seize your property, but you have no means of regulating their behavior.  Does that sound like America?

So, who does choose the technical college district boards?  It turns out they are selected by a committee of school board presidents in 3 districts (including Milwaukee), and by a committee of county supervisory board chairs in the other 13.  Others might trust a committee of school board presidents to be zealous guardians of the taxpayers' interests and responsible spending.  If so, BadgerPundit would like to offer those believers a compelling investment opportunity in the Nigerian banking sector.  We elect school boards and county supervisory boards- why shouldn't we directly elect the technical college district boards as well?  Right now, the WEAC and public sector union stooges who populate the technical college boards can raise your taxes with impunity- because you have no effective means with which to hit back.

Reducing Wisconsin's tax burden and cleaning up our government requires accountability at all levels of government.  Permitting taxation without representation at Wisconsin's technical colleges is therefore a terrible and destructive idea.  Contact your state legislators and demand that either the technical colleges be stripped of their statutory taxing authority, or that the district boards face popular election rather than appointment by union cronies.

Time for a Milwaukee Tea Party?

Returning visitors to BadgerPundit might have noticed the new "Support TABOR" link in the upper left hand corner of the page, accompanied by an engraving depicting the Boston Tea Party. Like many overtaxed residents of this state, I am hopping mad about the arrogance of Wisconsin public employees unions and government officials, who seem to believe the more they squeeze, the more the people of the Badger State will just roll over and pay up. It's time to bring a "Tea Party" ethos to the public spending debate in Wisconsin.  Thus, instead of complaining, concerned citizens should focus their energies on smashing the instrumentalities of oppression- in this case, fragmented and democratically unaccountable taxing authorities throughout the state. (Really, how many of you actually leave work to go vote in a school board election?).

TABOR is the weapon for modern Sons (and Daughters) of Liberty.  The idea is simple- a state constitutional amendment which will limit growth in all state and local spending to inflation plus population growth.  If municipalities or counties would like to spend more than that, they will have to go to the people and seek their explicit approval by referendum.  Simple, flexible, democratic.  What's not to like?

Well, predictably, Wisconsin's Education Mafia is scared stiff of TABOR, and is determined to fight it tooth and nail.  Public unions like WEAC count on the indifference and laziness of the voting public to achieve their agenda (which is increasing the pay and benefits of their membership, not educating Wisconsin's children).  They know that if forced to take their extortionate demands for more pay and ludicrously generous healthcare benefits to the people, they will lose time after time after time.  In contrast, if school boards have unfettered authority to raise taxes again and again, all WEAC has to do is elect a few of its members or sympathizers in sparsely attendend local elections, and voila, the fox is guarding the hen house.  The virtue of TABOR is thus proved by the vehemence of WEAC's opposition.

Why does Wisconsin need TABOR?  Wisconsin taxpayers have been being violated for so long that they appear to be suffering from Stockholm syndrome. So here's a reminder.  According to the nonpartisan Tax Foundation, Wisconsin levies the 6th highest state and local taxes as a percentage of personal income (based on 2004 data). From 1992 to 2002, state and local tax levies grew 3.57% per year, while Wisconsin personal income grew only 3.09% per year.  The cumulative effect of government outspending its citizens' ability to pay is that Wisconsites now give an additional 0.5% of their incomes to to the WEAC thugs (and their allies) than they did 10 years ago.  This is a problem, because at 11.1% of personal income, Wisconsin's state and local tax burden is already well above both U.S. and regional averages.   

In addition, Wisconsin has one of the 10 worst tax environments for business, reflecting in large measure the absence of credible spending controls to keep taxes in check.  Wisconsin also ranks 8th in terms of state and local property taxes collected as a percentage of income- this rank is worse than it appears, however, because Wisconsin trails high property tax states such as Texas, Florida, and Tennessee (which have no state income tax).  Wisconsin, by contrast, has the nation's oldest and 3rd highest state income tax burden.

BadgerPundit believes Wisconsin should have the nation's 6th highest tax burden if Wisconsin also ranks 6th in per capita personal income.  Unfortunately,  Wisconsin ranks a mere 21st on that score.  It's time to make state and local government live like the rest of us in Wisconsin- let's get the face paint and tomahawks and head for the figurative WEAC tea ships in Lake Michigan.

Good News All Around

On what would normally be a slow, snowy Sunday, the Journal Sentinel reports two items of startlingly good news.  First, Good Citizenship nominees Michael Pratt and Supreme Solar Allah will apparently face felony vandalism charges for their efforts to intimidate, harrass, and supress Republican voters in Milwaukee county.  It is a victory for justice that these two prominent Democrats will do time for their criminal attempts to subvert the democratic process.  I wonder if Congresswoman Gwen Moore, Supreme Solar's mother, will bother to express similar outrage over this scandal as she did about the horrendous "injustice" of urban Ohio voters having to wait 10 minute for a ballot.

Secondly, Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker has announced his intention to run for Wisconsin governor in 2006.  Although young, Walker has proven himself a courageous crusader against excessive government spending, waste, and bureaucracy in Wisconsin's largest county.  He has shown he understands the pressing problems confronting Wisconsin, and demonstrated an admirable willingness to confront public sector unions.  He will be a tireless fighter for tax relief, and is exactly the right man to overcome Doyle's obstructionism on the TABOR issue.  Further, Wisconsin needs a governor from Milwaukee, who understands the particularly critical importance (as WPRI has documented in this excellent report) of restoring the economic vitality of the state's largest city. Getting Walker elected will be a battle, but any political fight worth joining begins with an excellent candidate.

How Sweet It Is...

After Ohio dropped into the President's column on election night, BadgerPundit couldn't wait to swing by moveon.org, blogforamerica.com, and Michael Moore's web site to witness the heartbreak, despondency, and (with any luck) a jumper or two.  After 4 straight years of lies, villification, slander, and incessant hectoring diatribes all directed at America's 43rd president, election night vindication tasted sweet indeed.

As a professional politician, President Bush doubtless has a thicker skin than I do...perhaps he also has a more forgiving heart.  But for my part, I confess to an open delight in the pain and anguish of the president's adversaries as they tasted bitter defeat.  Every long-haired Hyde Park radical with a "Beat Bush" T-Shirt, all those now-ridiculous looking Kerry-Edwards bumper stickers in the parking lot, even the weird pudgy kid with the especially picayune Wesley Clark button on his backpack:  The sight of these forlorn specimens made me feel strangely elated on the bright morning of November 3.  Then I saw the marquee at the campus theater displaying a sign for "Farenheit 9/11", and I felt even better!

As inauguration day approaches, these charitable thoughts spring once again to mind, defying all polite impulses to suppress them (whether in the name of healing, bipartisanship, or even good sportsmanship).  My inner political self wants to cry out to Blue State America, again and again, "In Your Face, Losers!" "Enjoy Political Irrelevance for the Next 4 Years" and "Take Your Socialism and Shove it Up Your...", well you get the picture.  The temptation to do a sack dance in the end zone of political domination is just too great, so here goes.

The Wall Street Journal observes that President Bush is far from the first president to repay his critics with the best revenge- victory.  Alas, even Billy Jeff "BJ" Clinton was able to rest soundly in his bed, enjoying the gentle lullaby of the gnashing of teeth and rending of garments occuring nightly in conservative circles.  President Grant's 2nd Inaugural Address seems particularly apropos:

"I have been the subject of abuse and slander scarcely ever equaled in political history, which today I feel that I can afford to disregard in view of your verdict, which I gratefully accept as my vindication."

Or Thomas Jefferson in his 2nd Inaugural:

During this course of administration, and in order to disturb it, the artillery of the press has been leveled against us, charged with whatsoever its licentiousness could devise or dare.

So in honor of President Bush's triumph over his whining critics, I would like to propose a challenge to whomever might read this disgraceful piece of gloating.  Search the on-line world into its remotest corners, seeking the most hysterical, unhinged, libellous, vicious, fanciful, and fulminating condemnation of the President which the perfervid collective mind of the left can devise.  Save it for inauguration day...And then, when all your liberal friends are hiding from their televisions and radios, read crap like this and think to yourself:

How sweet it is.