Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday March 28, 2011

Wichita Eagle endorsements. Yesterday the Wichita Eagle released its endorsements for Mayor, Wichita City Council, and Wichita school board. It is no surprise that in each case the newspaper editorial board recommended that voters select the candidates most likely to support the board’s big-government interventionist policies, thereby (unwittingly?) providing a guide as who not to vote for, if you value limited government and economic freedom.

Wichita City Council this week. As it is the fifth Tuesday of the month, the Wichita City Council will not meet. While some might say the mayor and council members need to get to work and do their jobs, I’m more aligned with Will Rogers when he quipped: “Be thankful we’re not getting all the government we’re paying for.”

Sedgwick County commission this week. At Wednesday’s meeting, the Sedgwick County Commission has two economic development incentives to consider. These are forgivable loans, essentially grants of money, to be made to MoJack Distributors, LLC and Apex Engineering International LLC. Each has already received a forgivable loan from the City of Wichita, as well as other subsidy of various forms from governments state and local. More discussion is at Wichita again to bet on corporate welfare as economic development. The commission’s agenda is available at Board of Sedgwick County Commissioners, March 30, 2011.

Kansas judicial selection. A legislative maneuver could force the Kansas Senate to debate and possibly vote on the method of selecting judges for the Kansas Court of Appeals. This is despite the efforts of Senator Tim Owens, an attorney and Republican from Overland Park, to block the bill in his committee. See Method of choosing judges could see debate.

Kansas Department of Labor computer system. From Kansas Reporter: “A $50 million, six year project to upgrade unemployment claims technology within the Kansas Department of Labor was grossly mismanaged, resulting in massive system flaws according to Labor Secretary Karin Brownlee.” Brownlee took office earlier this year after being appointed by Kansas Governor Sam Brownback. More at Massive waste, inefficiency in Labor Department technology upgrade, secretary says .

General Electric: no taxes for me. Competitive Enterprise Institute explains how General Electric, one of the largest companies in the world, earns large profits and manages to pay no income tax.

Freeloaders come in all types. This weekend John Stossel had an hour-long special show that focused on freeloaders. Not just panhandlers, although Stossel did work in disguise as a panhandler and discovered he could make over $90 a day. Tax free, he added. One segment of the show uncovered farmers who received $50,000 because they were discriminated against by lenders. But — some of these farmers merely grew potted plants or fertilized their lawn to qualify as a farmer. Another reported on homeowners who stopped paying their mortgages on advice of a website. The homeowners and the website operator said there is no moral obligation to pay their mortgage loans. Corporate freeloaders didn’t escape, as General Electric was mentioned as a large recipient of government handouts. And, they won’t pay taxes: “Despite billions in profit, they’ll pay no taxes this year,” reported Stossel. … The severe poverty of American Indian tribes that live on government-managed reservations and living on government handouts is contrasted with a tribe that accepts no handouts and has no casinos. … Stossel covered his own beach house, which was covered by low-cost subsidized federal fund insurance. It suffered losses twice. … Standing in front of the U.S. Capitol, Stossel said “We rich people freeload off you taxpayers all the time, because the over-promisers in there keep churning out special deals for politically-favored groups. And they tend to be rich people, because the rich can afford lobbyists. … Think about how much money we could save if these guys just didn’t pass so many laws that encourage freeloading. But they do, year after year. They micromanage life with subsidies. And the winners are not so much the needy, but people like Bon Jovi, Ted Turner, Maurice Wilder, and — me. So let’s hope for an end to all this freeloading.”

New York City may seek waiver from ObamaCare. One of the strongest advocates for ObamaCare may seek an exemption for the city he represents. Politico reports in Anthony Weiner: Waiver might work for New York. … So far over 1,000 waviers have been issued, exempting businesses, labor groups and a handful of states from at least some of the requirements of the Affordable Health Care Act.

Economic freedom and a better life. Economics professor Josh Hall explains that economic freedom leads to greater human well-being. If we look at average income, life expectancy, income of the poorest 10%, and other factors, we see that when governments let citizens make economic decisions for themselves, this leads to greater human flourishing. This video refers to the Economic Freedom of the World index, which was the subject of a lecture delivered last year in Wichita by Robert Lawson. In that lecture, Lawson warned of the path of the United States in terms of economic freedom, as I reported: “Speaking about the United States, Lawson said that the numbers are likely to go down in the future. While the U.S. ranks above the world average, its measurement of freedom has been declining since 2000. At the same time, the rest of the world is on an upward trend. ‘It’s no longer accurate to say the United States is among the very top tier in the economic freedom index,’ Lawson said, adding that he blames George Bush for this. The decline is partly due to the increasing size of government, but the largest cause of the decline is in the area of property rights. This area is measured largely by surveys asking people how they feel about property rights in America. The perception, Lawson, said, is that the security of property rights are on the decline.”

Government investment specialty. Gene Callahan, in his book Economics for Real People: An Introduction to the Austrian School, explains some of the problems inherent in government acting as investor. Writing about a plan to build a sports stadium in Hartford: “The Public Choice School has pointed out another force weakening that incentive, indeed, in most cases, completely negating it. Strong incentives exist for politicians to favor special-interest groups at the expense of the general public. Those upon whom benefits are concentrated are motivated to campaign hard for those benefits. As the costs of most political actions are spread across the public as a whole, the average person has little motivation to become involved. In the context of the stadium project, we can see that, even at a total cost of $374 million, the cost to each Connecticut resident is only about $100. It is simply not worth much of any individual citizen’s time to become devoted to the cause of stopping the stadium. However, for the construction companies who hope to get work on the stadium and the owners of businesses and land nearby, the potential benefits are enormous. They have a strong incentive to lobby hard for the project, to donate to the campaigns of politicians who support it, and to sponsor studies that will make the project look good. In fact, if there were a profit to be made in some particular investment, private investors would be likely to act quickly to take advantage of the opportunity with their own funds. … Private investors will turn to the risky business of lobbying the government to support a project only when it is not clear to them that it is profitable without taxpayer subsidies. Thus, the government is likely to specialize in money-losing projects.”

Read more at Voice for Liberty in Wichit