On Monday (Jan. 8), the Motor Vehicle Property Tax Taskforce Subcommittee on Collecting Revenue at the State Level explored strategies that would recoup lost revenue in the event of a phased-out motor vehicle property tax. […]
Last month, the Connecticut Comptroller’s Office released its statutorily required annual report on savings generated by Gov. Dannel Malloy’s 2017 agreement with the State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition (SEBAC) — which showed the actual savings […]
The Articles of Confederation were not effective. Adopted by the Continental Congress in 1777 during the American Revolution, the nation’s first governing document “faced many challenges in conducting foreign policy, largely due to its inability […]
Paid administrative leave has become a controversial and often abused practice that flies in the face of good governance. It’s presented as a way to allow investigations of alleged wrongdoing by government employees to occur […]
On Wednesday (Dec. 20), the State Elections Enforcement Commission (SEEC) dismissed election misconduct allegations against Democrat Registrar Matthew Waggner during Fairfield’s 2022 election. Fairfield resident and former 2022 Republican state representative candidate Meghan McCloat lodged […]
With the upcoming legislative session months away, the Labor Committee is proactively championing a cause that can potentially lead to big payouts to big labor and an advocacy group, potentially at the expense of workers. […]
John Hinson was 20 years old when the state convicted him of burglary in 1773. As punishment, he was sentenced to spend the next 10 years in New-Gate Prison in East Granby, a former copper […]
*Update. In response to Rep. Robyn Porter’s statement that the citations were “signed by President Pro Tempore Martin Looney, Speaker of the House Matt Ritter and Secretary of the State Stephanie Thomas”, the Secretary of […]
The Connecticut State Legislature will begin its 2023 session on January 4th and will adjourn on June 7th. The “long session,” as non-election years are called in Hartford, will be centered around the biennial budget. The Office of the State Comptroller reports that state government found a way to spend $47.11 billion in 2022 and, if trends continue, we can expect that number to grow even more going forward. Concerns over energy prices, inflation, and general cost of living continue to dominate the headlines and the threat of a recession hovers over economic forecasts.
What will our elected officials be working on to improve policy outcomes for Connecticut residents? What tax reform proposals will there be? What can be done to lower home heating bills? How will state and local budgets be affected by fewer federal resources? How will schools be implementing to curriculum requirements?
While we wait to see the thousands of individual and committee bills that while dominate the myriad policy debates this year, Yankee Institute is hard at work promoting free-market solutions to the problems we face from Stamford to Putnam and Mystic to Salisbury. To that end, we have produced a new edition of our Charter for Change. The Charter provides commonsense reforms to make Connecticut’s government work for its residents.
Though the list of reforms may be exhausting to review, it is far from exhaustive! And that’s why we want to work with you to build a broad-based coalition to encourage sound policy reforms to enable Connecticut residents to forge a better future for themselves and their families.
It’s also imperative that we do so. As we noted in a report and CT Mirror op-ed last year, the debate over whether we’re in a national recession really misses the point for Connecticut residents. We had more people employed in the private sector in 2007 than we do today. Our economy has grown at one of the slowest rates in the nation for the past decade, and we are getting outpaced year after year. We’re not attracting innovation and industry. We’re losing some of our best and brightest as they seek other parts of the country where it’s easier to make a living.
But together, we can reverse this trend.
At Yankee Institute, we know Connecticut is a state with boundless opportunity, and we intend to help make our state more than a place where people are just able to make ends meet! Connecticut should be a place where everyone can thrive – and with your help, it will be.