A report by the Las-Vegas based Better Cities Project found the Stamford-Bridgeport-Norwalk area to have the fourth largest gig economy of the nation’s major metropolitan areas, with 10.2 percent of the area’s workforce per capita […]
State employee unions and the Working Families Party are holding a car caravan rally outside the Governor’s Mansion February 20, after union leaders and progressive lawmakers publicly expressed their disapproval of Gov. Ned Lamont’s budget […]
The Connecticut Communist Party held its annual People’s World Amistad Awards on Saturday, December 12, the anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party USA. The awards were presented to SEIU 1199 NE President Rob […]
A rule change to how Medicaid payments are issued to home healthcare providers implemented by the Donald Trump administration was overturned by a California court in a lawsuit that was backed by Connecticut Attorney General […]
With Connecticut’s budget on the rocks and a state employee pay increase just weeks away, SEIU 1199 launched a commercial on television and social media saying some politicians are “going to take away my wages […]
The PCA Workforce Council contract passed by the legislature in 2018 requires the personal and bank account information of personal care attendants to be transferred to SEIU 1199 if the federal government ends automatic union […]
SEIU Healthcare 1199NE held a rally outside the offices of Allied Community Resources in Enfield on October 14 saying the company has not been paying personal care attendants on time. But the rally may be […]
In what could be a very costly blow to organized labor, a regulatory change enacted by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services states that union dues can no longer be automatically deducted from home […]
Three years after SEIU 1199 ignored requests by Connecticut prison nurse Cheryl Spano Lonis to have her dues donated to charity, the union will have to return $2,500 in dues taken from her paycheck. Lonis’ […]
The Connecticut Board of Labor Relations approved full day union business leave and pay for union officials to attend an August 31 Connecticut AFL-CIO convention in Hartford that was scheduled to last only three hours, […]
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.