Nashville DA Glenn Funk rejects $354,000 in state money for DUI prosecutions, refuses to say why
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Saturday, November 26, 2022
Student Loan Pause Could Cost $275 Billion. Major beneficiaries are the wealthier. New doctors receive almost ten times the benefit of the average borrower
Commitee for a Responsible Federal Budget, Nov. 22, 2022- The Department of Education announced it would extend the pause to the sooner of 60 days after resolution of the student debt cancellation litigation or 60 days after June 30, 2023 (which would be the end of August, based on our understanding). An extension to the end of August 2023 would cost $40 billion, bringing the total cost of the pause to $195 billion.
Recent reports suggest the Biden Administration plans to once again extend the federal student loan payment moratorium – currently set to expire on December 31, 2022 – in light of court rulings against the Administration’s unilateral student debt cancellation plan. As we’ve shown several times before, extending the pause is costly, inflationary, regressive, and economically unjustified.
The pause costs over $5 billion per month and extending it through the end of 2024 would cost at least $120 billion. This would bring the total cost since Spring of 2020 to $275 billion. This represents about 70 percent of the cost of the President’s announced debt cancellation plan and is higher than the ten-year cost of President Biden’s proposal to double the maximum Pell Grant by 2029.
Extending the pause would also worsen inflation. We previously estimated the pause could add up to 20 basis points to inflationary pressures, which could lead the Federal Reserve to further raise interest rates and increase the risk of a deeper recession.
As we’ve shown before, the benefit of the pause accrues disproportionately to those with advanced degrees. Should the President extend the policy through the end of 2024, the nearly five-year long pause would mean that a typical medical student who graduated in 2019 would effectively have $107,000 forgiven and a law school graduate would have $65,000 forgiven. That’s compared to the average borrower receiving $11,000 of forgiveness. Between 75 to 80 percent of the forgiveness would be from the pause itself and the rest from the effects of higher inflation on eroding debt. New doctors receive almost ten times the benefit of the average borrower and $107,000 more than someone who never attended college.
The pause disproportionately benefits borrowers in higher-paid professions because people in those professions tend to borrow more and pay higher interest rates. Indeed, roughly 40 percent of debt is held by the 7 percent of borrowers that have over $100,000 of debt and 17 percent is held by the 2 percent of borrowers with over $200,000 of debt. Most of these borrowers have advanced degrees that lead to very high lifetime earnings; 16 of the 18 highest paying occupations in America are types of medical doctors and the other two are types of dentists.
Overall, the student debt pause is far more regressive than the President’s announced cancellation of $10,000 to $20,000 of debt. While we’ve estimated 57 to 65 percent of the President’s debt cancellation plan would go to those in the top half, it’s likely that well over three-quarters of the benefit of the pause goes to the top half (73 percent of repayments come from the top two income quintiles).
It is also completely unjustified under current economic conditions. The pause began as an emergency when the economy was in free fall, the country was largely shut down because of the pandemic, and the unemployment rate was surging toward 15 percent. The unemployment rate is only 3.7 percent today and only 1.9 percent among college graduates. The emergency phase of the pandemic has long since passed, and most borrowers are actually financially better off than they were before the pandemic. The biggest threat to the economy is now inflation – which extending the pause would exacerbate.
Ultimately, continuing the pause would be expensive, regressive, inflationary, and unjustified. The pause has already been extended seven times – and the Administration has announced twice that it would come to an end. Reneging on this again will undermine the Administration’s credibility to cancel future debt, especially from the $250 billion of new federal student loans issued over the course of the pause.
Regardless of what the court decides on the legality of debt cancellation itself, it’s time to restart payments.
Emphasis was added by the editor. For more on this topic visit Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
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Tennessee's school voucher program wins court challenge
by Mariah Timms, The Tennessean, Nov. 23, 2022- Tennessee's contentious school voucher program in Nashville and Memphis can go ahead without court intervention, a three-judge panel ruled Wednesday.
The program, which allows families in Nashville and Shelby County schools to use public funds for private school costs and tuition, has been in legal limbo since it squeaked past the legislature in 2019.
... "This controversy is merely a disagreement of public policy and inappropriate for judicial decision," the majority wrote on Wednesday. ... "The Court's decision secures access to additional educational opportunities for thousands of children in Shelby and Davidson counties," Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti's office wrote.
The Institute for Justice says it is the nation’s leading advocate for school choice and was joined by the Beacon Center of Tennessee in intervening in the case. (link)
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Thursday, November 24, 2022
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Wednesday, November 23, 2022
AIER’s Bastiat Society program in Nashville will host an in-person event with William J. Luther, Nov 29. "Why Are Prices So High?"
AIER’s Bastiat Society program in Nashville will host an in-person event with William J. Luther, associate professor of economics at Florida Atlantic University and director of the American Institute for Economic Research’s Sound Money Project.
Prices have risen rapidly over the last two years. Some claim prices are higher due to supply constraints. Others blame the Federal Reserve. Dr. William Luther assesses these two views and considers the likelihood that inflation will remain high well into the future.
Eventbrite Ticket Required. Register Here.
More about the speaker: William J. Luther is an associate professor of economics at Florida Atlantic University and director of the American Institute for Economic Research’s Sound Money Project. The Social Science Research Network currently ranks him in the top five percent of business authors. Luther has published articles in leading scholarly journals. His work has been featured by major media outlets, including NPR, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, TIME Magazine, U.S. News & World Report, Barron’s, Forbes, Fortune, National Review, The Guardian, POLITICO, and VICE News. He earned his MA and PhD in Economics at George Mason University.
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Monday, November 21, 2022
The proposed new Titans stadium would have 60,000 seats. Is that enough for a Super Bowl?
The Tennessean, ... The 1.7 million-square-foot stadium design on the table would feature around 60,000 seats, about 9,000 less than Nissan Stadium and the smallest seating capacity in a National Football League stadium overall. The new stadium would also have around 5,000 fewer parking spaces. (link)
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National Review’s editors declare Trump “unworthy of the Republican nomination."
By THE EDITORS, National Review, November 15, 2022 -...A bruised Donald Trump announced a new presidential bid on Tuesday night, an invitation to double down on the outrages and failures of the last several years that Republicans should reject without hesitation or doubt. ...
... the Trump administration was chaotic even on its best days because of his erratic nature and lack of seriousness. He often acted as if he were a commentator on his own presidency, and issued orders on Twitter and in other off-the-cuff statements that were ignored. He repeatedly had to be talked out of disastrous ideas by his advisers and Republican elected officials. He turned on cabinet officials and aides on a dime. Trump had a limited understanding of our constitutional system, and at the end of the day, little respect for it. His inability to approximate the conduct that the public expects of a president undermined him from beginning to end.
... he threw away two Georgia Senate seats in a fit of pique over Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger refusing to bend to his will. The resulting loss of Senate control allowed Biden to get trillions of dollars in spending that he wouldn’t have gotten otherwise and confirm large numbers of progressive judges.
... The answer to Trump’s invitation to remain personally and politically beholden to him and his cracked obsessions for at least another two years, with all the chaos that entails and the very real possibility of another highly consequential defeat, should be a firm, unmistakable, No. (read it all)
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Trump Blasts National Review
By JACK CROWE, National Review, November 18, 2022 - Former president Donald Trump ripped into National Review on Friday, arguing that it is a magazine without any remaining influence in an official statement issued ....
“Why does anyone read the National Review. They are so negative to Conservatives and me, and are seen as being led by lightweights that couldn’t shine the shoes of Bill Buckley. They have absolutely nothing going, it is failing fast, and my only question is, who is paying for the losses — when it loses plenty of money and serves no purpose at all. People are tired of haters — let the National Review die peacefully!” the statement reads. (link)
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