We at the Rio Grande Foundation have been critical of the Albuquerque-Bernalillo Water Authority’s ongoing takeover of the private New Mexico Utilities Inc. for some time now. Thus, I read with interest a recent article in the Albuquerque Journal which showed that while the private company pumped about 14.9 million gallons less water this year than it did last year, the government-run Water Authority pumped 3 million gallons more water than it did during the previous year. Worse, in the usual heavy-handed manner of government, the Water Authority has threatened to impose water restrictions on residents despite the fact that precipitation for the year is well above average.
Considering that one of the leading arguments for condemnation of the private water company has been and continues to be “conservation,” it would seem that we might want to sell off the government run authority to a private company rather than the other way around. This is especially true considering that customers of the private NM Utilities Inc. already use less water than their counterparts with the the government authority.
The whole debate about water conservation here in Albuquerque and in all of New Mexico’s cities is really just a tempest in a teapot anyway. After all, by even the most conservative estimates, agriculture uses 75 percent of New Mexico’s water. It would seem that if New Mexico is going to solve its water problems, we need to focus on making sure a real market for water exists so that water is allocated to those who are willing to pay for it.

There are a number of major problems with American health care, but no single problem is bigger or more important than the destruction of the relationship between doctors and their patients. The latest example of this involves insurance companies paying doctors to switch their patients from brand name drugs to generics. A Boston news story on this can be found here.
While there is nothing inherently wrong with generics, there is no question that the fact that insurers stand between doctors and their patients is a big part of the problem here. As I discuss in this article for the Albuquerque Tribune,

Employers contribute no tangible benefit to their employees’ health care that could not be provided without them, employers are little more than “middlemen” that stand between individuals and their insurance providers and doctors. Cutting out this unnecessary layer would give patients greater say over their insurance providers and plans, thus helping to restore the patient-doctor relationship that has become all-too-tenuous in recent years.

Adoption of President Bush’s proposal to give individuals the same tax benefits for health care as their employers get would be good way to start restoring the doctor-patient relationship. Unfortunately, the left seems to be obsessed with replacing insurance companies with government bureaucrats, a “solution” that is destined to only widen the gap between doctors and their patients.

Surprise, surprise….actually, not surprising at all. The Federal Trade Commission has studied the issue and determined that oil companies did not manipulate oil prices last summer. For those who care to read the entire study, it is available here. Of course, we at the Rio Grande Foundation were saying this more than a year ago and, as both the FTC and Foundation writers pointed out, government policies, specifically the ethanol mandate, played a major role in driving prices up.

They say newspapers are a dying industry. Yes, there is no doubt that people have more ways to get information than ever before and some would even argue that blogs like the one you are reading now are helping to kill the industry. All of this may be true and, with the Albuquerque Tribune up for sale with a very real possibility of closure, the point is driven home.
That said, newspapers actually generate healthy revenues and are still a profitable business to be in. The fact is that the sale of the left-leaning Tribune represents a great opportunity for an entrepreneurial, market-friendly, wealthy individual to take over the newspaper and turn it around, preferably while focusing its journalism on investigating the wide range of abuses of power that go on in this state.
Newspapers may not have the circulation they once did, but their impact cannot be denied because people who read newspapers tend to be the best-educated and best-informed members of the population. Regardless of who buys the newspaper, I hope the Tribune survives, but I do think ownership of media outlets represents a unique opportunity for believers in the free market to reach out to the population as a whole.

The Rio Grande Foundation, along with the New Mexico Alliance for Legal Reform, is offering cash rewards for anyone who “turns in” the craziest laws whether they be statewide or city/county here in New Mexico. Bernalillo County Sheriff Darren White is the honorary chair of the contest.
More information including instructions for submitting your entries is available here. Check out this listing of crazy laws in other states for ideas on what to look for.

The fact that health care mandates drive up the costs of health care and help create larger numbers of uninsured is well-known and accepted. Before the 2007 legislative session, New Mexico had a relatively high number of mandates (45), but that was not enough for Governor Richardson and the Legislature. In fact, four new mandates were adopted this year and they are now in effect. The new mandates are as follows:
1) Hearing Aids/Related Services for Children Under Age 21 (SB 529);
2) General Anesthesia and Hospitalization for Dental Surgery (SB 776);
3) HPV vaccine for members aged 9 through 26 (SB 407);
4) Colorectal cancer screening tests (HB 510).
It would seem that driving up health care costs would be counterproductive as a means of achieving Richardson’s goal of providing health care coverage for all New Mexicans, but logic does not always apply to health care policy, especially in New Mexico with one of the highest rates of uninsured in the nation.

We have certainly had our differences with Greg Payne and the Albuquerque Transit Department (about the Mayor’s proposed trolley in particular), but I’ve got to give them credit for their recent deal to add about 100 new bus shelters (subscription required) at no cost to taxpayers.
The key to making this happen is a partnership with the advertising company Lamar. Lamar will provide about $1 million for the shelters and will be able to place billboards on them for five years. This is a win-win in a city that is too often hostile to private enterprise.

We don’t always see eye-to-eye with the ACLU, but it is hard to argue with their standing up for the concept of “innocent until proven guilty.” According to news reports, a truck driver was stopped at a weigh station on U.S. 54 in New Mexico north of El Paso, Texas. He gave police permission to search his truck to see if it contained “needles or cash in excess of $10,000.” While the driver had no needles, he did have $24,000 in cash.
Now, the DEA is holding the driver’s cash unless he can prove that the money was not related to drugs. Now, I’m not sure exactly how anyone can possibly be expected to affirmatively prove their innocence, but so are the inner workings of America’s bizarre asset forfeiture laws.

A state employee named Charles R. Ferguson had what may be the most courageous opinion piece I’ve ever seen in the Albuquerque Journal today.
The piece is fantastic, but the money quote is “Just think about this: if you walked into a business and demanded money from them, and told them to pay up or go out of business, the district attorney would have a field day charging you with extortion and racketeering. But stick a union label on that scenario and it’s called ‘fair share’ or ‘agency fee.’”
Obviously, a key component of economic freedom is for an employer and employee to agree to determine the terms of their relationship and not to have a third party (unions supported by the government) intervening. If New Mexico is ever to have such policies, known as “Right to Work,” the Rio Grande Foundation will be a key factor in that success. Unfortunately, despite Mr. Ferguson’s courageous words, we are a long way from achieving that freedom here in New Mexico.

Economic literacy is important. It is even more important when you cover one of the most controversial issues for the state’s leading newspaper. Winthrop Quigley covers health care for the Albuquerque Journal and while I don’t have a major problem with his reporting, a recent column (subscription required) of his stood out for its being based on a erroneous assumption.
Tthe headline — which Quigley probably did not write — provides a good summary of the article and my problem with it, “How we pay the doctor just coudn’t matter less.” This is simply absurd. How we pay doctors is actually the key to health care reform. If patients pay their doctors, then patients are viewed as the customer and will be treated as such. If it is insurance companies acting as the agent for employers or the government that has the relationship with doctors and ultimately pays them, then the doctors will respond to insurance companies or the government.
Quigley does point out in the article the problems associated with what he calls “health care’s 19th century business model” and he notes the very real problems posed by a single-payer system, but his argument that how we pay for health care is irrelevant does not hold water.
The fact is that government regulations and cost-shifting have contributed greatly to the inefficiencies and lack of responsiveness we see in today’s health care system. Giving individuals the same tax deduction now given to their employers would be a step in the right direction. So would allowing individuals to shop for health insurance across state lines as a means of avoiding state mandates that drive costs up significantly. Congressional action on market-based Medicaid and Medicare reforms would also help matters a great deal by limiting the problem of cost-shifting from Medicare and Medicaid users and on to paying customers.

Recently, the Rio Grande Foundation released its study of the “local” tax burdens (gross receipts and property) of New Mexico’s 10-largest cities. Carlsbad and Hobbs were found to have the lowest burdens as a percentage of income while Albuquerque and Las Cruces residents faced the heaviest burdens.
To calculate your own gross receipts and property tax burden (assuming a new purchase that is not impacted by the 3 percent property tax cap), go to our website and use the tax burden calculator.

The idea had been around for several months, but last night, Albuquerque’s brain-dead city council decided to impose a far-reaching, 31 page-long set of “big-box” regulations. Sally Mayer of all people stood up for reality by voting against the bill and saying, “The regulations are too detailed. Many developers are already building high-quality designs that match the bill’s goals.” She went on to point out that “the ordinance would make it much harder to redevelop property in older parts of Albuquerque… thus defeating what the council is always talking about, which is infill.”
Of course, the city already has a tremendous degree of control over the so-called “big-box” stores as we witnessed in the recent Wal Mart fiasco involving the proposed store near Vista del Norte. The public meetings and new approval procedures will only make it easier for small, vocal groups of NIMBYists to throw a wrench into store location proceedings. This will only drive costs up and reduce the positive economic impact of Wal Mart and others.
The legislation now moves on for signing or a veto from Mayor Marty.

I’ve discussed the dairy cartel in past blogs, but the Albuquerque Journal ran an excellent opinion piece from a farmer and critic of the House-passed farm bill now moving through Congress. This legislation, as the author points out, would continue Congress’s tradition of hurting family farms while professing to help them. That is nothing new considering that Ted Turner and Scottie PIppen (a former NBA star) have received massive subsidies in recent years.
Unfortunately, the simple fact is that agriculture policy in this nation is set by a handful of extremely wealthy and well-connected people. The rest of us must deal with the consequences of these absurd policies.

It is widely known and understood that Governor Richardson is running for the presidency on his experience as an executive. After all, his leading opponents, Clinton, Edwards, and Obama are Senators with limited experience even in that role. Good strategy for Bill.
Something that makes quite a bit less sense is his emphasis on the various tax credits he has pushed as an economic development tool in his recent television advertisements. Richardson has received ample praise from conservatives and free market advocates, but not because of his economically-dubious narrowly-targeted tax credits. Indeed, Richardson has made waves by cutting New Mexico’s top income tax rate from 8.2 percent to 4.9 percent and dropping the state’s capital gains tax from 8.2 percent to 2.45 percent. Despite having raised other taxes in ways that have offset the net effect of these tax cuts, it is this record that Richardson should be running on.
So, what does this mean? Why is Richardson talking about meaningless, targeted tax policies when the key to New Mexico’s recent economic success — aside from oil and gas prices — has been pro-growth tax cuts? One strong possibility is that running in a primary and attempting to please the Democratic Party base, he doesn’t want to talk about being a tax-cutter. This may be indirectly a result of Bush’s lack of popularity. I’d be interested in others’ thoughts on why Richardson’s campaign is missing the forest for the trees….is it economic ignorance or sheer strategy to attract a left-wing Democratic Party base?

Rio Grande Foundation scholar David Hogberg recently talked to Investors Business Daily about Rudy Giuliani’s health care plan. In summary, it contains some nice reforms and it doesn’t go down the dangerous road to “universal coverage,” but “does nothing to cut down on burdensome regulations.”
There is no doubt that health care will continue be a hot topic in legislatures and campaigns nationwide. Unfortunately, too many politicians — including our own Bill Richardson — see “universal care” as the be-all end-all for health care while the quality of Americans’ health care is too often ignored.

It’s summer and nowadays that not only means hot weather but feverish speculation about global warming. Robert Samuelson throws some cold water on those who believe that warming is the most important problem facing humanity and that taxing and regulating energy usage are the best solutions.
For more facts on the purported global warming “crisis,” check this site. Also, a free booklet on the warming issue is available from the Rio Grande Foundation. It details what is and is not a “consensus” in the scientific community on the issue of warming. Please contact us at 505-264-6090 for a copy. It is also available online here.
Oh, and speaking of global warming, 1998 is no longer the warmest year on record…that would be 1934.

One of the most prominent features of the Rio Grande Foundation website is the spend-o-meter which tallies New Mexico spending in real time. I had an article in the Los Alamos Monitor that discussed the meter and what it means for New Mexico taxpayers. This elicited a response from a John Lilley who felt the article was “biased.”
Without dwelling on my disagreements with his article, it would seem to me that there may just be some waste in New Mexico’s budget. Apparently he doesn’t think so.

I have been remiss in not saying anything about the tragic bridge collapse in Minnesota. If you have been living under a rock, on August 1 the I-35W highway bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis collapsed during evening rush hour killing several people.
Naturally, some politicians are using the opportunity to call for higher taxes, ostensibly to fund bridge inspection and maintenance. Of course, if politicians are serious about preventing future events like this, they should consider their own practices of earmarking and diverting gas tax revenues to transit. The earmarking problem has become especially prevalent in recent years which led directly to the “Bridge to Nowhere” in Alaska. Perhaps funds from that wasteful project could have been used to maintain existing infrastructure?
The other major problem is the practice of using highway funds to pay for transit boondoggles. While New Mexico has a relatively good system of highways, Minnesota, at least according to this study, was not that bad either. Of course, investing $400 million in a commuter rail project won’t help New Mexico maintain its roads and bridges.

A few weeks ago I blogged on the topic of the proposed Desert Rock energy plant, a proposed coal-burning facility on Navajo land near Farmington that Governor Richardson now opposes.
Okay, so the environmentalists oppose a coal plant. Nothing new there, right?
How about biomass? Environmentalists LOVE biomass, right? And Richardson has made “renewable” energy a top priority of his administration.
Unfortunately, now, with a company in the midst of running the bureaucratic gauntlet necessary to construct a biomass plant in New Mexico, Richardson’s Environmental Secretary Ron Curry has taken the side of radical environmentalists who oppose using dead trees for fuel.
Certainly, biomass is not the “silver bullet” that will solve all of our energy needs — unfortunately for the enviros, those are still coal, oil, gas, and maybe nuclear — but it seems pretty unlikely that one plant will strip all of New Mexico’s forest’s bare. If Richardson is serious about renewable energy (not to mention attracting business to New Mexico) he might want to change course on this one.

The headline in today’s Albuquerque Journal (subscription required) says it all: “Union to State Workers: Pay Up.”
According to the story, “last month, the State Employee Alliance-Communications Workers of America sent letters to nearly 500 employees saying they faced termination proceedings unless they began paying dues.” The story went on to note that “employees covered by the union’s collective bargaining agreement with the state are required to pay dues, even if they’re not union members.”
There are so many angles to this story that I could easily turn this posting into a lengthy essay, but I will refrain, so here are some points to consider: 1) While the role of private-sector labor unions is certainly open for debate, at least they benefit when the private-sector economy grows. Government labor unions on the other hand could care less about the private sector and only want to make government bigger. 2) Competition in the private sector forces labor to compete as well (look at the airline industry as an example). Governments don’t compete and there is no check whatsoever on government labor unions. 3) It is simply wrong to force a person to join a labor union in order to obtain employment, especially government employment as we are all taxpayers. 4) Adoption of Right to Work laws would allow individuals to join unions if they choose and to not join them if they don’t want to. 5) New Mexico is not a Right to Work State, but it should be in order to prevent labor unions (as opposed to actual managers) from having the ability to hire and fire government workers.

Readers of this blog and followers of the Foundation may have already read my recent Wall Street Journal column, but if you have not, you can listen to it as a commentary that recently aired on Albuquerque’s public radio station, KUNM.

Governor Richardson claims to be a “market Democrat,” but the “universal” health care proposal that his campaign announced today can only be called a disappointment to believers in the free market.
Details of his plan are as follows:

* Coverage – Guaranteed Coverage for All Americans with Real Choices: Bill Richardson believes that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to providing affordable health coverage for all Americans.Nor does he believe in creating new bureaucracies. Under a Richardson administration all Americans will have affordable coverage choices through 1) the same plan as members of Congress; 2) Medicare for those 55-64; 3) Medicaid and SCHIP for lower income families; 4) existing family coverage for young adults up to age 25; and 5) a Heroes Health Card and stronger Veterans Administration for veterans;
* Costs – Making Health Care Affordable for All: Bill Richardson believes that everyone must share responsibility for making the system work. He believes that 1) All Americans should be required to have coverage; 2) Employers should be required to do their fair share to contribute to a healthy and covered work force; 3) A sliding-scale tax credit should be available for Americans who need help affording coverage; 4) American families should get immediate relief from high interest rates for medical debt placed on credit cards. As President, Richardson will save the government up to $110 billion per year to invest in quality, affordable health coverage for all Americans, by streamlining health care administration and investing in prevention;
* Care – Improving Quality of Care for All Americans: Bill Richardson believes that all Americans deserve access to affordable, high-quality health care. Richardson will work to improve quality of care for all Americans by: 1) Promoting evidence-based care and comparative effectiveness research; 2) Promoting transparency on price and quality of health care; 3) Restructuring incentives for high-quality care; 4) Improving patient safety; 5) Ensuring an adequate health care workforce; and 6) Reducing health disparities.

For starters, Richardson may not believe in “creating new bureaucracies,” but that doesn’t mean he won’t dramatically-expand the current, broken bureaucracies. Medicaid, Medicare, SCHIP, and the Veterans Administration all face significant issues. I hardly think that expanding these programs/agencies is the answer to our health care problems.
Of course, Richardson is not the only Democrat heading down the misguided path to “universal coverage.” The problem is that so-called universal coverage is likely to be a disaster no matter which party ultimately passes it.

Setting long-term goals is fun for politicians. No other group of people has as much fun and power in planning the lives of others. Nowhere else is this proclivity more often displayed than in the intertwined areas of energy and environmental policy.
Our own Bill Richardson, for example, set ambitious goals in the 2007 legislative session to force utilities to produce 20% of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020. He’ll be out of office by 2011 at the latest, so it is his successor or even the next governor after that who will have to make the tough decisions if the law is to be implemented.
The same thing is happening now in Congress but to an even more ridiculous extent. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) are pushing a bill (HR 2635), the “Carbon-Neutral Government Act of 2007” that is designed to stop the federal government from being such a big polluter. Sadly enough (because it shows that government is way too big), the federal government is the largest single consumer of energy in the United States.
Among other things, the legislation would require that federal agencies reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 2 per cent per year beginning in 2010 and reach ZERO EMISSIONS by 2050. Of course, Waxman and Pelosi will be long gone from Washington by that time.
On second though, while a zero-emissions government may be ridiculous in reality, this may be our best bet to shrink the size of the federal government. Better still, since CO2 is a “pollutant” according to the global warming crowd and no single group produces more CO2 in the form of hot air than Congress, what does this legislation mean for Congress by 2050.
For more on global warming and CO2 emissions, check out this excellent video from our friends at the Heartland Institute.

Maryland has already made headlines this year by passing the nation’s first “living wage” bill. Fortunately, the bill only forced government employers (and not your average business) to pay the absurd cost of $11.30 per hour.
Unfortunately, Howard County wants to pass an even higher living wage bill. One of the prime arguments is that such an increase benefits low income families. Yet, as Santa Fe has shown us, all it does is increase part-time employment (primarily low income workers) and force those with the least education (also primarily low income workers) out of their jobs.
We can all rest assured that when the continued plight of low income families comes to light, regulations will once again target “unfair business practices” instead of dealing with the real issue. After all, there’s always something to blame on them.

http://www.livingwagecampaign.org/