spending

Other states have begun to worry about the coronavirus shutdown’s impact on their economies and state government finances. Energy producing states like Colorado and Texas must deal with plummeting…

Our budget stalemate may have an unexpected and unintended benefit. Because the General Assembly and Gov. Roy Cooper could not agree on a new budget, state government has been operating…

Editor’s Note: This will be the final research brief for 2019.  On behalf of the John Locke Foundation’s Research Division, I want to thank you for reading our work and…

As the 2020 election season gathers momentum, North Carolina’s tax reforms and demands for higher spending on any number of government programs will be front and center. One example is a…

The state budget battle has entered extra innings. Gov. Cooper signed and vetoed another batch of mini budgets, the ninth round of budget-related legislation since his first budget veto on…

In this research update, I take a closer look at revenues and expenditures in North Carolina over the past 20 years. I use actual collections and expenditures from the…

The John Locke Foundation is approaching its 30th anniversary, and the Republican majority in the General Assembly is halfway through its fifth session. It seems a good time to…

It is widely believed, with plenty of evidence to support the hypothesis, that tax cuts spur economic growth. Over the past six decades, tax cut legislation has been implemented by…

Kansas has been criticized since 2012 for cutting taxes irresponsibly, despite a court-ordered increase in education spending. Tax cuts in the Sunflower State may have been larger than circumstances warranted,…

Policymakers around the country look to North Carolina’s fiscal example to guide their quests for lower taxes. Restrained spending has made it possible for state government to tax less and…