At the beginning of the Covid pandemic, schools confronted new difficulties when they were tossed into remote learning due to prolonged lockdowns. Resorting to online classes, schools relied on obtrusive software to proctor online tests. State Senator Dr. Richard Pan is recently advancing with a proposed revision to California’s Business and Professions Code relating to student privacy. The California Student Test Taker Privacy Protection Act aims to curb the invasive surveillance of remote students by their schools. 

What if your city government spent millions more than it does today to pay for housing for the homeless? What do you think your community would have to show for it?

Rising wages do not cause inflation (“Raises for Job Switchers Heighten Inflation Risk”, Wall Street Journal, April 25, 2022, p. A1). Instead, rising wages are symptoms of rising inflation rates. When prices are—and people expect them to be—on an upward march, workers demand (and employers are willing to pay) higher cash wages in the attempt to maintain standards of living. To conclude otherwise is to confuse increases in the price of one good (labor) with an increase in the prices of all goods. 

We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled. The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision, including the one on which the defenders of Roe and Casey now chiefly rely—the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment (Draft at 5). 

So declares a leaked draft majority opinion authored by Justice Samuel Alito in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. Of course, we are a long way from a published opinion; moreover, we should all be indignant that someone leaked the draft opinion contrary to all Court protocol. Still, it appears at least five votes have been cast to overturn the Court’s extraconstitutional abortion jurisprudence/public policy and return the issue to the states where the matter can be decided in our 50 laboratories of democracy.

On April 27, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced a “disinformation governance board.” As politicians, scholars, and journalists of various persuasions noted, such a board is more characteristic of Communist dictatorships than a constitutional democracy. On the other hand, in current conditions, the board should come as no surprise. 

Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter for $44 billion last week dominated headlines. Presuming the deal goes through as expected, there is uncertainty about what Musk plans to change. There is a case for optimism; Elon Musk’s ownership of Twitter provides the world with a fresh opportunity to consider how freedom of speech can flourish on a social media platform. How should it play out and what should Musk implement?

On a Monday morning in August 2011, I was suddenly summoned to a conference call. A fellow employee said my services were no longer required. I was then handed a packet, and in the style of William Holden in Network, told to vacate the premises by 1:30 p.m. 

The Independent Institute sorrowfully announces that David J. Theroux, Independent’s Founder and President, has died after a brief illness. Mr. Theroux passed away in Oakland, California on Saturday, April 23 in the company of his loving family.

Back in January, with gasoline prices already on the rise, California governor Gavin Newsom outlined a plan to delay the automatic 5.6 percent hike in the gasoline excise tax due on July 1. “It’s a $523 million dollar gas tax holiday of sorts,” the governor explained, but now embattled Californians won’t be celebrating.

Getting pandemic unemployment benefits was easy money in 2020. Lockdowns by state and local governments shut down thousands of businesses, throwing millions out of work. Uncle Sam rode to their rescue with billions in unemployment benefits, doled out through state unemployment offices.