The U.S. Senate voted 61 to 39 Thursday to pass a deficit-neutral bill that provides funding to states for Medicaid relief and education. The House plans to take up the bill, H.R. 1586, next week, probably on Tuesday, August 10. Although House passage seems likely, it is by no means assured.A WCCF report issued Thursday examines the...
The National Juvenile Justice Network has just released The Real Costs and Benefits of Change: Finding Opportunities for Reform During Difficult Fiscal Times, a compilation of reform efforts and strategies that make sense both in terms of producing better outcomes for youth and communities and saving money. Reform efforts such as Youth...
Perhaps nostalgia isn’t what it used to be, but the new (2010) poverty levels are just what they used to be – in 2009. You can find the new, old poverty guidelines in the August 3 Federal Register. I won’t "tip my hat to the new constitution," but will tip it instead to a post yesterday on the Say Ahhh! blog by the Center for Children...
A new report estimates that the Recovery Act has created or saved 63,000 jobs in Wisconsin so far, and between 2.5 and 3.6 million jobs nationally. Check out the Wisconsin Budget Project Blog for the full scoop, including an estimate of what the Wisconsin unemployment rate would have been without the stimulus.
Only three other states have a lower percentage of uninsured adults than Wisconsin, according to a Gallup Survey released last Friday. The survey provides further evidence that BadgerCare Plus has been successful in offsetting the loss of employer-sponsored insurance during the recession. Wisconsin tied with Minnesota for the 4th lowest...
The U.S. Senate had scheduled a vote for late Monday afternoon (Aug. 2) on a bill that would provide Wisconsin an estimated $365 million, according to the State Budget Office. However, the vote has been delayed for a couple of days, because the Congressional Budget Office said today that the costs exceed the offsets by $5 billion....
Check this out - The UCLA School of Law recently released a review of the literature related to the Impact of Prosecuting Youth in the Adult Criminal Justice System. Perhaps no surprise, but after reviewing all the studies related to this issue, their summary includes a statement that “As the overwhelming majority of research studies...
Thousands of Wisconsin families will sleep a little better after the Senate finally managed to approve a bill last night to extend unemployment insurance (UI) benefits for the long-term unemployed. The House approved the bill this afternoon and sent it to the President for his signature. Although passage of the bill is a huge relief for...
The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that the state must pay back the $200 million (plus interest) transferred from the medical malpractice fund to help balance the 2007-09 budget. A July 20th Wisconsin Budget Project blog post explains that cutting that amount of state funding out of Medicaid and BadgerCare Plus would also require...
New data from the U.S. Census Bureau released last week show that Wisconsin was below average in per capita state and local taxes and spending in fiscal year 2008. The Wisconsin Budget Project’s analysis of the data reveals that the average Wisconsinite paid $40 less in state and local taxes than the average for the nation as a whole in...
Your address helps us identify your legislators and the most relevant messages to send you.