Investing

Colleen Hroncich A group of Tennessee parents and anti-school-choice advocacy organizations filed a lawsuit on November 20, challenging the state’s Education Freedom Scholarship (EFS) Act, claiming the program violates the state’s constitutional mandate to maintain and support a single system of public schools that provides every child with an adequate education. The lawsuit invokes Tennessee Constitution Article XI, Section 12, ...

Mike Fox It’s difficult to imagine a more quintessential conservative value than the idea that the government should leave peaceful people to their own devices. But that hasn’t happened, and it flows naturally that those who value traditionally conservative principles of constitutionally limited government would embrace the notion that when the government acts aggressively and outside the bounds of constitutional ...

Dominik Lett Since taking office in January, President Trump has repeatedly suggested downsizing and eventually eliminating the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and returning disaster responsibility to the states. Trump’s instincts are right on the money: Decades of federal intervention in what has traditionally been a state-led process have produced slow, inefficient disaster responses, poor mitigation, and wasteful boondoggles. A ...

Colleen Hroncich Montana mom Holly Long had no idea how motherhood would change her. “I loved my job. When I had my daughter, I thought I’d take my three months and go back to work just like all the other ladies that I worked with did,” she recalls. But, to her surprise, Holly didn’t want to send her daughter to ...

Nicholas Anthony The marketing team at the European Central Bank has picked up a new buzzword for its digital euro campaign: “freedom.” European Central Bank board member Piero Cipollone has been at the forefront of this marketing campaign. In a recent speech, Cipollone said the digital euro “would preserve our freedom to choose how we pay” and that “at its ...

Jeffrey A. Singer Today, the Washington Post reports that career scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are quite upset to learn that the agency has updated the CDC website to resurrect the long-debunked link between vaccines and autism. The webpage in question previously stated that studies have shown “no links” between vaccines or their ingredients and ...

Adam N. Michel Earlier this summer, France briefly floated the idea of quintupling its digital services tax (DST), a tariff-like levy on services primarily provided by American tech firms. The proposal was pulled back almost immediately, but it highlighted something striking: A key piece of the international tax debate was completely absent from the Group of Seven’s recent side-by-side agreement. ...

Benjamin Giltner Earlier today, the EU’s European Commission and High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy announced the “Military Mobility Package.” Europe’s fear of Russia attacking another European nation within five years seems to have finally motivated the EU to do something about Europe’s preparedness to meet the Russian threat. This package, which could cost up to €17.65 billion, plans to ...

Walter Olson What if there were a redistricting shootout but only one side was competent at using its weapons? In recent months Texas and then California decided to enact gerrymanders designed to grab five congressional seats from the other side, helping trash a venerable norm against so-called mid-cycle redistricting. If a November 17 decision stands, however, national Republicans are likely ...

Patrick G. Eddington One of the primary purposes of Cato’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) program is to uncover questionable or demonstrably unconstitutional or otherwise illegal conduct by Executive branch officials and entities. In my own work, I place a special emphasis on exposing actions by federal law enforcement organizations that violate constitutional rights.  To that end, this week Cato ...