Read More »"/> Read More »"/> May, 2016 | MyGovCost | Government Cost Calculator

Archive for May, 2016

Marking Memorial Day at the VA


Monday May 30th, 2016   •   Posted by Craig Eyermann at 3:00am PDT   •   0 Comments

In the United States, we celebrate Memorial Day to remember and honor the Americans who died while serving in the military services of the nation. As a holiday, it began informally in the late 1860s, where it was first called “Decoration Day“, which arose in the cities and towns whose families had provided so…
Read More »

The Developing Bailout of Puerto Rico


Thursday May 26th, 2016   •   Posted by Craig Eyermann at 6:25am PDT   •   0 Comments

A major step toward the bailout of the bankrupt government of the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico was taken on May 25, 2016, when a draft of the “Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act” (PROMESA) advanced from a Congressional committee with bipartisan approval. The Wall Street Journal describes the bill now pending…
Read More »

Secret EPA Slush Fund: Who Will Get the Remaining $3.5 Billion?


Wednesday May 25th, 2016   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 8:00am PDT   •   2 Comments

As we noted in 2013, it is possible for an EPA “policy advisor” such as John Beale to falsify his employment record, claim that he actually works for the CIA, and maintain this ruse for 20 years while bagging fat bonuses but performing no actual work of any value. The EPA’s secret agent man…
Read More »

Federal Slush Fund Shovels Millions to Favored Activist Groups


Tuesday May 24th, 2016   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 7:00am PDT   •   0 Comments

As we noted in 2013, an immigration bill pending in Congress included a hidden multimillion-dollar slush fund for left-wing nonprofits that would provide almost $300 million over three years and grow over time. A primary beneficiary of the slush fund was the National Council of La Raza, whose former senior policy analyst Cecilia Munoz…
Read More »

U.S. Truckers to Test Drive Pension Benefit Cuts


Saturday May 21st, 2016   •   Posted by Craig Eyermann at 11:15am PDT   •   0 Comments

According to Social Security’s Trustees, in 2034, all Americans who receive retirement benefits from Social Security will have their pension payments slashed by 21%. But before that happens 18 years from now, U.S. truckers will test drive even larger retirement benefit cuts from their pensions if the U.S. Treasury department has its way, as…
Read More »

World Banks Panic Selling U.S. Treasuries


Wednesday May 18th, 2016   •   Posted by Craig Eyermann at 6:35am PDT   •   1 Comment

What happens when a number of the world’s central banks begin selling off their holdings of U.S. Treasury securities—the money the U.S. federal government borrows to sustain its spending? That’s a real question today because according to CNN, that’s exactly what three of the U.S. government’s largest lenders did in the first quarter of…
Read More »

Recalling California’s Stem Cell Bust


Tuesday May 17th, 2016   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 5:00am PDT   •   0 Comments

As John Tozzi and Michelle Cortez of Bloomberg report on the stem cell front, “press releases, popular media, and even some journal articles routinely inflate expectations for future therapies based on early findings that probably will never turn into cures.” Now the International Society for Stem Cell Research, representing more than 4,100 researchers, wants…
Read More »

Count the ARC for Looming OPEB Obligations


Friday May 13th, 2016   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 10:51am PDT   •   0 Comments

When counting the cost of government, taxpayers should pay close attention to OPEB, the “Other Post-Employment Benefits” of government employees aside from their pensions but including their health care costs. Now taxpayers have a calculating tool, State Retiree Health Plan Spending: An examination of funding trends and plan provisions, a new report from the…
Read More »

The National Debt Burden per Household


Friday May 13th, 2016   •   Posted by Craig Eyermann at 9:50am PDT   •   1 Comment

How has the national debt burden per typical U.S. household changed during the last 8 years? To answer that question, it might help to know what a typical U.S. household is. For our purposes, a typical American household is one that earns the median household income, which means that 50% of U.S. households earn…
Read More »

GovSecrecy.Con


Thursday May 12th, 2016   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 10:22am PDT   •   0 Comments

As the story goes, somebody opened a restaurant with politicians and bureaucrats as waiters but it failed because they kept serving the food under the table. In the real world, likewise, politicians and bureaucrats strive to keep things out of sight from taxpayers. As Taryn Luna writes in the Sacramento Bee, one way they…
Read More »

Facebook Twitter Youtube

Search MyGovCost