The Weekly Wonk: May 25, 2012

What’s up this week at Oklahoma Policy Institute? The Weekly Wonk is dedicated to this week’s events, publications, and blog posts.

This week OK Policy released a statement in response to the announcement that there will be no tax cut this session.  We released a graph with analysis showing how state support for schools has been falling, while enrollment rises.  Guest blogger Dr. Steve Ellis revealed the intellectual bankruptcy behind tax-cut arguments.

Our work was featured in an Associated Press article and a NewsOn6 story covering the final days of the legislature’s budget and tax negotiations.  Our Director David Blatt made the case for tax fairness in The Journal Record.  OK Policy analyst Kate Richey was featured in an OETA segment on low economic mobility in Oklahoma.

In The Know, Policy Notes

• Barbara Ehrenreich discusses how employers, payday lenders, and local governments make profits from preying on the poor.
• Economix maps out when states are expected to return to their peak prerecession employment levels.
• The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities describes the Kansas tax cut bill that may be the most fiscally irresponsible and economically damaging piece of legislation to emerge from a state in many years.
• Robert Reich explains why fairness is essential to growth.
• Economic Policy Institute investigates whether the declining labor force participation rate is more influenced by unemployment in the aftermath of the Great Recession, or is a result of long-run trends.

Numbers of the Week

• 40.5 percent – Percentage of vehicle crashes in Oklahoma that occurred during inclement weather, 2010
• 1 in 3 – Proportion of older Oklahomans for whom Social Security is their only source of income, 2009
• 10 percent – Percentage of teens in Oklahoma that do not attend school and do not work, the national average is 8 percent, 2008
• 40 percent – The percentage of the tax cut being considered in the legislature (HB 3061) that will go to the top 4% of households.
• 17 – Number of counties in Oklahoma where 50 percent or more of the children under 5 years of age are minorities, 2010