Free Republic

Seattle’s City Council made national headlines earlier this year when it enacted a city income tax aimed at “high earners.” Immediately, politicians crowed that they had planted a flag of “resistance” to the forces of “Trumpism.” In a court hearing last week, the city defended its war on wealth against several legal and constitutional challenges. The briefing from both sides exposes an inconvenient reality for the levy’s defenders: its real, ultimate victims aren’t necessarily the plutocrats they claim to be targeting. In fact, just the opposite. Some background: there are few precedents from other parts of the country for a...

Editor’s Note: Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry, a conservative writer and fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, is writing a series of columns on uncomfortable truths about health care in America. Some will make conservatives more uncomfortable, others will make progressives more uncomfortable, but most should make everyone uncomfortable. ‘The poor you will always have with you,” says the Good Book. Jesus might as well have been speaking at a health-policy seminar. We don’t, mostly, speak about health-care policy in the cold language of efficiency, productivity, and resource allocation. We also use a moral language about fairness, justice, and righteousness....

This week, Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner (R) signed legislation authorizing tax money to be used to fund abortions for poor people. This reversed a position he announced last April against such funding, but honors his 2014 campaign pledge "to ensure that poor mothers have the same ability to terminate unwanted children that their richer sisters have." Rauner brushed aside Republican arguments that individuals morally opposed to the murder of unborn children shouldn't be forced to finance it through taxes, saying that "individual matters of conscience cannot be permitted to impede the collective will of the people. I was elected on...

The social network has an army of behind-the-scenes employees who can’t afford to live in an area with out-of-control housing costs... ....In May 2015, amid a nationwide movement to raise the minimum wage, the company established a $15 per hour minimum for its contractors, as well as benefits like paid sick leave, vacation, and a $4,000 new-child benefit. But those wages only go so far in a region with out-of-control housing costs. San Francisco and San Jose ranked first and third in the nation a recent analysis of rents, with one-bedroom apartments in San Jose going for $2,378. The extreme...

Think grade inflation has made grades less meaningful? A consortium of 100 elite prep schools agrees. But rather than impose stricter grading curves, these schools plan to eliminate grades altogether. “People are nonstandard,” says D. Scott Looney, head of Cleveland’s Hawken School and founder and board chair of the new Mastery Transcript Consortium. “They grow and evolve in the world in nonstandard ways. Distilling that down to a simple common number like a GPA shaves off a lot of humanity in that journey.” These are not artsy-fartsy alternative schools; the consortium includes some of the most famous pressure-cooker private institutions...

Former U.S. Democrat Representative Corrine Brown was found guilty on 18 of 22 charges for fraud and tax evasion during trial verdict Thursday in federal court in Jacksonville. Brown was found guilty of taking tens-of-thousands of dollars from her One Door for Education Foundation, a charity for poor and impoverished children, and putting the money into her personal accounts for use in maintaining an indulgent lifestyle. She was also found guilty of conspiring within the scheme to defraud donors to the foundation, and guilty of attempts to impede/obstruct the investigation.

This is the sickest State-sponsored attempt at Democrat Utopian Socialism The City of Sacramento, under the short reign of former State Sen. Darrell Steinberg (D), now Sacramento Mayor, just approved free electric Zipcars for residents of Sacramento’s public housing projects. Wow! But don’t worry taxpayers – “The program is funded through a $1.3 million grant from the California Air Resources Board using cap-and-trade funds that businesses pay to offset their carbon emissions,” according to the Sacramento Bee. In other words, the money extorted from California businesses for the privilege of being allowed to continue doing business in this state, is...

This is the sickest State-sponsored attempt at Democrat Utopian Socialism The City of Sacramento, under the short reign of former State Sen. Darrell Steinberg (D), now Sacramento Mayor, just approved free electric Zipcars for residents of Sacramento’s public housing projects. Wow! But don’t worry taxpayers – “The program is funded through a $1.3 million grant from the California Air Resources Board using cap-and-trade funds that businesses pay to offset their carbon emissions,” according to the Sacramento Bee. In other words, the money extorted from California businesses for the privilege of being allowed to continue doing business in this state, is...

President Trump’s initial budget proposal would end aid for poor families to pay their heating bills, defund after-school programs at public schools, and make fewer grants available to college students. Community block grants that provide disaster relief, aid neighborhoods affected by foreclosure, and help rural communities access water, sewer systems, and safe housing would be eliminated. Mick Mulvaney, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, suggested recently that even small amounts of federal funding for programs like Meals on Wheels, which delivers food to house-bound seniors, may not be justified. With billions of dollars worth of...

With housing affordability a huge concern for many Sydney residents, one organisation is offering low- to middle-income earners the opportunity to live more cheaply in smaller spaces. Evolve Housing's initiative has already seen single people and couples making the switch to one-bedroom, one-bathroom places that are close to work but do not hurt the hip pocket. But can people actually live in a tiny apartment? The ABC took a tour inside one to see what it would be like.

In a new video, former Planned Parenthood employees reveal they were incentivized to pressure women into getting abortions to meet monthly corporate quotas.In the video from Live Action, Sue Thayer, a former Planned Parenthood manager in Storm Lake, Iowa, explained that if her center met its quota for abortion referrals, employees would be rewarded with pizza parties, paid time off, and other rewards.After administering a pregnancy test to a woman, Planned Parenthood employees would tell her how much it cost and ask how much she would be able to pay towards it. If a woman was unable to pay for a...

Why is China’s huge toll road system running massive losses despite billions of income from toll fees? It’s another strategy devised by the communist regime to siphon wealth from the public, says Cai Shenkun, a well-known Chinese economist and blogger.The Chinese state operates the largest toll road system in the world. Toll roads across the country collect more than 400 billion yuan (US$60 billion) each year. But strangely, this profitable monopoly industry reports huge losses year after year. According to recently released data by China’s Ministry of Transportation, revenue from toll roads was 409.78 billion yuan in 2015 while operating...

Ignoring the Poor Is a Damnable Sin – A Homily for the 26th Sunday Msgr. Charles Pope • September 24, 2016 • The Rich Man and the Poor Lazarus by Hendrick ter BrugghenIn the Gospel for today about the rich man and Lazarus the Lord gives us some important teachings on judgment and Hell. We live in times in which many consider the teachings on Hell to be untenable. They struggle to understand how a God described as loving, merciful, and forgiving can assign certain souls to Hell forever. Despite the fact that the Doctrine of Hell is taught...

Investors in Cambodia’s garment industry are increasingly purchasing modern equipment as they look to produce higher value-added products to compete in the international market and counter rising labour costs, an industry insider said yesterday. Ly Tek Heng, operation manager at the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC), said rising factory worker wages were thinning margins on the production of low-value garments and footwear in the face of fierce global competition.

Holding defendants in jail because they can't afford to make bail is unconstitutional, the Justice Department said in a court filing late Thursday — the first time the government has taken such a position before a federal appeals court. It's the latest step by the Obama administration in encouraging state courts to move away from imposing fixed cash bail amounts and jailing those who can't pay.

People at work were talking about getting to work and back home the other day. In the conversation, they mentioned the toll roads in Austin, Texas and the cost thereof. I was in shock. The amount per month spent on toll roads for people ranged from $300-600 per MONTH. Then it hit me! The poor can not afford to pay those charges. So, the regular roads in Austin are in bumper-to-bumper traffic overload. The well-to-do go to and fro with great convenience while the lower classes suffer pretty badly with some having a 2-hour trip EACH WAY from home to...

Retailers have blamed the weather, slow job growth and millennials for their poor results this past year, but a new study claims that more than 20 percent of Americans are simply too poor to shop. These 26 million Americans are juggling two to three jobs, earning just around $27,000 a year and supporting two to four children — and exist largely under the radar, according to America’s Research Group, which has been tracking consumer shopping trends since 1979.

This seems like a good cause, a new organization started by a friend of mine, Colonel Brian Sperling. Ever since I took part in my first mission trip, over a decade ago in Zimbabwe, my heart for missions, for the homeless, and for the poor all over the world has grown. My name is Brian Sperling, a career Army officer, and I have reached a time in my life and achieved a conviction where I am taking steps to do something more than I have been. I have moved 14 times in my 27-year career and have seen financial needs,...

Terri Clark, 96. A breakout for daughters of the slotted Vail...

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx is calling for infrastructure projects he says can help revitalize urban areas and close gaps in economic inequality. The new Department of Transportation (DOT) push will place a greater emphasis on projects that connect people who live in low-income and minority neighborhoods to “areas of opportunity” and prioritize projects that encourage investment in underserved communities. It's part of a fight against the tendency for highway projects to be routed through low-income and minority neighborhoods. Foxx on Wednesday said that, after the interstate highway system began, bulldozing urban areas to build roads that bypassed the communities they...