American Experiment Testifies on the High Cost of Community Solar at the MN Senate

Last week, I testified on the high cost the Community Solar Garden program in front of the Minnesota Senate Committee on Energy and Utilities Finance and Policy. My testimony begins around 18:45 into the audio file below. I have also included the slides I used in my presentation so you can follow along below.    

An Artful (and Accurate) Expression of Left-Wing Fantasies

Lance Morrow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center takes a pretty good shot at both sides in the Wall Street Journal over the weekend (“America is Torn between Trump’s Fibs and Progressives’ Fantasies”): Mr. Trump works with huckster falsehoods — the flashy superlatives of a car salesman. The progressive left works with conceptual falsities. Voters in 2020 will decide which style of lies they prefer. Yet his longer, artful diatribe against the Left rings very true, and will be appreciated by conservatives: The progressive left embraces new visions of perfection — tamer in its methods than its 1930s predecessors,...

Politicians’ environmental regulations drive the high housing costs they complain about

If policymakers are going to jack up housing costs with ever more onerous environmental regulations, they should stop bleating about a lack of 'affordable housing'.

AMERICAN EXPERIMENT BOOK SHELF

Minnesota plumber highlights successful career: “It’s like a golden ticket”

Troy Good, a master plumber and general manager at Champion Plumbing, jumped into a plumbing apprenticeship at the age of 30 with only a high school GED. He is currently a minority owner, general manager, and master plumber making six figures.

Teachers’ Union Wish List? $4 Billion More from “the Rich.”

Taxpayers and smart lawmakers should remind Gov. Walz and their colleagues in the Legislature that Minnesotans from all walk of life have choices, and they can vote with their feet, taking their income and wealth with them. Let's instead come up with a budget plan that honors the hard work of all taxpayers by wisely spending the taxes they already send to St. Paul.

On Taxes, Schafer Gets It Half Right

Business columnist Lee Schafer wrote in Saturday’s Star Tribune that Minnesota “needs to take a look at its income tax.” Schafer began with the fact that Minnesota’s personal income tax revenues, like those of other high-tax states, are falling short of projections: [Management and Budget Commissioner Myron] Frans was reporting that January general-fund revenue was $2.28 billion, about 10.7 percent less than the most recent forecast. Most of the lines were close to the forecast but not individual income taxes, coming in about $280 million less than the $1.73 billion forecast. *** [T]he last state budget update before this one...

Mix One Part Green New Deal With One Part Polar Vortex

A deadly cold front recently swept through the Midwest, but thanks to nuclear energy, coal and natural gas, things did not turn out as badly as they could have. Most people stayed warm and safe because they trusted affordable, reliable and secure domestic energy sources that have served us for decades. The system that provides electricity and heat for millions could change drastically under the proposed Green New Deal. Proponents propose to completely abandon the sources of energy that protected millions of lives recently, telling us that “the world will end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change.” From there, they springboard to demanding that we switch our energy system to 100 percent renewables by 2030.