Voice For Liberty

Tag: Kansas Governor

  • Job growth, Kansas and other states

    Kansas Capitol 2013-11-11 14.58.34Critics of Kansas Governor Sam Brownback and his economic growth plans say Kansas hasn’t been creating jobs. A look at the statistics tells us that Kansas has produced substandard performance in job growth for a long time.

    job-growth-states-compound-annual-rate-2013-12

    The nearby chart (click for a larger version) shows the compound annual rate of growth of jobs in the states, with Kansas highlighted in blue.

    From 1992 to 2012, Kansas created jobs at the rate of 1.022 percent per year, compounded. Arkansas managed 1.096 percent over the same period. That seems like a small difference, just 0.074 percentage points. But over time, compounding adds up, so to speak. If both states started with one million jobs and continued growing at these rates, in ten years Arkansas would have 8,136 more jobs than Kansas. In 20 years, the difference would be 18,080 jobs. That’s about as many people as work in each of Finney and Ford Counties, home to Dodge City and Garden City, respectively.

    Or, consider Texas, the state Kansas progressives love to hate. It’s has created jobs at the rate of 2.001 percent. If both states started with one million jobs and grew at these rates, in ten years Texas would have 112,083 more jobs than Kansas would have. In 20 years the difference would be 260,722 jobs. That’s almost as many people as work in the Wichita metropolitan area.

    Using the visualization.
    Using the visualization.
    If you’d like to use the interactive visualization of state employment data, you may click here to open it in a new window. Data is from Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor. Visualization created using Tableau Public.

  • Kansas jobs: Who do we believe?

    bownback-davis-logo-02Earlier this week we saw that candidates for Kansas governor have released statements on recent job figures in Kansas. The news releases from Sam Brownback and Paul Davis appear to contain conflicting views of Kansas employment.

    But we saw that the Bureau of Labor Statistics has two monthly surveys that measure employment levels and trends. There’s the Current Population Survey (CPS), also known as the household survey, and there is also the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey, also known as the payroll or establishment survey. BLS explains: “These estimates differ because the surveys have distinct definitions of employment and distinct survey and estimation methods.”

    cps-ces-jobs-compared-2013-12Both the Davis and Brownback campaign appear to cite the data correctly. So which is the better measure to use? Which gives the best indication of the performance of the Kansas economy in creating jobs?

    Here’s something to consider. On the national level, a widely-watched number each month is the count of new jobs created. This number, which is universally considered to be important, comes from the CES survey. That’s the number that shows quite a bit of job growth in Kansas. But in order to belittle the Brownback effort, the Davis campaign cites the other data series.

    So let’s be fair. The next time Davis and Democrats praise good job creation figures at the national level as evidence of the goodness of Barack Obama, let’s ask them to give the same credit to Sam Brownback.

  • In Kansas, dueling job claims

    bownback-davis-logo-01Candidates for Kansas governor last week released statements on recent job figures in Kansas. The releases from Sam Brownback and Paul Davis appear to contain conflicting views of Kansas employment.

    Brownback released a statement containing this, in part: “In the past year, we have seen more than 20,000 new jobs in Kansas and a total of 45,600 new jobs created from January 2011 through October 2013.” (Click here for the full statement.)

    Davis released a statement containing this, in part: “From January 2011 – Oct 2013: Period during which Brownback cites 46,500 new jobs … Employed: +3,634 (not 46,500, which is what was claimed by Brownback)” (Click here for the full statement.)

    So which campaign is correct? The answer is not easy to provide. That’s because there are two series of employment data provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The two series don’t measure exactly the same thing, and each campaign has chosen to use the series that benefits their campaign. Nearby is an example of just how different the two series can appear.

    cps-ces-difference-example-2013-12
    A document from BLS titled Employment from the BLS household and payroll surveys: summary of recent trends explains in brief: “The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has two monthly surveys that measure employment levels and trends: the Current Population Survey (CPS), also known as the household survey, and the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey, also known as the payroll or establishment survey. … These estimates differ because the surveys have distinct definitions of employment and distinct survey and estimation methods.”

    Another BLS document explains in detail the differences between the CPS and CES data. For example: CES: “Designed to measure employment, hours, and earnings with significant industrial and geographic detail” CPS: “Designed to measure employment and unemployment with significant demographic detail.”

    Another difference: CES: “Self-employed persons are excluded.” CPS: “Self-employed persons are included.” (See Understanding the employment measures from the CPS and CES survey.)

    I’ve prepared a table showing the claims made primarily by the Davis campaign (since it provided the most detail) and gathered data from both the CES and CPS series. I’ve also showed the seasonally adjusted data compared to the raw data when available. Sometimes the numbers match exactly with the claims made by the campaigns, and sometimes the numbers are a little different. Click here for the full table.

    cps-ces-jobs-compared-2013-12
    I’ve also created an interactive visualization of the CPS and CES data for Kansas. Click here to open it in a new window.

    Each campaign uses the data that best makes its case. Generally speaking, the CES data shows larger employment gains.

    [gview file=”http://wichitaliberty.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/kansas-job-claims-2013-12.pdf”]

  • Spinning for fundraising, Kansas-style

    Kansas liberals accuse Republicans of “spinning” statistics on school funding. Can we look at some actual numbers?

    Candidate for Kansas Governor Paul Davis sent this fundraising email:

    paul-davis-facebook-2013-11-20

    This weekend another independent advocate for our schools called attention to Sam Brownback’s attempt to mislead Kansans about his real record on education. The fact is, Sam Brownback made the largest cut to our schools in Kansas history — leading to larger class sizes, school closings, and increased fees for parents.

    But being the politician that he is, Sam Brownback is trying to spin his record. We won’t be fooled.

    Kevin McWhorter of the Goddard School Board said it plainly, “State funding for education will continue to decline, and state officials will continue to twist the numbers to ask you to believe otherwise. Don’t fall for it. It’s just spin.”

    Davis is referring to an op-ed in the Wichita Eagle written by a Goddard school board member. (Kevin R. McWhorter: Don’t fall for spin on school funding, November 17, 2013)

    In his op-ed, McWhorter complains that present funding from the state is not as high as statute requires. He calls that a cut. He concludes that the “governor’s economic policy is a train wreck” and that “state funding for education will continue to decline.”

    goddard-school-spending-2013-11

    Nearby you may find charts of data for the Goddard school district. (Click for larger versions.) You may draw your own conclusions. Recall that Sam Brownback became governor in 2011. The charts are derived from visualizations of data obtained from the Kansas State Department of Education. You may click here to access the visualization for school spending. Information about school employment, including a video and interactive visualization is at Kansas school employment trends.

    goddard-school-employment-2013-11

    Charts for the entire state look similar: Employment going down, then rising. Ratios of employees to students improve correspondingly. This is not the case in every school district, however.

    But not everyone believes the statistics. When the Kansas Republican Party posted a chart of statewide school employment on its Facebook page, someone remarked “Where do I find the facts supporting this graft [sic]? Where did the numbers come from? How are these more than 400 additional teachers and 500 certified employees being paid when school funding has been reduced?”

    Sounds like someone’s been spun.

  • Kansas editorial writers aren’t helping

    Recently it has become fashionable for newspapers to carry editorials bemoaning the current state of affairs in Kansas, contrasting the current regime to a tradition of moderation in Kansas governance. In particular, Governor Sam Brownback is singled out for criticism.

    Examples of such columns are Kansas 1861-2013 in the Hutchinson News, Kansas slipping away from its people in the Topeka Capital-Journal, and Which Kansas is that? in the Wichita Eagle.

    The common thread in these articles is willing ignorance of the facts. I say willing ignorance because these writers ought to know facts. If they don’t know facts about the Kansas economy and schools, we have to wonder why they are writing editorials that will be read by thousands of Kansans?

    Here’s a brief rundown of the state of Kansas:

    Kansas population has been growing at a slower rate than the country. A chart is here.

    Kansas has been growing jobs at a slower rate than many other states. Here’s a link to an interactive visualization of job growth in the states. You can compare Kansas to any other state or combination of states. Should we be satisfied with the performance of Kansas compared to other states over the past few decades? No, we shouldn’t be satisfied with our record during the period that these editorialists write about.

    Kansas has been growing its private-sector gross domestic product at a rate slower than most states. An interactive visualization is here.

    Kansas has lost ground in interstate migrants. Many more people leave Kansas for other states than move to Kansas, as can be seen here. In the 2012 United Van Lines migration study, Kansas is seen as “balanced.” But Atlas has more outbound shipments than inbound.

    While Kansas newspaper editorial writers like to boast of outstanding public schools, a proper examination of NAEP scores finds that Kansas can’t do better than Texas, a state that we often compare with ourselves in a negative way. Comparing Kansas to national averages, Kansas performs well compared to other states in math and reading in grades four and eight, scoring better than the national average in all these cases. But if we look at the data separated by racial/ethnic subgroups, something different becomes apparent: Kansas lags behind the national average in some of these areas. A table of these figures is here.

    Regarding Texas again: Editorial writers say that because Texas has no income tax, its property and sales taxes are higher. Perhaps. But overall, Texas collects less taxes from its citizens. In 2011 Kansas state government collected $2,378 in taxes for each person. Texas collected $1,682. Texas may have higher sales or property taxes than Kansas, but the total tax burden in Texas is lower.

    Spending follows the same pattern. In 2011 Kansas state government spent $5,115 per person in total, with $1,974 in general fund spending and $130 in bond spending. For Texas the total was $3,718 spent per person in total, with $1,654 in general fund spending and $50 in bond spending. The lower level of spending means Texas has a less burdensome state government, which allows more money to remain in the productive private sector. In Kansas, we spend more on government.

    The “sea of oil” and bountiful severance tax revenue that newspaper editorial writers say benefits Texas but not Kansas: In 2011 Kansas, which has a severance tax of its own, collected $42.54 in this form of tax for each person. Texas collected $104.29 per person in its severance tax. The difference between the two — $61.75 per person per year — is only a small portion of the difference between Kansas and Texas taxation.

    I could go on. But the more facts one states, the more criticism one receives.

    It’s not that what our governor is doing is perfect. It wasn’t the best course to single out certain forms of business organization to receive tax cuts. Everyone should have their taxes cut the same way.

    Governor Brownback still meddles in the economy, supporting harmful policies like the renewable portfolio standard for electricity generation. The Hutchinson News editorial wrote of how “Kansas proved to be a state teeming with inventiveness, ingenuity, determination and a savvy sense of business” and mentioned iconic Kansas-founded companies like Cessna, Beech, Stearman, Coleman, Pizza Hut, and White Castle. But today our state is strangling entrepreneurs, expanding control over economic development under the Brownback regime. Kansas has expanded the realm of public-private partnerships to the detriment of entrepreneurship. Cities like Wichita implement new regulations over industries like parking lot striping, taxicab driving, and haunted house attractions.

    Instead of moving to a modern pension system for state employees, we’re considering borrowing money to cover up the mistakes of the past, with no reform forthcoming and few lessons learned.

    Most inexplicably, Governor Brownback was absent in this year’s debate over important school reform measures like charter schools and school choice. These are initiatives that are working in other states, but not in Kansas.

    It isn’t supportive of our state (or county, city, or school district) to overlook facts in order to create a false impression of a prosperous state with successful schools. Yet that’s exactly what these newspaper editorials want us to do.

    If we don’t learn the facts and if we don’t accept the facts, we don’t have a common base of understanding and a common starting point for debate. Even if the facts are uncomfortable — especially then — we must recognize where we’ve been and what is the actual condition of our state.

    Hoping that Kansans won’t notice might be politically expedient. Both parties can be guilty of valuing political gain more than the health of Kansas. But it’s a severe loss to Kansas that these newspaper editorial writers will not recognize facts, and a shame that they prefer political attacks to reality.

  • In Kansas, arguing about the wrong school issues

    School blackboardSunday’s Wichita Eagle makes a state-wide issue (literally) out of something that could self-regulate, if only we would let it.

    The issue is what proportion of Kansas school spending finds its way “into the classroom” — whatever that means — and Kansas Governor Sam Brownback’s use of this statistic.

    The front page Sunday article (Governor’s numbers come under question) spent over 1,000 words on the topic. It covers where Brownback got the number he uses, the controversy over how to classify spending as “classroom” or other, and troubles surrounding an advocacy group that pushed for more spending going to the classroom.

    Why is this issue important? In Kansas, most children attend government schools that are funded and regulated by government. This means that how schools spend money is a political issue. There will be arguments.

    In the private sector, however, we don’t see these types of arguments. Do we argue in public about how much the grocery store spends on administrative overhead compared to other spending? Of course not. The managers and owners of the grocery store are intensely interested in this issue. The public is too, but only in how the management of the grocery store affects their shopping experience.

    If shoppers don’t like the way a store is managed, they shop somewhere else. Management may notice this and make changes that customers appreciate. If management doesn’t adapt, the store will likely close and be replaced by other stores that do a better job delivering what customers want.

    Or, some shoppers may like a high level of management in a grocery store — one with more personal service. Some like a bare-bones store where you sack the groceries yourself. This variation in customer tastes and needs leads to what we observe: diversity in the types of grocery stores shoppers can choose from.

    The point is that in the private sector, people get to choose what they like. They choose what’s best for them. But with our system of public schools funded and regulated by government, there is no choice. (Yes, you can escape the public schools and use others, but you still must pay for the government schools.)

    There’s a factor that leads to this diversity of grocery stores and self-regulation focused on meeting consumers’ needs. It’s market competition.

    But Kansas has no market competition in schools, unless you want to escape the system entirely and still pay for it. We have a very weak charter school law, meaning there are very few charter schools in Kansas. We have no vouchers or tax credit scholarships.

    If we had these instruments of school choice in Kansas, government schools would face market competition. They would have to start being responsive to customers. We could allow schools to decide for themselves how much to spend on management and things other than the classroom. Market competition would guide schools in structuring their management and budgets to best meet the needs of schoolchildren and parents.

    If we had school choice in Kansas, we would have a more diverse slate of schools for parents to select from. We could rely on the nature of markets to self-regulate schools like we rely on markets to regulate grocery stores.

    We could quit arguing about things like how much is spent in the classroom, and we could actually focus on teaching children.

    But the Kansas school education establishment doesn’t want that. That establishment fights every attempt to introduce even small elements of choice into Kansas. We’ll see this soon as several bills facilitating school choice are introduced in the Kansas Legislature.

  • Kansas school efficiency task force report

    In an effort to spur greater efficiency in Kansas public schools, Kansas Governor Sam Brownback created a school efficiency task force. The task force has released its report, which may be viewed here.

    While some of the recommendations are very useful and should be implemented, some are minor in nature, and some — especially the ones that would reduce the power of the teachers union — will be very difficult to implement. There is also a list of mostly generic “best practices,” such as “Look for savings on utilities.” The task force also solicited anonymous suggestions from the public, and a representative sample is included.

    Two specific recommendations relate to the issue of the various funds schools use and their balances. This has been a contentious issue, with schools defending the need for large (and increasing) fund balances. See Kansas schools have used funds to increase spending for background.

    School districts have complained that the state has been late in making its payments. School districts use this as an argument for the need for high fund balances. So it’s not surprising to see this recommendation: “Place a priority emphasis on the timely transfer of state payments to school districts in June and January.”

    There’s also this recommendation: “Legislatively eliminate, reduce, and consolidate the statutory cash reserve accounts and separate fund accounts that currently exist, thereby ending the ‘use-it-or-lose-it’ policy and allowing the funding contained in each fund category to be more broadly spent across the full variety of educational requirements. Accounts that remain, including the General Fund, should be allowed a modest amount of carryover from year to year.”

    The explanation tells us that the current system of accounts restricts school districts’ ability to effectively use funding. And obviously, “use-it-or-lose-it” is a bad policy.

    There is also the recommendation to form a definition of what counts as “instructional” spending, and whether the current target of 65 percent instruction spending is the best goal.

    In school bond issue campaigns, a popular selling point made to voters is that the state will pay for some of the bond payments. It’s pitched as free money, or at least as a way to get back the money the taxpayers have been sending to Topeka to pay for other school districts’ bonds. So another recommendation is to consider reevaluating this program.

    The issue of accounting and data management is addressed, with examples of the state requiring reports that are “cumbersome, inefficient, and time-consuming” to provide. The reports calls for data to be trackable down to the building level, and made more readily available to the public.

    There are also recommendations that are sure to be opposed by Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), our state’s teachers union. These include a review of teacher tenure, seen as limiting administrators’ ability to efficiently allocate resources. Instead of the strict salary schedule that is currently used, the report recommends a salary range, which could include factors like experience and area of expertise.

    There is also recommended a reduction in the matters that are subject to negotiation with the union, specifically mentioning “work hours, amount of work, insurance benefits, force reductions, professional evaluation procedures, etc.” as no longer subject to mandatory negotiation.

    Missing from the dialog

    Perhaps it was not included in the mandate given to this task force, but missing from the recommendations is using the power of markets to improve the education of Kansas schoolchildren.

    For example: Private sector firms don’t need to be told to “Look for savings on utilities.” The profit motive induces them to do things like this, either to earn a better return on investment, or in the case of non-profit institutions, to better serve more customers (students).

    While public education spending advocates insist that schools shouldn’t be subject to the same competitive market forces that rule the business world, competition works wonders in states where it is allowed to exist. Since Kansas has a very weak charter school law (and therefore very few charter schools) and no school choice through vouchers or tax credit scholarships, Kansas schoolchildren don’t benefit from the dynamism that we see in other states.

    We also don’t experience the cost savings that states with school choice see. The The Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice has found — over and over — that school choice programs save money.

    Unfortunately, Governor Brownback has not expressed support for school choice programs, or even for charter schools.

    Schools are sure to oppose most of the recommendations, even those that are the hallmark of good government. An example is a KSN Television news story which reported that Newton school superintendent John Morton thinks it is “a real concern” when citizens have access to data about government spending. This is a common reaction by government bureaucrats and officials. They prefer to operate without citizen scrutiny.

    Finally, there is this irony: The Kansas school bureaucracy says that everything they do “is for the kids.” You might think that they would already be doing everything they can to increase school efficiency in order to benefit students. They have much of the power they need to do this. It’s time to see whether they’re actually willing to act in the best interests of Kansas schoolchildren, and for taxpayers, too.

    Kansas Governor’s School Efficiency Task Force Recommendations

  • Kansas judicial selection: The need for reform

    Kansas University School of Law Professor Stephen J. Ware appeared on the KAKE Television public affairs program This Week in Kansas to discuss the method of judicial selection in Kansas. Phil Journey and Chapman Rackaway appear as panelists. Tim Brown is the host.

    In today’s debate the issue of judicial selection reform is usually characterized as strictly political. Now that Kansas has a conservative governor and a conservative legislature, it is said that conservatives want to remake the courts to suit their ideology.

    That may be the motivation for many. But Professor Ware has advocated for reform for a long time, favoring a system of appointment by the governor with confirmation by the senate. Ware’s 2007 research paper on this matter, published by the Federalist Society, may be read at Selection to the Kansas Supreme Court. The opening sentence of this report starkly states the singular character of the process in Kansas: “Kansas is the only state in the union that gives the members of its bar majority control over the selection of state supreme court justices.”

    At the time Ware wrote this paper and convinced me of the need for reform, Democrat Kathleen Sebelius had just been re-elected Kansas Governor. The senate — which would confirm the governor’s appointments — was firmly in the control of political liberals and moderates who would be sure to rubberstamp her pick. Rubberstamp — that’s a word we see used today by progressives to describe the machinery of Kansas politics at the state level.

    Another paper by Ware explains the problem with the process used in Kansas. The paper is titled Originalism, Balanced Legal Realism and Judicial Selection: A Case Study and may be downloaded at no charge.

  • Kansas Policy Institute on Kansas 2014 budget

    Kansas Policy Institute president Dave Trabert offered the following statement today regarding the release of fiscal year 2014 — 2015 budget proposal by Governor Sam Brownback:

    On taxes: “HB 2117 was a great step in the right direction on taxes and we should absolutely continue to lower taxes on all Kansans. We applaud Governor Brownback’s efforts to eliminate income taxes in Kansas, but increasing sales taxes in July is not the way to do it. Completely eliminating the income may require a sales tax increase, but the rate cannot be determined until government stops giving away taxpayer money in the name of economic development and gets spending under control.”

    On spending: “We can’t know how much government should spend until we actually look for ways to be more efficient. Spending less is not about cutting service, it’s about providing the same or better service at a better price. The Governor’s budget does so in some places but it should go further. 31 states are estimated to have spent less per-resident than Kansas in 2012 so we can certainly find ways to be more efficient — especially given that general fund spending has increased 32% since 2005.”

    “We often hear laughter when we ask people around the state if government operates efficiently and a recent public opinion poll we conducted with SurveyUSA backs this up. In fact, 83 percent of Kansans believe the state government could operate five to 10 percent more efficiently.”

    On K-12 Finance and Gannon implications: “The $654 increase in Base State Aid Per-Pupil called for in the Gannon court ruling, would bring total taxpayer aid to schools to $14,045 per-pupil this year. It costs a lot of money to operate our schools, but it’s how the money is spent that matters, not how much. No study has ever been conducted in Kansas to determine what it costs for students to achieve required outcomes and have schools organized and operating in a cost-effective manner. Legislators have an obligation to fund schools, but they also have an obligation to do so in a way that makes effective use of taxpayer money.”

    “The education focus should be on outcomes. Billions in increased aid to schools over the years have not improved student achievement on independent national exams. Even state assessments show that only 56 percent of 11th grade students read grade-appropriate material with full comprehension. More money isn’t the answer to raising student achievement. It’s time to start looking for real solutions..”

    On KPERS: “Gov. Brownback clearly recognizes that last year’s KPERS reform didn’t go as far as it needs to. So even though it isn’t formally in the budget a move to a 401(k) style plan for new hires and non-vested current employees stops the likely $15 billion KPERS hole from getting deeper and, if properly structured, starts filling it back in.