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David Roberts emails with a challenge:

Kevin, I’ve been casting around trying to think of someone who’s wonky enough that they might actually read or care about this post. You’re my only hope!

You’re on, pal.  How bad can this be, after all?  It’s not like we’re talking about quantum mechanics, are we?

No.  It’s much worse.  David is writing about how the CBO does budget scoring for greenhouse gas legislation.  Holy cow.  But we’re troupers around here.  The question is: why does increased efficiency, which is (ahem) by far the most efficient way of reducing energy use, get scored so poorly by the CBO?  The answer has to do with the fact that if you tax some part of the economy, that means less spending, which in turn means less taxable income and therefore less tax revenue.  So you don’t really get the full benefit of the taxation.  But how much do you lose?

Rather than try to calculate that percentage for every piece of legislation and every set of taxed entities, the CBO […] has settled on a standard number, which it applies across the board: 25%. So for every buck that’s raised via an indirect tax, a quarter is lost in direct taxes and only $0.75 can be slated for new spending….This revenue offset is colloquially known, by the tiny number of people who have reason to know such a thing colloquially, as the “25% CBO haircut.”

But that’s just the start.  It turns out that if you spend the money on certain things you can avoid taking the haircut.  You get to use all 100% of the tax revenue.  Hooray!  Unfortunately it also turns out that tax cuts and tax breaks avoid the haircut but spending on things like state energy efficiency block grants gets the full hit.  And since members of Congress prefer to spend as much money as possible in their bills, they’re biased against things that get the haircut.  Things like energy efficiency programs.

Which is a drag, since energy efficiency programs are just about the best use of federal dollars you can imagine.  To learn more — a lot more — click the link and read the whole post.  It counts for three points toward your budget geek certificate.

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

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