June 2004 PRI Ideas in Action
Policy Update and Monthly Impact Report

EDUCATION STUDIES KEY ISSUE: RONALD REAGAN AND EDUCATION

Policy Briefing
Although he has been lauded for his foreign policy achievements, the late President Ronald Reagan’s important domestic achievements should not be overlooked. In education, like in so many other areas, Reagan changed the nature of the debate and laid the foundation for many of the key education reforms that have been implemented by federal and state governments.

PRI Perspective
Ronald Reagan used the bully pulpit of the presidency to push for a broad array of education reforms: parental responsibility in education; school choice, including tax credits and vouchers; rigorous academic content focused on “basics” such as reading, writing, arithmetic, history, and government; religious freedom in schools; high standards of conduct and discipline; and character education.

Many of his ideas have now become reality, including Congress’s recent approval of a voucher program in Washington, DC and the standards and accountability laws passed in many states.

Today’s education reformers, therefore, owe a huge debt of gratitude to Ronald Reagan’s leadership, bold thinking, and clarity of purpose.

PRI Impact

• June 1, The Orange County Register published Lance’s op-ed “ So much for education reform”

• June 1, School Reform News published an op-ed by Lance entitled “ Cut and Run: California Retreats On Math."

• June 8, KQED-FM broadcast Lance’s commentary on Ronald Reagan’s impact on young people and on the nation. This commentary was republished on June 18 by Californiarepublic.org.

• June 25, Californiarepublic.org republished Lance’s Capital Ideas column “Ronald Reagan’s Education Legacy.”

• June 22-23, Lance attended an education conference in Jackson, WY sponsored by the Jackson Hole Institute.

Policy Briefing
Water sub-meters are devices that can be installed in apartments with vertical riser pipes to bill individual users for water consumption. With sub-metering, a third party provides residents with a bill that accurately measures their water consumption, so individual costs can be compared to individual benefits, and consumption altered accordingly. Large families, people who delight in long showers, or those who wash clothes or dishes frequently pay more. Single people or those who conserve water religiously pay less. It’s simple, fair, and promotes water conservation.

The National Apartment Association and the National Multi Housing Council report that submetered properties use 18-39 percent less water than properties where water costs are built into rent. Another study, conducted in San Antonio, found that sub-metering decreases consumption by 31 percent. Currently, California regulations discourage the installation of sub-meters.

PRI Perspective
In California, water meters must conform to the accuracy standard of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Devices that test outside this accuracy standard are not approved. But this standard was designed to measure traditional utility-type meters, not point-of-use submeters, which operate under different water-flow conditions. As a result of California’s strict standard, most sub-meters cannot pass the test.

California should adopt a less strict accuracy standard, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) standard for point-of-use sub-meters. All other states use this standard, and California Secretary of Food and Agriculture A. G. Kawamura has authority to accept the ANSI standard, which would permit installation of more point-of-use submeters and conserve California’s water.

PRI Impact
• June 11, Sacramento Bee "What about apartment dwellers?" by Lawrence J. McQuillan and Andrew Gloger

• “State Water Regulators Receive California Golden Fleece Award for Allowing Water Conservation to Go Down the Drain,” PRI’s 7th California Golden Fleece Award (June 2004).

• June 7, California Journal Workers Comp Compromise: Pacific Research Institute critiques the compromise, by Lawrence J. McQuillan and Andrew Gloger

TECHNOLOGY STUDIES KEY ISSUE: – CANNING BAD SPAM-FIGHTING IDEAS

Policy Briefing
The reason laws are ineffective against spam is the same reason why a Do Not Email Registry would be ineffective – it’s too easy for spammers to hide. And when they are found, it’s difficult to impose American law if they don’t live in the United States. The FTC was correct in rejecting arguments from biased business people that so obviously clashed with the ideas of most experts in the field. There’s a wide range of potential solutions available to fight spam, and it would be incredibly shortsighted for government to preempt marketplace experiments and simply pick what it forecasts to be best.

PRI Perspective
Spam is without a doubt expensive and annoying, but it’s worth waiting for the nation’s technology innovators to discover the most effective solution using market forces. Ideas that rely on blindly throwing money at the problem, legislating tech standards, or depending on a self-interested business lobby should be abandoned.

PRI Impact
• June 3, Sonia moderated and participated in two panels on Spam at the Inbox Spam event in San Jose. The titles of the panels were: “Money Talks: Slamming Spam with Economics” and “Outsource or Internalize Email Content Control - A Debate.”

• June 4, TechNewsWorld "Regulating Telecom Regulators for the Sake
of Innovation," by Sonia Arrison.

• June 25, TechNewsWorld “Can”Bad Spam-Fighting Ideas, by Sonia Arrison.

• June 18, TechNewsWorld The Future of Broadband Starts Now, by Sonia Arrison.

OTHER RECENT IMPACT

• June 4, San Francisco Business Times, "SBC strike illuminates health care’s ‘basic injustice’," by Sally C. Pipes
It wasn’t their intention, but those SBC workers who recently ended a four-day strike provided an educational lesson on health care for all Americans.

Reagan Remembered
• June 7, SF Gate.com "Reagan, in short," by Steven F. Hayward
“No, no, Jimmy Stewart for governor; Ronald Reagan for best friend.” While Democrats underestimated him, the voters didn’t, sending him to Sacramento by a million-vote landslide.

• June 7, National Review Online - The Corner
"Liberals Then, Liberals Now – Always the Same," by Steven F. Hayward
“I’ve seen a few commentators say things like, ‘Gee, politics was more civil back when Reagan was around; things have really turned nasty under George W. Bush.’ Au contraire.”