An Indiana University grad and author of five books, Jim Grant possesses deep knowledge on the role central banks have played throughout history and the cumulative results of their monetary policy decisions.
This is the season of economic forecasts, for which there are many uses beyond their pure entertainment value.
Consider for a moment what it’s like to be on unemployment in Indiana.
Anytime a government program makes tax dollars available to certain individuals, unfortunately, a few will look to game the system.
The Mayans were right when they predicted the world would end in 2012. It was just a select world: the GOP universe of arrogant, uptight, entitled, bossy, retrogressive white guys.
The priority for Congress as it convenes in a lame-duck session is to reach an agreement that averts a fiscal crisis. To accomplish that goal, it may also be necessary to agree on major changes to three arcane procedures that govern the House and Senate.
One thing is clear in the troubling weeks following the loss of a Republican U.S. Senate seat in Indiana: Chris Chocola will not give up easily in his quest for ideological purity.
By all accounts, Glenda Ritz has a daunting challenge as the next superintendent of public instruction. Across a state that has been at the forefront of the so-called education reform movement, recent legislation has incensed and motivated teachers in profound ways.
For the political among us, 2012 was solely focused on the election. From the early days in January with the Iowa caucuses to the ongoing transitions at the state and federal levels, the year was packed with action.
Single-parent families are at a significant economic disadvantage, and more black children in Indiana (42 percent) are living in poverty than are nationally (36 percent).
When Interstate 64 came to my hometown, I was too young to appreciate what an amazing engineering feat it was. To me, the construction zone was a wonderland of big trucks and other exotic-looking equipment.
Indiana seems to be experiencing a fresh outbreak of reefer madness.
Just north of the revived City Market, along the Alabama Street stretch of the Cultural Trail, stands a vacant landmark that has resisted redevelopment for almost a decade—the old City Hall.
Legacy can be a tricky word. Most leaders are interested in the legacy they will leave when their term ends or they step down from running an organization or entity; others, you could say, probably border on obsessed. Politicians, my reading of history has educated me, fall mostly into the obsessed category.
While the Republican brand in some quarters may be a bit tarnished these days, there is no doubting what it represents—the idea that we should have smaller government at all levels, and that government should stay out of our personal lives at least so far as taxation and guns are concerned.
Battle lines for the next General Assembly are evident already.
Here are six words I never imagined stringing together: I’m going to miss Mitch Daniels.
Mitch Daniels will leave the governor’s mansion to a chorus of hurrahs from budget-balancers, conservative pundits and the Republican Party, which wishes—now even more than before—that he had run for president. But what can other Midwestern states learn from the Daniels era?
Mitch Daniels had 48 former governors as role models when he took his oath of office. Now we can decide how he stands among them.
I realized that my original vision of the American Dream was a nightmare. I learned that there is more to business than the money earned.
