Should the federal government waste your tax dollars on biased research? You know the answer. And, recent work by a pair of free-market organizations shows Washington’s doing just that … again.
See for instance this article by Michelle Minton of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. She notes that National Institutes of Health have issued a five-year grant totaling over $3 million to an organization to examine the effect of the recent privatization of alcohol sales in Washington State. While at first blush, this might seem like a legitimate examination of an important subject, Michelle uncovers the truth:
The organization that received the grant and its scientists have a long history of producing anti-alcohol-biased research. Dr. William Kerr, the lead on the project, has written and spoken many times in the past about his firm stance against the privatization of alcohol sales which he believes directly results in increased drinking and costs to the state. He received funding from the National Alcohol Beverage Control Association, an organization with the sole purpose of defending control state systems, to produce a study warning states of the dangers of privatization. In all likelihood, the conclusion of this forthcoming study will communicate a similar attitude.
This is particularly troubling given that several other states, most notably Pennsylvania, are examining changes to their alcohol laws. Such efforts to expand consumer choice and create jobs could very well be blocked by flawed, taxpayer-funded “research.” That would mean taxpayers would be shortchanged both by the inappropriate expenditure of funds to pay for the grant, but even more significantly by stymieing pro-consumer changes to outdated laws.
Perhaps just as troubling is a study funded by the Small Business Administration (SBA) to tout an Internet sales tax bill, which has garnered much attention on Capitol Hill this year. Big retailers have spent millions of dollars on lobbying and PR efforts in support of the so-called “Marketplace Fairness Act;” however, as Andrew Moylan of the R Street Institute points out:
In service of the PR campaign for President Obama’s and Senator Dick Durbin’s favorite Internet sales tax law, the SBA decided to fork over $80,000 of taxpayer money to…(drumroll please)…the very people who have been writing studies in favor of the Marketplace Fairness Act (MFA)!
Here again, the use of taxpayer dollars is offensive in its own right, but even worse is the fact that public funds are being used to promote blatantly anti-taxpayer legislation. My colleagues, Pete Sepp and Doug Kellogg accurately dubbed the SBA study the “Outrage of the Week” in a recent podcast. The federal government should stop funding biased research. Doing so would represent a small step toward deficit reduction and a much bigger one toward fairer, more responsible governance.