BY LIZ FARMER | MAY 22, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Is it better to be born rich or smart? According to recent research on equity and education, for most kids, wealth trumps knowledge.

BY LIZ FARMER | MAY 20, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

A year ago, the new $10,000 cap on the federal deduction for state and local taxes prompted dire predictions for the real estate market, especially in expensive areas like New York and San Francisco.

In these and other high-tax places, local property taxes alone can cost more than $10,000 a year. Many finance experts warned that limiting what these residents could deduct from their local taxes would lower home values and hurt governments' property tax revenue along with it.

As it turns out, those predictions were wrong -- at least on a large scale.

BY LIZ FARMER | MAY 17, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

In recent weeks, drug companies have reached their first settlements in lawsuits related to their role in the opioid crisis. They will pay Oklahoma and West Virginia a total of nearly $300 million.

With hundreds of similar cases still pending, many wonder, what will governments do with the money?

BY LIZ FARMER | MAY 10, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Houston’s standoff over pay parity between firefighters and police officers is coming to a crescendo after more than a year of legal battles and political posturing.

This week, thousands of firefighters received pay raises thanks to a voter-approved law to give them equal pay compared with police officers of the same rank.

But no one’s celebrating.

BY LIZ FARMER | MAY 8, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Public pensions are more invested than ever before in high-risk and expensive assets like real estate and hedge funds. Yet research continues to show that this tactic is unlikely to improve their earnings.

According to Fitch Ratings, in the span of a decade, pensions tripled their average investment in these so-called alternative investments. In 2007, they averaged 9 percent of state and local public pension investment portfolios. By 2017, that number had risen to 27 percent.

BY LIZ FARMER | MAY 3, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Tech companies have gotten really good at tracking our online behavior and placing ads tailored to our interests. They make billions of dollars doing so, and for years, there have been calls for governments to take a cut of the action.

Most recently, California Gov. Gavin Newsom called for a "data dividend," saying that “consumers should also be able to share in the wealth that is created from their data."

But as one lawmaker in New York is finding out, implementing a data tax on big tech has some complications.

BY LIZ FARMER | APRIL 25, 2019 AT 4:58 PM

As the 2020 election approaches, states are ramping up efforts to require presidential candidates -- including Donald Trump -- to disclose their tax returns.

A total of 18 states this year, including Trump’s home state of New York, have considered bills that would require such a disclosure in order to appear on the ballot, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The push comes as the administration fights a Democrat-controlled House committee’s subpoena for Trump’s tax and financial records.

BY LIZ FARMER | APRIL 19, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

This week, the federal government released new guidelines for the nation’s more than 8,700 "opportunity zone" communities trying to attract venture capital investment and boost their struggling economies.

Rural areas account for 40 percent of the designated opportunity zones, which offer private companies and investors tax breaks in exchange for investing in certain low-income communities. But some warn that even with the tax incentives, many rural areas still likely won't benefit unless state and local governments intervene to make the investment less risky.

BY LIZ FARMER | APRIL 17, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Teaching isn't a lucrative profession practically anywhere in America, but what drives some educators to strike over their pay and others to accept it?

It likely won't come as a surprise that, according to a new analysis, most of the places with the lowest pay have recently been home to walkouts or strikes. The data also suggests that the action in some states is having a spillover effect in others.

The part of the 2017 law that high-tax states are battling in court is likely helping them lower their debt -- at least in the short-term.

BY LIZ FARMER | APRIL 12, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Many states that lobbied against federal tax reform’s limit on a certain tax deduction are now benefiting from a potential effect of that 2017 policy change.

Tax reform capped the state and local taxes (SALT) that filers can deduct from their federally declared income at $10,000. High-tax states like California, New Jersey and New York have sued to block that change because their state and local taxes can be twice that amount for residents.

BY LIZ FARMER | APRIL 5, 2019 AT 7:05 AM

Baltimore has filed two antitrust lawsuits in eight days, alleging price-fixing by big banks and hoping to turn both proceedings into class action suits that seek billions in damages for governments and pension plans.

The suits address two different kinds of municipal market bonds, but both levy the same charges: that banks manipulated interest rates to their advantage, at the expense of taxpayers.

BY LIZ FARMER | APRIL 3, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

In the decade since the Great Recession, most cities have recovered. But even in places that have bounced back -- some stronger than before -- many people are still struggling.

A new report by the Brookings Institution outlines how the economic expansion over the last decade has been a lopsided one marked by growing income inequality, wage stagnation and racial divides.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 29, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Historic flooding in the Midwest has left millions of acres under water in 10 states after a "bomb cyclone" storm brought heavy snow and drenching rains. And it’s far from over. Weather forecasters say more precipitation is on the way.

The task list for the cleanup and recovery is already mounting. So far, the floods are affecting the safety of more than a million private water wells; farms won’t be able to plant crops this year; and Superfund waste sites are inaccessible.

And when it comes to getting the money to rebuild, states and localities in the Midwest likely have a long wait ahead of them.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 27, 2019 AT 2:15 PM

Federal funding to combat the opioid crisis more than doubled last year, marking an important commitment to prevention, treatment and recovery. A new report looks at whether and how that extra $4 billion is being effectively spent.

In 2017, more than 70,000 people in the United States died from a drug overdose; almost 50,000 of those deaths involved an opioid. In 2018, the Trump administration increased opioid funding to states to more than $7 billion, from a little more than $3 billion in 2017.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 22, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

New Jersey will likely be the next to legalize recreational marijuana, which would make it the 11th state (plus the District of Columbia) to do so. Medical marijuana is legal in an additional 22 states, meaning that more than half the country permits some form of the drug.

And yet, most growers and sellers can’t get a bank account for their business.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 20, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

The aircraft manufacturer Boeing has received roughly $1 billion in tax incentives and credits from Washington state over the past four years. That includes tens of millions of dollars for activities in 2017 related to production equipment for the 737 MAX jets, all of which have been grounded in the past week after two fatal crashes.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 14, 2019 AT 3:12 PM

This week, President Trump introduced his vision for the federal government’s 2020 budget. It proposes slashing domestic spending by 9 percent, including a 31 percent cut to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Defense spending, on the other hand, would increase by 5 percent, or $34 billion.

Here are six things state and local officials should consider when reviewing the administration’s proposal.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 7, 2019 AT 2:57 PM

For the past year, most teacher strikes aimed at boosting education funding have been getting results. But when it comes to restoring cuts made during the Great Recession, new data show these states and others still rank among the worst in the country.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 6, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Three weeks after Amazon announced it would back out of plans to build a second headquarters in New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo are still lobbying to woo the company back in hopes of getting the 25,000 jobs and billions in community investment that it promised.

BY LIZ FARMER | MARCH 1, 2019 AT 4:00 AM

Kentucky and Illinois have two of the worst-funded pension plans in the country, and they’re struggling under the weight of skyrocketing costs. Both are now considering drastic measures to ease the annual burden in ways that critics say will ultimately make the problem worse.