Solving Violent Crimes Should be a Priority

Criminal Justice 

• Proposed legislation in Illinois would require law enforcement agencies to provide more transparent data on how many homicide cases result in arrests and charges, CBS News reports.  
   
• AP has published an investigative report into how prison labor supports the US food system and is linked to numerous products sold in restaurants and on the shelves of grocery stores.  
   
• Reuters reports on how thousands of predominately Black and Hispanic people incarcerated in federal prison are now eligible for sentence reductions as a result of last year’s amendments to federal sentencing guidelines, which became retroactive starting on February 1st.  

Higher Education 

• A House Democratic proposal that includes the College Transparency Act marks a “welcome return to normalcy” where lawmakers on both sides of the aisle try to improve higher education through legislative change rather than executive orders, writes AV grantee Beth Akers, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. 
   
• The ASAP Ohio student success program resulted in a 50 percent increase in graduation rates and an 11 percent boost to post-graduation earnings, MDRC shows in its latest infographic. 
   
• Forbes reports on a new study by the HEA Group that found that students borrowers who don’t complete college collectively end up owing more than they initially borrowed.  

Infrastructure 

• A new research commentary from MIT evaluates the impact of the BIG WIRES Act, finding it would increase interregional capacity and reduce electricity system costs. 

Public Finance 

• Arnold Ventures’ Program Integrity Fellow Doug Criscitello shines a light on the growth of federal lending and the need for careful design, management, and budgeting.  
   
• AV grantee the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget reacts to the Congressional Budget Office’s updated baseline for 2024. 
   
• The New York Times has created useful visuals to demonstrate who would benefit from the bipartisan Child Tax Credit reform that passed the House 357-70 last week.
   
• The Washington Examiner editorial board calls the bipartisan Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act “a big win for conservative tax policy,” and AEI’s Timothy P. Carney discusses the important role the CTC plays in the tax code in The Wall Street Journal.
   
• The U.S. Treasury has released analysis of the impact of modernization funding for the IRS – finding that the original $80 billion investment would bring in up to $561 billion in additional federal revenue over the next ten years.