NRPLUS MEMBER ARTICLE
F
or the past 14 years, I’ve had the privilege of authoring the annual ALEC publication, Rich States, Poor States: ALEC-Laffer State Economic Competitiveness Index, alongside economists Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore. In each edition of our report, we rank the economic outlook of states, measuring their relative economic competitiveness based on 15 influential policy areas, such as taxes, regulations, and labor policies.
Why do we choose these 15? First, it’s because we know, based on the research, that they matter for economic growth. Secondly, and importantly for state-policy discussions, the variables we pick are things that state legislators directly control.
Incredibly, in …