On the heels of testimony presented before the Senate the prior day, the Center for a New Economy on Thursday offered seven strategies to jumpstart Puerto Rico’s economy, that sidestep the government’s proposed tax reform — for now.
Saying that it "is a serious attempt to carry out a comprehensive change of the tax system,” the Center for a New Economy suggested during public hearings Wednesday that the reform should be put off until Puerto Rico’s adverse fiscal conditions improve.
Aiming to encourage work in the formal economy while neutralizing regressive consumption taxes, the Center for a New Economy recently commissioned the Urban Institute in Washington D.C. to conduct a study that proposes a new work credit focused on working families with children making between $7,500 and $25,000.
Contrary to what the government has been asserting over the past few months, the proposed budget for Fiscal 2015 will not be a balanced one because it is not factoring in sufficient appropriations to cover bond interest payments due, the Center for a New Economy said Wednesday.
Puerto Rico’s Center for a New Economy has been included in the seventh annual 2013 Global Go To Think Tanks Report, the most comprehensive ranking of the world’s top think tanks commissioned by the World Bank. The nonprofit ranked 69th among the world’s 80 “think tanks to watch.”
Puerto Rico needs to make "clear demands" to the U.S. government regarding what is needed to pull through its present difficulties, including requesting more flexibility with the Jones Act, a legislation that is also hurting Hawaii.
The Center for a New Economy will receive $1.9 million over the next two years from the Open Society Foundations to develop a “specific and measurable plan to increase civic capacity, transparency, and access to justice and equity in Puerto Rico.”
A number of prominent private-sector leaders expressed their support Tuesday of Senate Bill 837, which proposes to create the Puerto Rico Energy Regulatory and Oversight Commission to, among other things, begin reeling in local electricity costs.
The Center for a New Economy expressed its support Wednesday of the creation of an independent energy regulatory board to “rigorously oversee” the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority’s operations, to spur an improvement in the grid and a reduction in electricity costs passed on to consumers.
Puerto Rico's socioeconomic fiscal base has eroded and continues to erode significantly, while the central government and some public corporations are basically insolvent.
Puerto Rico may have reached the limits of sustainable growth within its current institutional framework and its leaders must find the political will to make profound changes to the socio-economic structure to pull out of the seemingly unstoppable downward spiral the island is on and insert it squarely into the new globalized economy.
The Open Society Foundations announced Monday it has awarded the Center for a New Economy a $100,000 grant to lead a group of nonprofits to create an initiative geared toward strengthening the civic core in Puerto Rico.
Puerto Rico needs to find alternative ways to govern itself that include all members of society with the single-minded goal of seeking solutions to its overwhelming fiscal and social problems, or risk going down the same path as Detroit, once a thriving city that is now desolate and in a state of emergency.
The Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority needs to undergo profound changes to improve its fiscal situation and consumer services, something that could happen under the supervision of an external, independent regulatory board, members of the Center for a New Economy think tank said Tuesday.
Promoting healthy habits and providing access to basic and specialized medical services to children in vulnerable communities is the mission of “Proyecto Creceré,” an initiative unveiled Tuesday by the Extra Bases Foundation — established by famed Puerto Rican baseballer Carlos Delgado — Merck, the University of Puerto Rico’s School of Pharmacy and the Association of Pediatricians of the West.
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