Fool’s Gold: Charney at Eller takes down G.I., Beacon Hill

by David Safier

First the Goldwater Institute says a one cent sales tax hike will cost Arizona 14,000 jobs based on an economic model and a one page table from the libertarian Beacon Hill Institute.

Next, UA Eller College of Management's Alberta H. Charney punches holes in the analysis, saying, mainly, that the model is too limited to even be relevant to the sales tax hike. She formulates a more complete analysis, both of jobs most possibly lost in the private sector (about 7,400) and jobs that will be saved in the public sector (about 20,500). The result is, there will be something like 13,000 more jobs in Arizona if the tax hike passes than if it fails.

Then Beacon Hill posts a response to Charney's arguments which is so fundamentally wrong, even I can show how weak it is. Nonetheless, G.I. crows that Charney has been stomped.

Now, Charney has published a detailed response to Beacon Hill's response. I won't try to summarize it, except to say that it is clear, direct and holistic while Beacon Hill's response was picky and muddled. Here is the second paragraph:

When are the Goldwater Institute (GI) and/or the Beacon Hill Institute (BHI) going to take responsibility for releasing a set of numbers without any explanation of what numbers were run and why their results are so different from both IMPLAN and REMI. They are the outliers. It is not responsible to post a press release with a link to a one-half page undocumented table.

In response to Charney's question about G.I. taking responsibility for its misrepresentations and outright lies, I can only say, G.I. never takes responsibility for its misstatements. It is a propaganda organization masquerading as a think tank.

Any organization that will stand by the assertion that Bus Drivers and Bureaucrats is never to be trusted, period.