The Wall Street Journal published a news story suggesting that public schools face ruin without more federal aid.

In response to the crisis, federal policymakers have passed a series of aid packages providing hundreds of billions of dollars to state and local governments.

Presidential candidate Joe Biden said that he does not favor defunding police but instead “conditioning federal aid to police based on whether or not they meet certain basic standards of decency and honorableness.”

Disasters usually prompt calls for a top‐down response led by the Commander in Chief and guided by the supposedly higher expertise in Washington.

The federal government spends more than $700 billion a year on 1,386 subsidy programs for state and local activities such schools, transit, and housing.

The federal government spends $750 billion a year on 1,386 different subsidy programs for state and local governments. The number of aid programs has tripled since the 1980s.

Former Ohio Governor John Kasich paves the way for sound thinking on highways in his new Wall Street Journal op-ed.

In my upcoming Cato study, “Restoring Responsible Government by Cutting Federal Aid to the States,” I discuss 18 reasons why federal aid to state and local governments should be zeroed out. Reason #12 regards how aid induces states to delay important projects such as infrastructure.

Here is the framing of countless news articles on infrastructure: the streets have potholes; the federal gas tax has not been increased since 1993; experts are quite sure we need a federal hike; the states have increased their own gas taxes; only misguided fears of a public backlash stand in the way.

Over the past two years, the White House budget called for eliminating Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) twice. If history is any indication, CDBG will once again be proposed for elimination when the budget is published next week. Most likely, Congress will reject the White House’s suggestion, as it has in previous years.

If Congress cares about helping low-income people, it isn’t clear why they would reject the White House’s suggestion, or at least why Congress wouldn’t repurpose CDBG money for activities that address low-income needs directly.