Week in Review: The Best Kind of Domino Effect

A whopping 8,000 Arizonans have reaped the rewards of the Goldwater Institute-led universal recognition of occupational licenses law, the latest update shows—and countless more are reaping the benefits nationally.

One in four jobs nationwide requires an occupational license—a government permission slip to work in fields ranging from floristry to hairdressing. Those licenses cost significant time and money to obtain, and when a worker moves to a new state, they often must go through the entire process again. But Goldwater’s universal recognition reform streamlines occupational licensing by allowing skilled workers to use their out-of-state experience to quickly obtain a license to work in their new state.

Goldwater enacted this law in Arizona in 2019, launching a nationwide movement—and a domino effect. Since 2019, Goldwater has passed universal recognition in more than half the states in the country, freeing countless workers to pursue their American Dream. As Goldwater Director of Strategic Engagement Heather Curry writes, “These thousands of success stories represent…the families, careers, and communities that benefit when government steps out of the way of Americans who are skilled, ready, and willing to work.”

Read more here. 

What Happens in Vegas…Must Be Reported to Big Brother?

Planning a vacation with your family? Would you still want to go knowing the government could spy on you coming and going and search your rooms, all without a warrant?

This week, Goldwater filed a brief in the Nevada Supreme Court in support of property owners challenging the constitutionality of intrusive short-term vacation rentals in Clark County, which encompasses Las Vegas. Those regulations force people who rent out their homes for under 30 days to video-record vacationers going in and out of the house, and to turn those recordings over to the government upon demand. They also force property owners to turn over financial records to the government and to allow government inspectors into the homes to search bedrooms, bathrooms, and other locations.

“It is just fundamentally un-American to force people to snoop on other people for the government’s benefit,” Goldwater Vice President for Legal Affairs Timothy Sandefur told KVVU-TV in Las Vegas.

Read more at In Defense of Liberty. 

$80 Million Stolen by Tax Bureaucrats?

The government illegally stole $80 million from hardworking Pinal County, Arizona, taxpayers. It promised to give the money back—but taxpayers haven’t seen a dime. So this week the Goldwater Institute went back to court to demand state and county bureaucrats repay the taxes they illegally took.

Pinal County officials had schemed to impose a new sales tax that only applied to purchases of less than $10,000, meaning it primarily affected lower- and middle-income taxpayers. That’s illegal, and when Goldwater sued on behalf of taxpayers, the Arizona Supreme Court agreed and struck down the tax.

Tax bureaucrats refused to give the money back, then said last month they wouldn’t be returning it. But as Goldwater told the court, the government has no right to keep money that it had no right to take in the first place.

Amid uncertain economic times, Goldwater has been hard at work scoring multiple monumental wins for taxpayers—striking a death blow against Prop 208’s massive tax hike; enacting the nation’s lowest flat tax rate; and reinforcing Arizona’s ban on government subsidies for private businesses. We’re leading the fight to keep the government’s hands out of Arizonans’ pockets—and we’re not done yet.

Read more at In Defense of Liberty.