Center for Analysis of Delaware's Economy & Government Spending

The Center's mission is critically important to Delaware because state policies continue to be an unfortunate catalyst for the clear decline of Delaware’s economy for far too long. For instance…

Over the past 20 years, Delaware’s per capita income has gone from the highest in the nation to below the national average.

According to the Delaware Department of Labor, employment is projected to grow at only 0.5% over the next decade, thereby trailing most of the nation.

Since 2009, Delaware has had five recessions compared to one in the rest of the country.

Including the variable Gross Receipts Tax, small business owners in Delaware often pay the highest personal income tax rates in America.

In partnership with other like-minded Delaware organizations, the primary goals of this Center are to develop bi-partisan strategies and alternative policy options that will bring transparency, regulatory reform, and improved effectiveness to the tens of billions of dollars spent by the State every year.

Updated Transparent Delaware data | 11/28/2018

Thanks to the generous support of CRI donors and the professional cooperation of the Delaware Office of Management and Budget, the payroll and vendor data in Transparent Delaware has been updated to include 2011. A review of the data shows that some things continued and some things changed substanti...

With All Due Respect to Alan Levin | 11/28/2018

March 28, 2013 I appreciate Delaware Director of Economic Development (DEDO) Alan Levins recent response in the News Journal to my assessment of the condition and immediate future of the Delaware economy ("Writer Misrepresents Delawares Economic Health" March 15, News Journal). I b...

The Government is Playing Games With Employee Retirement Benefits | 11/28/2018

The retirement benefits of Delaware state and local government employees are at risk. The governments of both the state and New Castle County have been playing financial games with their employees pension funds, but the chickens are coming home to roost. For more than two years groups like ...

How the Prevailing Wage Law Stopped Progress | 11/28/2018

Recently, with encouragement from the County Executive, Tom Gordon, the New Castle County Council voted 7 to 6 against using a $100,000 contribution from the Friends of Rockwood to renovate the county-owned Rockwood Mansion. The argument was that such construction repairs should be subject to Delawa...

Floundering in a Sea of Anecdotes | 11/28/2018

The data shows that Delawares economy is still floundering. While employment is starting to pick up, the unemployment rate is stuck at twice the historic average. And this despite the labor force dropping by more than 6,500 persons since the beginning of 2013. Transfer payments remain the driving co...

Real Steps to Increase Jobs | 11/28/2018

Delaware’s Goods Producing sector, like manufacturing and construction, declined 24% from pre-recession levels to 2012! The rest of the country was only down 2% and is on the way to full recovery. There are policy bar...

Getting a foot in the door via apprenticeship | 11/28/2018

The recovery of employment since the 2008 crisis has been unusually slow. The unemployment rate has at last dropped below 7 percent because many have left the labor force. Total employment is still below its 2007 level. Persistent unemployment can be due to structural causes. For example, contr...

What if Delaware government was TABORed? | 11/28/2018

As governments in Delaware and throughout the Northeast and Midwest struggles with writing checks that they now are unable to cash, perhaps it is time to consider a Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR). Colorado was the first state to introduce a TABOR in 1992. The provision, approved by voter...

Supplemental Pay in Delaware State Government: Benign Neglect? | 11/28/2018

As the failed gubernatorial recall in Wisconsin and other recent referendums evidence, citizens are waking up to the fact that politicians have made pension commitments for public employees that can’t be sustained. Delawareans should be equally concerned about the overuse of supplemental pay b...

Kicking Delaware businesses when they are down | 11/28/2018

The state of Delaware gross receipt tax is levied against total business income, regardless of whether a firm makes a profit or not. Following the onset of the recent recession, one of the state’s answers to falling revenues was to twice raise the gross receipt tax. First, an increase of 25% i...