Research Reports

Budget, Taxation, and the Economy Introduction North Carolina’s strong fiscal position at the start of the COVID-19 crisis was a combination of planning and providence. Since 2011, the Republican-led…

Gov. Roy Cooper’s COVID-19 statewide shutdown order has pushed North Carolinians online for everything from family gatherings to shopping and education. But the COVID-19 pandemic has also showcased the power…

Executive Summary North Carolina has thousands of crimes scattered across untold pages of statutes, regulations, and ordinances. Many of these crimes are duplicative, unconstitutional, or outright silly. This labyrinth of…

Executive Summary North Carolina’s Teachers’ and State Employees’ Retirement System (TSERS) is widely recognized as being among the nation’s healthiest pension plan systems, currently almost 90 percent funded at a…

Introduction North Carolina’s K-12 public school finance system is broken. And efforts to fix it have been at least a decade in the making. This paper highlights the problems with…

Introduction While the national health care policy debate focuses on access to health insurance and health providers, the importance of oral care often does not receive the attention it should.

Introduction: A tale of two enterprising Tar Heels Bob has a bumper crop of North Carolina sweet potatoes. How can he get them to a consumer? Bob’s got a lot…

North Carolina has reduced tax rates in four of the last six years while building its savings to the highest level in history. We present seven traditions, institutions, and processes…

This is the second part of a three-part analysis of the federal government’s “equitable sharing” program and its impact in North Carolina. Part One explained how equitable sharing makes it…

Background Did you know that North Carolina used to be the nation’s leader in locally owned and operated distilleries? It’s true. In 1904 the state had 745 registered distilleries, 540…