During the Pandemic, People Left NJ and Took a Record Amount of Wealth with Them, Mostly to Low-Tax, Non-Lockdown Florida
Posted On08/03/2023 byWhen it comes to domestic migration, how did New Jersey fare during the first year of the pandemic? Unfortunately, not well: New Jersey saw a net loss of over 12,000 taxpayers and $3.8 billion of gross income, the largest annual outflow of wealth in its history. This was despite the largest inflow of wealth from…Read More
Strong 2023 Investment Returns But Teachers’ Pension Plan Is Still in Trouble
Posted On08/01/2023 byThe Star-Ledger reports that state pension investments have “raked in huge gains” so far this year, but the structurally unsound state pension system is still in trouble. It is of course good news that stock markets have had strong returns this year and that state pension plan assets have rebounded after a dismal 2022. And…Read More
Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman Adds Hypocrisy to His Habitual Mendacity
Posted On07/19/2023 byMendacious Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman is at it again. The founder of the New Jersey Public Education Coalition (NJPEC) recently took to the pages of NJEdReport to decry parents ostensibly using their children as “spies” to expose “woke” indoctrination in public school classrooms. Gottesman claims that, by such actions, the “radical right” aims to…Read More
Conflict of Interest: NJEA President Spiller Uses Teachers’ Highest-in-the-Nation Dues for His Own Political Ambitions
Posted On07/14/2023 byLooks like NJEA President/Montclair Mayor Sean Spiller is actively pursuing his personal political ambitions, and he’s happy to use New Jersey teachers’ highest-in-the-nation dues to do it. Perhaps Spiller’s mounting legal troubles in Montclair have spurred him to seek greener pastures for his next campaign for public office. The New Jersey Globe reports that Spiller, “a…Read More
FY2024 Budget: State Spending Up 56% Under Gov. Murphy. What Happens When the Revenue Windfalls Go Away?
Posted On07/07/2023 byOnce again under Gov. Murphy, when it comes to the budget, politics supersedes fiscal responsibility. Murphy and his pals in the legislature sure know how to take care of their friends in an election year. Adding to a continuous string of record budgets, Murphy signed a $54.3 billion FY2024 budget. That’s up over 7% from…Read More
Sweeney Center Warns of “Fiscal Crisis” When Revenue Windfalls Go Away. What Happens with $7 Billion Pension Payments?
Posted On06/30/2023 bySunlight has long warned about New Jersey’s fiscal condition. In particular, we have focused on Gov. Murphy’s decision to accommodate his biggest political supporter, the NJEA, by choosing to make the full required pension payment rather than doing the hard work of reforming the teachers’ pension fund (TPAF), the largest and most distressed of the…Read More
More Mendacity and Bullying from Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman
Posted On06/27/2023 byMeet Michael “Hundreds of Millions” Gottesman, founder of the NJ Public Education Coalition (NJPEC), the group trying to bully school boards into adopting a progressive education agenda. Gottesman got his nickname because he maintained to the Star-Ledger that “right-wing extremist” groups had “hundreds of millions of dollars being donated to them in New Jersey” to…Read More
Student Test Scores Continue to Plummet, NJ’s Remediation Plan Is Failing Badly, and Gov. Murphy Is AWOL
Posted On06/21/2023 byWe have two disturbing pieces of news about learning loss for NJ students. First, a new update on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), known as the “nation’s report card” on student learning, and the news is terrible: both reading and math scores continue to plummet due to lingering effects from school closures. Here’s…Read More
More Signs that Education Truth Project and NJ Public Education Coalition Are NEA/NJEA Fronts
Posted On06/20/2023 byDark-money Super PAC Education Truth Project (ETP) continues to look like a NEA/NJEA front. Sunlight must rely on circumstantial evidence because ETP is funded by dark money, but there’s plenty of circumstantial evidence. And now we have more. And because ETP funds its affiliate, NJ Public Education Coalition (NJPEC), that group is also likely funded…Read More
Lee Siegel: Montclair School Kids Suffer While NJEA President/Montclair Mayor Spiller Focuses on His Political Ambitions
Posted On06/09/2023 byLong-time Montclair resident Lee Siegel penned a scathing article in City Journal on the poor condition of Montclair’s schools and the apparent indifference of its mayor, NJEA President Sean Spiller. Siegel notes that Montclair’s political elite, including Spiller, mouth progressive platitudes, but their actions speak louder than their words. As always, it’s the kids —…Read More