Marc Joffe is President of the Contra Costa Taxpayers Association and a California Policy Center visiting fellow.
After a long career in the financial industry, including a senior director role at Moody’s Analytics, he transitioned to policy research at CPC and Reason Foundation. Joffe’s research focuses on government finance and state policy issues.
Marc earned an MBA from New York University and an MPA from San Francisco State University.
In a recent op-ed, California Federation of Teachers (CFT) President Joshua Pechthalt calls out special interests for pouring money into California elections in support of charter schools. He writes: The charter association spent better than $24 million in relatively few races this year. Oakland, where previously $20,000 was a lot of money for a school...
By Marc Joffe
A rare point of agreement between President-Elect Trump and Congressional Democrats is that America has an infrastructure deficit: The nation’s transportation, power, water and sewerage facilities are too often outdated and unable to reliably serve a growing population. But while the diagnosis crosses party lines, solutions are more controversial. Democrats may not be too worried...
By Marc Joffe
When a government files for bankruptcy, bondholders, employees and vendors typically fight for a share of the agency’s assets. But what about taxpayers? Shouldn’t their interests also be considered by the bankruptcy court judge? This is the question we hope will be answered in California’s newest Chapter 9 bankruptcy, that of the West Contra Costa Healthcare...
By Marc Joffe
On October 20, the West Contra Costa County Healthcare District (WCCHD) filed for Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy – its second such bankruptcy filing in ten years. In 2015, the district closed its one hospital – Doctors Medical Center in San Pablo – which had been hemorrhaging money for many years. Since WCCHD is insolvent and...
By Marc Joffe
Along with the grandeur of Yosemite and the beauty of the California coast, there’s our state’s epic rush hours. But sales taxes on the Nov. 8 ballot, like Contra Costa’s Measure X, aren’t the way to solve them. Measure X would add 0.5% to local sales tax rates to fund a variety of transportation projects...
By Marc Joffe
This fall, voters in San Francisco, Alameda and Contra Costa counties will consider a $3.5 billion BART bond measure. Proponents argue that the measure is required to ensure the system’s safety and reliability. Critics are concerned that bond proceeds will be used to support excessive employee salaries and benefits. BART management denies that claim. In...
By Marc Joffe
Given declining enrollment, Orange Unified School District’s $288 million bond measure may fund more school upgrades than students need. There is also a risk that the taxpayer cost of debt service for the bond issue will exceed the district’s forecast rate of $29 per $100,000 of assessed valuation. According to statistics from Ed Data, enrollment...
By Marc Joffe
If Orange Unified voters approve Measure S this November, newly authorized bonds will be added to an already large district debt. A California Policy Center review of OUSD financial reports finds that the district owed $120 million to bond investors as of June 30, 2016. The largest portion of OUSD’s bond obligations takes the form...
By Marc Joffe
Orange County voters are being asked to approve over $2.4 billion in new school bonds. The largest bond: Capistrano Unified School District (CUSD)’s $889-million Measure M. The new CUSD bond would be serviced by property owners in most of the school district, but not quite all of it. One community, Rancho Mission Viejo, won’t be...
By Marc Joffe
Scholars from the University of California at Berkeley have played a pivotal role in making income inequality a major political issue. But while they decry the inequities of the American capitalist system, Berkeley professors are near the top of a very lopsided income distribution prevailing at the nation’s leading public university.
By Marc Joffe
Californians may be accustomed to living with the specter of a public pension crisis. But the federal government’s problem with its retirement system – including Social Security – is far worse, and yet none of the three remaining major-party candidates for president has a plan to do anything about it. The California Policy Center generally...
By Marc Joffe
Taxpayers in Stanton, a quiet suburb of Orange County with only 38,000 residents, will pay millions for a pricey bond deal approved in an obscure vote of a little-known city agency five years ago. Rather than risk voter rejection over the deal, Stanton city council members David Shawver, Alexander Ethans and Brian Donohue – acting in...
By Marc Joffe
Years after the Great Recession slammed their Wall Street investments, at least five California counties have broken through the 10 percent ceiling, spending at least one of out of every $10 to fund their government-employee retirement programs. The resulting strain on local budgets, called the pension burden, is revealed in California Policy Center’s latest analysis of county reports....
By Marc Joffe
a new form will got here
a new form will got here