Available Soon: Request your printed copies of the Idaho Freedom Index mailed to you!
Request Your Copies
Note to Dustin: This is currently only visible to logged in users for testing.
Click Me!
Menu
Close

Policy

Is the Governor’s Office Funneling Taxpayer Dollars into an Anti-School Choice Nonprofit?

By Rachel Hazelip, M.A.P.P.
January 31, 2025
Conservatives who watched Governor Brad Little’s 2025 State of the State address on January 6 were underwhelmed by his “promises made, promises kept,” to say the least — particularly regarding school choice. A large section of his speech focused on education in Idaho, but he explained that his priority, “first and foremost [is] our public […]
TAGS: 

Property Taxes Are Extortion

By Ronald M. Nate, Ph.D.
January 28, 2025
“It’s a nice home you have here…” In the movies, it’s called “extortion” — pay us what we require, and nobody gets hurt. But, when the government does the same thing regarding you and your home, it’s called a “property tax.” Nobody truly owns their home when the government demands taxes be paid on it […]
TAGS: 

CRT 2.0

By Samuel T. Lair
January 27, 2025
This article was originally published in The American Mind, a publication of the Claremont Institute In states across the country, left-wing academics and major educational establishments are hijacking the review process for K-12 history and civics curricula. Educators and radicals, in league with one another, are conspiring to turn students against America’s traditional cultural and […]
TAGS: 

Immigration Enforcement: Where the Federal Government Failed, Idaho Can Succeed

By Rachel Hazelip, M.A.P.P.
January 24, 2025
What if someone broke into your house last night, but when you called the police, they were too busy or didn’t care enough to send officers to deal with your situation? You still have the right to protect yourself and your family by kicking the intruder out of your house, even if force is required, […]
TAGS: 

House Concurrent Resolution 4 on Legislative Pay Misses the Mark

By Fred Birnbaum
January 21, 2025
The Idaho Senate voted to reject the 22% raise with Senate Concurrent Resolution 101. For the record the Idaho Freedom Foundation has not opposed a pay raise for legislators. We have stated that the 22% raise was simply too large.  Unfortunately, the House response has been to suggest that legislators who believe they are overcompensated […]
TAGS: 

Now It’s Judicial Pay Raises: The Snowball Effect

By Ronald M. Nate, Ph.D.
January 20, 2025
Well, we called it. In the past few weeks, key members of the Idaho judiciary wrote a letter, and Idaho Supreme Court Chief Justice Richard Bevan spoke to the Legislature about the “need” for dramatic increases of 27% to 31% in judicial salaries. Here is what their proposed increases look like: These are outrageous pay […]
TAGS: 

Bannock County Returns Misspent Funds to the State, but Is That Enough?

By Rachel Hazelip, M.A.P.P.
January 17, 2025
As the adage goes, “Where there is smoke, there is fire.” This appears to ring true regarding the misappropriation of public funds between Idaho State University (ISU) and Bannock County. Since the Idaho Freedom Foundation’s last article on the misuse of public funds, ISU has requested that Bannock County return the remaining balance, which they […]
TAGS: 

Sources and Uses of Idaho’s Taxpayer Dollars

By Fred Birnbaum
January 15, 2025
If you’re a state and local taxpayer, have you wondered where your money goes — your income tax, sales tax and property tax dollars? Let’s examine a chart developed by the Legislative Services Office and updated annually. DISCLAIMER: In our review of the budgets, the buckets depicting expenditures on the bottom row do not align […]
TAGS: 

Idaho’s State Spending Briefly Explained

By Fred Birnbaum
January 10, 2025
The Idaho Freedom Foundation has written extensively about Idaho’s budget, and will continue to do so. Numbers and financial analyses can be difficult for people to understand who don’t focus on it. Let’s discuss some of the basics. Let’s start with a few terms from the glossary of the Legislative Budget Book. General Funds “consists […]
TAGS: 

Governor Little is Dodging DOGE in Idaho

By Fred Birnbaum
January 7, 2025
“Idaho was DOGE before DOGE was cool.” That was Gov. Little yesterday in his State of the State address, and subsequent press conference, invoking the now “infamous” DOGE, the Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy led Department of Government Efficiency. Let’s give the governor his due on reducing regulations as a way to increase government efficiency. […]
TAGS: 

The Ancient Myth of Idaho’s Food Tax Credit

By Ronald M. Nate, Ph.D.
January 3, 2025
One of the weakest arguments against repealing the grocery tax is that because there is a “food tax credit” on your income taxes, it would be redistribution to leave the credit alone while removing the sales tax on groceries. A few squishy legislators insist on removing both the tax and the credit at the same […]
TAGS: 

Want Limited Government? Control the Spending!

By Fred Birnbaum
December 31, 2024
All eyes were on Congress over the past week as, yet again, at the 11th hour, Congress funded the federal government for several months and averted a shutdown. It’s a good thing Idaho doesn’t approach appropriations bills this way and that we have a drama-free budget every year. Or is it? As U.S. Representative Chip […]
TAGS: 
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 … 66

Latest Research

1 2 3 4 5 … 56

Idaho Freedom Index

Our goal is to make state legislation transparent and readily accessible.
View Freedom Index
Idaho Freedom Foundation
802 W. Bannock Street, Suite 405, Boise, Idaho 83702
p 208.258.2280 | e [email protected]
Visit our FacebookVisit our TwitterVisit our YouTube channel
COPYRIGHT © 2025 Idaho freedom Foundation
magnifiercrossmenucross-circle linkedin facebook pinterest youtube rss twitter instagram facebook-blank rss-blank linkedin-blank pinterest youtube twitter instagram