Blog Archives - Jay Evensen

Security breaches: Just how vulnerable are we?

5/29/2019

Internet security is kind of like your sewage system. You hardly think about it until something goes wrong, and then you can’t think of much else.

But it’s more important than that, of course. Unless you have a smart toilet (it’s a thing; look it up), your bathroom may be one of the few places left untouched by the internet.

Would you vote to do away with the income tax?

5/28/2019

With spring rains apparently beginning to dissipate, and with summer beaming on the horizon, it’s time to lie in the grass and ponder some recent developments.

Be bold: Utah lawmakers are hinting they want to consider “big, bold ideas” when it comes to tax reform. These, according to Senate Majority Whip Dan Hemmert, might even include the “crazy idea” of drop-kicking the income tax entirely. That would put Utah on a par with neighboring Nevada and Wyoming.

That’s bold, all right. The million-dollar (or much more, actually) question, is whether you, the average Utahn, would vote to make this happen.

When you click "agree," you probably don't know what that means

5/22/2019

Here’s a shocker. Most Americans click the “I have read the terms and agree” button on newly acquired software, online services and apps, even though they really haven’t read them and have no idea about the terms to which they are agreeing.

Are you kidding me?

Deciding how we vote isn't as important as keeping enemies away

5/21/2019

Utah lawmakers have been fretting over what might happen if someone wins a primary election with less than 50 percent, plus one, of the vote.

It’s an interesting debate and all. Americans, in general, don’t like it when someone gets sworn into an office of authority after earning less than that threshold, even though it happens all the time in the race for president and has happened countless times in various elections in the nation’s history.

But, with all that is swirling around us these days, the debate sounds a bit like arguing over which shrubs to plant in the front yard while someone is shooting at the house with a machine gun.

If we followed this Bible story, would the next recession be different?

5/15/2019

Here’s an Old Testament story you probably never heard in Sunday School.

Pharaoh has a troubling dream, so he eventually pulls Joseph out of prison to interpret it. Joseph tells him the dream means Egypt is about to have seven years of plenty, followed by seven years of famine.

But, he adds, he has a plan. If Pharaoh cuts taxes, greatly increases the national debt and gets people to max out their credit cards on useless consumer items, he says, Egypt might be able to keep the good times rolling for awhile — at least until Pharaoh and the other political leaders of the day no longer are in office. After all, let the young leaders of tomorrow take the blame for the famine!

Don't fear the urban transportation revolution

5/14/2019

During a recent trip to China, I marveled at the flow of traffic in Beijing. Bicycles, scooters, electric motorcycles and strange little motorized contraptions flowed at various speeds along the lanes closest to the sidewalks. Traditional cars, buses and trucks sped along the center lanes.

Red lights seemed more like suggestions than authoritative traffic regulators. My wife and I gazed with wonder at a woman on a motorized bike with several children hanging on in load-equalizing symmetry.

This seemingly chaotic scene was described to us as a type of inward harmony, with drivers anticipating each other’s moves and measuring them against their own wishes.

20 years later, what is the value of charter schools in Utah?

5/8/2019

Two decades ago, Pinnacle Canyon Academy, a charter school in Price, had the audacity to start a high school in a wing of a local motel.

If you know anything about charters, this really wasn’t such a crazy idea. Many make due with whatever facilities are available and leave the glass palaces to the public schools in traditional districts.

But motels don’t exactly conjure idyllic images of school days and the three Rs.

So, why is tax reform necessary in Utah again?

5/7/2019

At long last, the members of a task force that might redo Utah’s tax system have been publicly announced.
I say “might” because successfully changing tax law won’t be easy.

Ten state lawmakers, including two Democrats, plus four nonvoting tax experts who supposedly will guide the discussions with a dry-eyed sense of reality, will try to craft a better tax structure within the bounds of what is politically possible.

But will they be up to the challenge of answering this essential question: Why is reform necessary in the first place?

Cashless society is taking its sweet time getting here

5/2/2019

To correctly predict the future is virtually impossible, even if you’re an expert on the subject at hand. So when someone gets it mostly right, they deserve a shout out.

Which is why Norman H. Carter needs three cheers, belatedly.

Back in 1969, he was the vice president of the Computer Sciences Institute in El Segundo, Calif. That’s when he told the Pasadena Rotary Club that a cashless society was on the way.

It would be nice to have a bitcoin for the thoughts of those in attendance.

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