Joseph Coletti

Senior Fellow
Joe Coletti is a senior fellow at the John Locke Foundation focused on fiscal policy issues. He previously headed the North Carolina Government Efficiency and Reform initiative within the Office of State Budget and Management, which led to changes automotive fleet management, natural and cultural resources, and state contracting. He has spent his career improving operations and strategies at for-profit, nonprofit, and government entities. He has degrees from Johns Hopkins SAIS and the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

Posts by Joseph Coletti (page 1)

  • State revenues are getting hammered

    Tax revenues are falling for states and local governments across the country. The Atlantic wonders, “Will the coronavirus bankrupt cities?” Pew provides numerous examples of how state taxes are getting slammed: Hawaii officials have estimated a $225 million decline; in New York, it’s a whopping…
    Joseph Coletti, April 3, 2020
    COVID-19 superimposed onto cut outs of yellow paper over a pile of money

  • How far will your federal coronavirus payment go?

    For some people, there is never enough money. A writer for a policy group on the left grouses this time about the paltriness of federal payments to taxpayers by deliberately understating the amount of money a family could receive and overstating the costs to be borne. Some money is better…
    Joseph Coletti, March 30, 2020

  • True facts about public health spending and Coronavirus

    There has been no Republican war against public health spending either in North Carolina or in Washington, DC. Reposting here a portion of my comments from March 16 to help set the record straight A progressive advocacy group recently claimed that public health funding was cut by 28% because of…
    Joseph Coletti, March 25, 2020

  • Available funds to meet “significant economic changes”

    As more of America shuts down each day, nobody knows what comes next, but the current situation reminds us that it’s always been hard to make predictions, especially about the future. House Speaker Tim Moore posted today about the $3.9 billion in North Carolina’s unemployment trust fund that…
    Joseph Coletti, March 17, 2020

  • Democrat Sen. Wiley Nickel Could Single-Handedly Solve Budget Impasse: Why Won’t He?

    State senator Wiley Nickel and state representative Julie von Haefen, both Democrats from Wake County, are holding a press conference this afternoon to show how concerned they are about retirees and teachers. Sen. Nickel jumped the gun with a string of tweets last night calling for new negotiations on budget…
    Joseph Coletti, March 10, 2020
    Featured image thumbnail

  • Transparency and local budgets

    This might be the first year in a long time that municipalities and counties live up to their financial reporting obligations if a law passed in 2019 works.
    Joseph Coletti, March 9, 2020

  • Tax votes split 4-4

    With a competitive Democratic presidential primary and a Republican incumbent, eight counties saw an opportunity to get voter approval for a sales tax referendum. This was the first presidential primary year with more an incumbent Republican and an open field for Democrats and the results for sales tax votes reflected…
    Joseph Coletti, March 4, 2020

  • WRAL misinterprets its own poll results

    WRAL used results from a poll that makes no mention of the budget fight to claim, “[Gov. Roy] Cooper is winning the popular vote in the ongoing battle.” The poll asked voters a hypothetical question about expanding Medicaid that obfuscates the budget cost and consequences, let alone the…
    Joseph Coletti, February 24, 2020