Research

Arizona Housing Competitiveness Index

April 25, 2024 • 12 min read

Historically, Arizona – and its greater Phoenix metro area – has had a relatively affordable housing market. Recently, though, housing costs in the Phoenix area rose faster than any other major metro area in the country during the pandemic.

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Tags: Arizona Housing, Arizona Housing Affordability, Competitiveness Index, Housing Competitiveness, Housing Index

Growth & Change: How One Year of Universal Empowerment Scholarship Accounts Has (And Hasn’t) Altered Arizona’s K-12 Landscape

April 10, 2024 • 13 min read

FULL REPORT Authors: Glenn Farley Introduction For over a year, Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program has been open to any school-aged Arizona resident under its universal eligibility category. During that time, program enrollment has grown from 12,000 to 77,000 students. 51,000 of the new enrollees have been under the new universal category, implying 14,000 […]

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Tags: Education, Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, ESA, School Choice, Universal ESA

March Madness: The Economic Impact of Glendale’s Final Four Basketball Championship and Arizona’s Sports & Tourism Sector

April 4, 2024 • 10 min read

This year the Men’s Final Four is hosted in Phoenix for the second time. When the Men’s Final Four Championship games were last hosted in Phoenix (2017), it was the second highest-attended Final Four game (with 77,612 average nightly attendees).

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Tags: Basketball, Final Four, Sports and Tourism, State Farm Stadium

Arizona Government Budget Competitiveness Index

April 2, 2024 • 12 min read

A thriving economy depends in part on an efficient government that operates at sustainable levels. One measure of efficiency: given the powers and duties reserved to and assumed by a government, how much does it take from the broader economy to accomplish them?

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Tags: Arizona State Budget, Competitiveness Index

Arizona Jobs and Labor Force Update March 22, 2024

March 22, 2024 • 2 min read

Job growth was slow in February, with the Grand Canyon state posting a gain of just 2,200 jobs (+0.07%), but on a lagging year-over-year basis, growth remains stronger at 2.1%.

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Tags: Arizona Jobs, Employment

Housing Affordability in Arizona: Quarter 1 2024 Update

March 19, 2024 • 8 min read

At 102.15 (-3.5% since October 2023), the homebuyers ‘Misery Index’ remains at all-high time highs – despite falling about 10% last year, the Index is being held aloft by persistently high prices. For context, the long-run average of the Index is set to zero, and it peaked at 54.05 prior to the Great Recession.

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Tags: Housing affordability, Housing Shortage, Misery Index

Inflation in Arizona March 2024 Update

March 12, 2024 • 3 min read

Inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for the Phoenix metro area continued its decline in February, falling from a rate of 2.7% year-over-year in December to 2.2% in February – the lowest inflation rate since February of 2021.

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Tags: Arizona Prices, CPI, Inflation, Phoenix metro area

Arizona Jobs and Labor Force Update March 2024

March 11, 2024 • 3 min read

Arizona gained 10,900 nonfarm jobs in January (+0.34%) – the 10th-fastest month-over-month employment growth rate among all states.

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Homelessness Spending Tops $1 Billion in Arizona

February 27, 2024 • 25 min read

PDF| SYNOPSIS Jim Kolbe Free Enterprise Fellowship Brandon Bloch is CSI Arizona’s Jim Kolbe Free Enterprise Junior Fellow. He graduated Summa Cum Laude with a B.A. in Political Science from Arizona State University. He has interned in a U.S. Congressional District Office performing constituent services. He has also acted as a junior fellow for an […]

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Tags: Free enterprise, Homeless Nonprofit, Homelessness, Housing Shelter, Jim Kolbe Fellowship

Arizona’s 2023 Economic Performance Index

February 22, 2024 • 10 min read

Arizona has grown rapidly in the past 10 years – household incomes are more than 50% higher today than they were in 2011, and the percentage of people in poverty is down 7 percentage points to 12.5%.

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Tags: Arizona, arizona economy, economic report