October 29, 2026

Photo credit: Yulia Reznikov / Moment via Getty Images

Signed into law in 2021, California’s Medicaid reform package, CalAIM, sends Medicaid dollars to social programs for things like housing deposits, transitional rent payments, and “medically tailored meals.” Those meals include organic produce, salmon, and beef, delivered right to recipients’ homes—all for free.

Applying for CalAIM is easy. Applicants just need a Medi-Cal card and a qualifying medical condition, and food arrives for up to 12 weeks. After that, recipients can re-enroll. Between the food itself and the delivery, the program can cost taxpayers more than $1,500 across 24 weeks for a single recipient.

“California’s medically tailored meal and grocery offerings seem to have been inspired by the ‘Food Is Medicine’ movement,” Christopher Rufo and Maddie Rowley write. “Proponents argue that sending people state-funded health foods will reduce hospitalizations, ultimately saving taxpayers money.”

To be sure, companies are cashing in on the trend. California-based contractors like Project FoodBox and Project Open Hand have already raked in millions of Medicaid dollars. Middle-class families, meantime, are struggling to pay for groceries.

Read more.

Last week, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson unveiled a nearly $18 billion budget proposal. On his wish list: increasing the “cloud tax,” which taxes software subscriptions; a new head tax on employees; and raising taxes on package delivery, sports betting, and liquor. His most egregious proposal, Judge Glock argues, is issuing nearly $500 million in bonds to pay for settlements surrounding police misconduct. “In practice, this will leave Chicagoans to pay off Johnson’s civil-rights attorney allies, who often profit from these settlements,” Glock writes. “Such bonds are usually used for city improvements.”

Read more about the budget, Johnson’s tenure, and Chicago’s fiscal woes here.

Encouraged by polls showing skepticism about whether the wealthy are paying their fair share in taxes, a number of U.S. states are entertaining proposals that would enact a levy on assets—rather than just income.

Proposition 40 in California, for example, would impose a one-time 5 percent wealth tax on billionaires. Earlier this year, Minnesota’s ruling Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party introduced a bill that would impose a 1 percent annual tax on wealth above $10 million, while Illinois Democrats have pushed a “mark-to-market” tax that would require residents worth at least $1 billion to pay annual taxes on the appreciation of their assets. Democratic legislators in Maryland formulated a bill that would apply a progressive wealth tax on those with a net worth above $1 billion. And a bill in Washington State would impose a tax on “stocks, bonds and other intangible assets.”

“So far, the migration of wealth and people away from high-tax locales hasn’t tempered Democratic enthusiasm for hiking local taxes,” Steven Malanga writes. “Advocates note that wealth taxes would affect relatively few people. But only a small number of departures could significantly reduce expected revenues and remove substantial wealth from a state’s economy.”

Read more.