Research Library

Australia’s domestic natural gas price caps are poor policy, writes nonresident scholar Kelly Neill. A better idea is a tax enabling the Australian government to share resource profits and losses with the gas industry.

Visiting scholar Osamah Alsayegh explores the water and energy challenges of GCC states and offers three key policy recommendations that could help to build the region’s resilience and sustainability.

Although President Joe Biden campaigned on a promise of ending Title 42 — a contentious border policy enacted by former President Donald Trump and used to expel asylum seekers — his administration has actually expanded its use, writes Kelsey Norman, the director of the Women’s Rights, Human Rights and Refugees Program at the Baker Institute. In this policy brief, she explores Biden’s recent changes to migration policy and proposes a better way to help those seeking asylum.

Expanding current non-immigrant work permit categories through minimal adjustments is a way to move forward on immigration reform — one that recognizes the undocumented community for its valuable contributions, writes expert Catherine Glazer in a new policy brief for the Center for the United States and Mexico.

“Charles Duncan represented the very best of his country, his state and his hometown. A native son of Houston, he was a no-nonsense corporate leader and Secretary of Energy for the United States who diligently maintained a laser-like focus on getting things done. Although his career took him around the world, Charles never lost his love for Houston, where he played a critical role as chairman of the Board of Rice University in the creation of the Baker Institute for Public Policy on that campus. My wife Susan and I will greatly miss him, and we send our deepest sympathy to his entire family.”

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s 2018 educational counter-reform could be hurting Mexico’s future productivity and economic growth, writes expert Jesús Antonio López Cabrera in a new policy brief.

The Baker Institute for Public Policy mourns the loss of Stephen Chazen, a devoted and visionary member of its Board of Advisors

“A beautiful and bright light of honor, thoughtfulness and elegance went out today with the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, whose 70-year reign was a beacon for her countrymen as well as those in the West who admired her enduring spirit.”

Stem cells have two unique properties that make them an appealing therapeutic tool for regenerative medicine: they can grow indefinitely and can differentiate into a wide variety of cell types, including those that form blood, bones, lungs, skin, and the brain.

“History will remember Mikhail Gorbachev as a giant who steered his great nation toward democracy. He played the critical role in a peaceful conclusion of the Cold War by his decision against using force to hold the empire together. I found him to be an honest broker and could count on his word despite domestic pressure in Moscow. The free world misses him greatly.”