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Greg Johnson

Greg Johnson writes with a worldview shaped by an Appalachian heritage, a global perspective from ministry work in Russia, Kenya and the Caribbean, an eye on economics from years in the financial services industry and a foundation in his faith.



  • Greg Johnson: Rogero's hybrid pension plan fails Published 6/22/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 30 comments

    President Barack Obama's consigliere, David Axelrod, tried to explain away Republican Gov. Scott Walker's big win in the Wisconsin recall election, a recall sought by public employee unions when Walker made good on campaign promises to right-size public employee benefits.

  • Greg Johnson: No turning back on teacher evaluation reform Published 6/15/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 29 comments

    The most important sentence in a report on Tennessee's new teacher evaluation process is easy to miss. With media reports focused on shortcomings and the kumbaya call for collaboration, teachers, principals, administrators, legislators and parents shouldn't have to search so ...

  • Greg Johnson: Presidential choice is businessman or social worker Published 6/10/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 6 comments

    Tell the truth: If you owned an enterprise that once was the envy of the world, but that enterprise was now limping along, growing far below potential, was running unimaginable deficits year after year, was staggering under enormous and ever-increasing ...

  • Greg Johnson: City didn't explore all its pension options Published 6/8/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 23 comments

    Will Knoxville voters go the way of San Jose? Or, unlike taxpayers in northern California, will Knoxvillians meekly accept mild pension modifications that will leave taxpayers guaranteeing most of the retirement income for city workers?

  • Greg Johnson: Hybrid pension plan no real change Published 6/1/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 9 comments

    The city of Knoxville's work to find a solution for its ever-increasing pension plan obligations may have been exhausting, but it was far from exhaustive. In fact, the "Hybrid Max Plan" promoted by Mayor Madeline Rogero, which she claims combines ...

  • Greg Johnson: Reality bites into city pension plan Published 5/25/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 10 comments

    Hamstrung by state law and a Tennessee Supreme Court ruling, Knoxville is stuck with inexorably greater pension obligations for decades. The city owes an estimated $14 million in the 2012-2013 fiscal year, and annual contributions could grow to $30 million ...

  • Greg Johnson: Shore up finances of Import-Export Bank Published 5/18/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 4 comments

    Massachusetts Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren, in the aftermath of a $2 billion trading loss, has called on JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon to step down from the New York Federal Reserve Board. Warren, architect of the completely unaccountable ...

  • Greg Johnson: Dutch tulip bubble teaches lessons for modern times Published 5/13/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 1 comment

    AALSMEER, Netherlands — Behind a bank of computer monitors, traders sit quietly, headsets in place, fingertips poised, eyes scanning their screens for opportunity. The giant "clock" on the wall displays prices and pertinent information. For this extravagant commodity, one trader ...

  • Greg Johnson: European votes don't discredit austerity Published 5/11/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 73 comments

    THE HAGUE, Netherlands — The American Book Center near the Binnenhof, Holland's house of government, shows the seriousness of this town of 500,000. Foreign policy journals in the front window beckon politicos and diplomats. A book on the Nuremburg trials ...

  • Greg Johnson: Return on investment key to school funding fight Published 5/4/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 18 comments

    As the funding fight for Knox County's schools moves toward Round 3, perhaps it is time to pause. Superintendent James McIntyre won Round 1, gaining approval of his proposed $35 million increase for the school system's general fund from the ...

  • Greg Johnson: Time to end insanity of entitlements Published 4/27/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 138 comments

    We've made promises we can't keep. From the city of Knoxville's pension plan to Knox County's Uniformed Officers Pension Plan to Social Security, we are awash in an ocean of obligations that will eventually overwhelm us. Taxpayers will drown as ...

  • Greg Johnson: Knoxville Mayor Madeline Rogero pushes ideology over pragmatism Published 4/20/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 34 comments

    Whether on the stump or on official speech duty, President George W. Bush used a standard shtick to remind the gathered of the eternal axiom that all politics is local. After greeting the assembled poobahs and potentates, Bush acknowledged the ...

  • Greg Johnson: Leadership lacking at leadership forum Published 4/13/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 11 comments

    Perhaps understating is acceptable at the Tennessee Valley Authority. At a "family meeting" last week to announce cost overruns and delays in completion of a second reactor at TVA's Watts Bar Nuclear Plant, President and CEO Tom Kilgore, who will ...

  • Greg Johnson: Pilgrimage best made in the company of others Published 4/8/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 9 comments

    Somewhere between Samos and Sarria, along the lonely pilgrim's path to Santiago de Compostela, the road grew monotonous, the day hot, still and dry. At an earlier fork, my son, Reed, and I decided to walk a longer way on ...

  • Greg Johnson: State worker rules to shift for the better Published 4/6/2012 at 4:00 a.m. 40 comments

    Barring an unforeseen undoing in the Legislature, Gov. Bill Haslam is on the verge of negotiating a seismic shift in state employment policy. This week, the Tennessee State Employees Association agreed to back Haslam's Tennessee Excellence, Accountability and Management Act ...

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