NY's budget numbers are game-changers
State officials say New York's budget deficit is poised to mushroom to $45 billion by 2013. That means carving out $3.2 billion this year, and another $7 billion next year.
And things just continue to get worse from there. What's more, there's little likelihood of another Federal stimulus to bail us out.
What does this mean for New York and its people? It means we have a very short time to figure out what exactly we want state government to do for us.
The full a la carte menu of services we now enjoy? Forget it. That's all over. Every conceivable interest group will suffer.
Social contracts that seemed graven in stone will be torn up. Tiny rural school districts will vanish. Subsidies to small towns will dwindle.
Yes, some prisons will close. A whole lot of workers will be laid off.
The generous wages and benefits enjoyed by millions of government workers -- state and local -- will be squeezed painfully.
The real question is whether New York's political infrastructure has the muscle and flexibility to guide these changes, shaping them to minimize pain and disruption.
Will state employee unions bend? Will thousands of special interest groups acknowledge that the long gilded age is over? Will taxpayers pony up a little more?
No one solution will do it. No sacred cow will go unslaughtered. Politicians who promise otherwise? They're playing by the old rules.
But old habits die hard. I'm guessing that we'll make these big changes in the way that democracies often do, clumsily, as emergencies rise, as bills come due that we literally can't pay.
On the other hand, maybe we'll exceed expectations as a society. Maybe we'll reinvent ourselves, get leaner, make some smart choices.
What do you think? Business as usual? Or time to brace for real change?
posted by Brian Mann @ 10/30/2009 05:11:00 PM
9 Comments
9 Comments:
Perhpas we can hope the example of California coming before us will force un into action before so many of the things that went wrong out there end upo happening here.
What are they basing this projection on? I'm automatically suspicious when someone throws out such numbers without explaining how they came to that prediction. For that matter I'm suspicious of anyone who claims to know the future past a year and even that is dubious.
The NYC democrats who control the legislature are completely to blame. Silver has led the way in spend, spend, spend, tax, tax, tax, borrow, borrow, borrow. They increased spending this year. This state doesn't have a revenue problem rather it has a spending problem.
Under "liberal" Jon Corzine New Jersey's state budget is $1.8 billion less than it was 4 years ago. Also the NY budget is larger than California's despite the fact they have twice our population.
Paterson's proposed "cuts" are not actual reductions in spending rather they are reductions in the growth of spending. The first step to getting spending under control is for the media to inform the public that the proposed "cuts" which are sending special interests into hysteria are really reductions in the expected growth rate of spending.
Paterson (about the only politician in Albany with half a brain) needs to call the legislature into session and keep calling them into session until they cut spending. If necessary change the lock on the door of the Capital and lock it until they fix the problem.
I neglected to say how much the budget increased it went up 9%.
Unfortunately, the recent cuts that have been announced are just the beginning, and NNY will be hit disproportionately hard. We will not recognize the place in 3 or 4 years. And while we are all paying attention to this stuff, the 2 x4 across the back of the head will be higher priced or scarcer energy supplies. Blaming this or that group really misses the point. For years NYS was the Empire State--at the top of the heap. During that era we built infrastructure and institutions that have outstripped our ability to afford them. Also, while we may be a high tax state we are also a high service state--good education, decent roads. People like those services but don't want to pay for them.
It's about time people started to see this. We've spent and spent and spent. We've taxed and taxed and taxed. Now we have a State that punishes the successful, is an enemy of business, is awash in entitlement programs and special interest spending. With Cap and Trade coming life in the cooler regions will be even tougher. With talk of Gov't health care the tax burden will increase to unimaginable levels. With more demands for social assistance the tax burden will again raise.
The answer? A spending freeze, a line by line review of the budget by outside responsible parties, a complete house cleaning in Albany, an end to the war on business and industry, landowners and farmers.
As Margaret Thatcher said, "The problem with Socialism is sooner or later you run out of other peoples money to spend." We're in the same boat.
It may be true that Paterson is the only politician in Albany with "half a brain".
However, as a person who has been accused of having liberal tendencies, I believe that a governor with strong leadership skills will be needed to get us on the right fiscal tract. (Maybe Giuliani?)
No, not Giuliani. Not if you want budget cuts. Spending in NYC went way up under Rudy, and he championed things like billion dollar stadiums that don't actually serve a whole lot of people. He also gave a lot away to the cops and fire unions.
Of course, that's one reason NYC did so well in the 90s--big spending made it a more attractive place to live for rich people, drawing in lots of rich people and enhancing the tax base.
But if you're talking about making hard choices, forget Rudy. Dinkins made more hard choices on the budget, by far.
This is 7:29. high taxes wouldn't be so much a problem if we actually received decent services from the state. But as the Crown Point bridge closure demonstrates we haven't. European countries have high taxes but they receive excellent public services. NY is in a class by itself when it comes to wasting taxpayer dollars.
Gulianin isn't the answer. He'll be all about NYC and downstate and was a huge supporter of Bush which is a dealbreaker for me. We need an upstate governor. Or absent that Richard Ravitch, the lieutenant governor, might be a good choice.
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