Piggybacking Chris' take on this N&O article, I must wonder why we only see such major headlines when the state is proposing budget "cuts."
Why not the same focus when the budget was growing at an obviously overaggressive pace? After all, its the ratcheting up of spending commitments during flush times that become unsustainable when revenue slows during a recession.
Imagine the following article appearing in the N&O during budget negotiations in one of the flush years when budget writers were awash in cash:
N.C. House eyes stark unsustainable spending cuts increases
Coming in 2009-10 2007-08: cuts spending hikes 'like nobody has ever
seen'
that would slash dramatically increase state spending and reverberate in schools, institutions and
communities across North Carolina.
The House proposal, which is not finished and could still change, would
balance spend a $4.2 $1.4 billion shortfall surplus almost entirely, through spending cuts while setting aside virtually nothing for a rainy day.
Education spending would be cut increased 12 15 percent from this year, meaning that
thousands of teachers, would either be laid off or not hired before school begins
next year. non-classroom personnel and administrators would be added; along with millions being spent on new, unproven programs. Funding for unnecessary university centers, programs and initiatives across the
state would be slashed added. No mention has been made about establishing an "education trust fund" to place extra money in now in order to avoid 'cuts' in the next budget deficit.
Thousands of state jobs would be eliminated tacked on an already bloated state bureaucracy, committing the state to long-term financing obligations of employee salaries, health care, pensions and retirement health benefits the state will not be able to afford. including 1,000 positions out of
21,000 at the state agency that runs prisons. Dozens of nonprofit agencies that should rely on voluntary contributions rather than coerced tax dollars would
lose see spikes in state funding. Poor Middle-class children would have less more access to taxpayer-funded health care.
Every category of state government would be cut increased, said Rep. Mickey Michaux, a
Durham Democrat and the senior budget writer in the House.
But House leaders are not proposing — not yet, at least — to raise lower taxes.
"You're looking at a bad situation. People are going to be hurt when these spending hikes become unsustainable in the next recession" Michaux
said. "It's got cuts pork spending and handouts to special interests in it like nobody has ever seen before."
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