Oh, now this is interesting. If you follow this link from my last Howard Rich post, you get a bunch of other links, one of which explains something called TABOR, or the "Taxpayers Bill of Rights." It’s been the ruin of many a poor state, and God, I know, we’re one.
Does this seem familiar to you? I’ve written about it before, at least tangentially. You see, a modified version of the idea was the basis of the governor’s outrageous veto of the entire state budget earlier this year. I say "modified," but the fact is that both are based upon the ludicrous idea that you can have a formula that tells you in advance that the state budget should be no more than precisely a certain amount.
Of course, maybe this would save us money. We could replace the entire state Legislature with a cheap pocket calculator, seeing as how coming up with a budget is the biggest thing they do most years. It would mean doing away with that old-fashioned idea of representative democracy, but what the hey?
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TABOR would be great – bring it on!! Finally the little piggies would have to live within their means, just as the rest of us have to do.
Oh, by the way TABOR would not in any way “mean doing away with that old-fashioned idea of representative democracy”. All TABOR would do is set a quite reasonable spending limit but the little piggies in the legislature would still be free to allocate the available money however they see fit. Plenty of “representative democracy” left but finally there would be some restraint on how deep the piggies can reach into my pocket!
I don’t really have a dog in this hunt…but who paid for that site? Who wrote it? I see very little info on the “why”?
I should have thought u would be very careful before posting a link…do u know these people? Did I miss the info?
What little piggies, LexWolf? Who is it that you paranoids think is taking your money home with them and converting it to their personal use? That’s the way you act — as though someone is personally profiting, rather than putting the money to use in the service of South Carolina. You know, putting troopers on the road for a change, or fixing a few secondary roads for a change, or actually guarding our prisons… all things we can’t afford to do with the governor’s formula.
Why do you resent the cost of a civilized society? I’ve been listening to you people for decades, and I have yet to hear you say anything more rational or mature than what I’ve heard from my children when they were going through the terrible twos, or their second adolescence, the one in the teens.
You know, Me First and the Gimme-Gimmes.
The bizarre thing is that the ONLY way your hard-earned tax money would go to enrich other individuals would be if we went with the governor’s approach of farming out education, and prison management, and everything else to FOR-PROFIT entities in the private sector.
WHY can’t you see this? It’s soooo obvious.
I think Brad stumbled across some anti-school choice website, possible egged on by Laurin, and is now following all the links to the highly partisan/biased articles. Surely we can’t expect objectivity from a site called http://www.howierichexposed.com! Maybe Brad’s new goal in life is to be added to the local newspaper stories in the middle of the site?
Brad,
I would not paint with so broad a brush. Some of us may have similar conclusions as your target poster but for completely differing reasons.
From your post it is easy to see why you think so little of us that support Karen (and others)…you think we are all like “other people” you have listened to in the past.
Jumping to such conclusions is wrong You should know better than that. But knowing that you do makes it a lot easier for me to understand your writtings.
Respectfully,
Chris
Paranoids we are now, eh? Guess that beats being called jerk and jackass, but not by much. Whatever happened to that civility thing?
“You know, putting troopers on the road for a change, or fixing a few secondary roads for a change, or actually guarding our prisons… all things we can’t afford to do with the governor’s formula.”
Who sez? Surely you should be above trotting out ye olde Washington Monument strategy yet again! Surely even you can see that there is no reason why we have to cut any of those high priorities when there are so many lower priorities to be cut.
It’s high time that our little piggies set priorities just like the rest of us. When I make a little less money in a particular month, guess what happens? We cut out some of the nice-to-have things and maybe eat out only once a week instead of three times. Or we delay some expenses. If we get a windfall, like the humongous state revenue increases last year and this year, we don’t fall all over ourselves trying to figure out ways to spend every last cent, the way the little piggies did.
WHY can’t you see this? It’s soooo obvious.
"ChrisW" — You’re asking for strict attribution, and signing your request with a nickname and an initial?
Come on! I told you that I think two of them are from Ross Shealy (so does Laurin), and asked if any of you folk on the blogosphere know different. (In fact, Laurin reminds me that Ross owned up to being behind one of them in our paper a while back.
The other — I don’t know. It SAYS it’s from an outfit called the "Ballot Initiative Strategy Center," but THAT group’s Web site is about as forthcoming as SCRG’s, in terms of telling us who’s behind it.
Do you not trust the information? Tell you what — if you or anyone else find out that Howard Rich opposes TABOR, let me know, and I will whisk this thing right off the blog. Deal?
Not everyone is as up-front as I am, you know. Take a look over at "LexWolf," and you’ll see what I mean.
Brad,
Did not mean to be offensive…
EVERY web page should be signed, and should have the originators name and address. Period…otherwise it is just not trustworthy. And I mean every web site…
Otherwise, it is like unsigned legal opinions…worthless.
(U did not think I would let that softball pass, did u? haha)
“Not everyone is as up-front as I am, you know. Take a look over at “LexWolf,” and you’ll see what I mean.”
Now what is that supposed to mean? Is this yet another insult from you?
Lexie, you call others childish names and now whine about “insults”? You also complain about partisan sites yet you constantly post links to such unbiased gems as http://www.schoolchoice.com? Lame.
I would not paint with so broad a brush. – Chrisw
Please Lexie Junior. You refer to SC Schools being terrible and disparage “educrats”. Great example of hypocisy.
Lexie has found a brother in arms – same defenseless positions.
This Lex guy is one hardcore dude.
The limitation of government spending to population growth + inflation sounds like a great idea in theory, but in fact it’s flawed by design for several reasons.
First of all, inflation is measured using the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which is calculated according to what an “average” American buys each year.
Well, governments aren’t just paying a mortage and grocery and car bills. Governments are paying for things like healthcare, the cost of which rises more quickly over time than, say, the rising prices of groceries from year-to-year. Tethering state spending to a rate based on individual spending just doesn’t make sense.
And as to the population growth element in the equation, well, it doesn’t necessarily make sense either. Population growth is the overall population change from year-to-year. The figure doesn’t account for the changes in certain sectors of the population — groups with special needs that are more expensive, like senior citizens. Think about how the aging of the baby boomers is going to affect costs of operating Medicare and services for seniors.
The formula is arbitrary. I think a better place to start cleaning up government spending is to examine the way that the Ways and Means committee builds the budget — with committee members’ trading support for each other’s little pet projects. There ought to be more sunlight on the process, which should be concerned with the big stuff and not as much with securing a new firetruck for the small town of some influential legislator.
Brad, as I wrote on a post below, I think I speak for some of the more quiet ones in the land that I appreciate very much your bringing this to our attention, and Laurin’s comments as well. Just because some of us don’t comment doesn’t mean we don’t read and learn. Thanks.
Brad, “the paranoids”???? You really are starting to lose all objectivity. Inflation is rising 2% annually and we have the state budget up 22% and no one sees a conflict there, or if you do, you are paranoid. And Laurin, as usual, makes a great point, let’s have some sunshine on the way money is really spent in this state. So Leatherman got $7,000,000 for a Florence arts center, what did someone else get? Where in the heck is the State investigative arm? I know the editor staff cant do it but is anyone investigating anything? Take a look at the backroom dealings on where I-73 is routing, and through whose property, etc. That may be too harsh but it appears a lot of powder puff time is spent on featuring the State Fair while a lot of other things are ignored.
Dave, out of curiosity, where did you get the 22% number? Ravenel’s campaign commercial? The debate on state spending is so difficult to have because there are so many different ways to manipulate the numbers.
I had the hardest time knowing whether to believe Gov. Sanford when he said this last budget amounted to around 14% growth whereas Speaker Harrell said the number was more like 7%. Harrell’s number came from the Office of State Budget, which is technically an executive office but operates as a nonpartisan one.
As I understand it, the Governor’s office was comparing [2005 recurring spending] to [2006 recurring spending + 2006 nonrecurring spending]. By such a calculation, of course the 2006 was much higher. Harrell’s number compared [2005 recurring spending + 2005 nonrecurring spending] to [2006 recurring spending + 2006 nonrecurring spending].
Whatever the measure, apples need to be compared to apples, and I don’t think the governor’s office was doing that, and the Office of State Budget agreed.
With that said, I’m certainly not defending any state budget spending decisions in years past. As I wrote above, I think the process does need to be changed and more openly exposed, but I also think we need to be honest in our assessments of the way things operate now.
Laurin,
sure some things are higher or grow faster but other things are lower or grow slower, or even decline. It all comes out in the wash! The alternative is basically “anything goes” and that can’t be right.
I firmly believe that Population + Inflation is more than sufficient to meet our state’s real needs. You know, the things that are really necessary, not crap like the Florence Taj Mahal snagged by Leatherman and numerous other frivolous expenditures that these piggies would never even think about if they had to pay for them out of their own pockets.
As it is right now, it’s as if the piggies had a giant AMEX card with no limit, and quite predictably they are running wild, buying everything in sight. Then when an adult tells them no, they throw a hissy fit.
When we have a state government spending about $1,500 for every man, woman and child (that’s about $6,000 for a family of four) we are way beyond the point of real needs. It’s time the piggies get a credit limit just like the rest of us. P+I would be that limit. Bring it on!
Population plus inflation might sound great.
But it’s a simpletonian solution, in my opinion. What about the specific costs of government services. For example, what if general inflation stays about the same, but the price of fuel goes up .50? All those state troopers’ cars, all those grass mowers by the highway, all those corrections transport vehicles, all those trucks working on DOT road projects…..I think the public should think hard about that kind of scenario before going with something arbitrary.
Lexwolf,
I’m not even going to attempt to formulate a direct response to your rant about laundry and piggies and hissy fits. Articulate some reasonable arguments as to why population growth + inflation isn’t an arbitrary number, and then we’ll talk.
But I will suggest that you do some research on the effects of TABOR in Colorado, the first state to conduct an experment like this.
The citizens of Colorado voted to enact a TABOR constitutional amendment in 1992, and after over ten years of seeing budgets on education, health care, emergency services, and law enforcement gutted, citizens voted to rescind TABOR in 2005.
Under TABOR in CO, the state fell from 25th in the nation to 50th in the nation for the number of fully-vaccinated children. The state even had to suspend the requirement that children be fully-vaccinated to attend school because the state couldn’t pay for it.
CO saw a similar decline in the availability of prenatal care for women and children’s access to healthcare. In 2005 CO had the highest number of children without health insurance in the country. At the same time, CO citizens were getting checks in the mail for a couple-hundred dollars each. I certainly think that in the aggregate, its of greater societal benefit for 200,000 children to not be without health insurance than it is for taxpayers to each get a $200 annual check in the mail.
The spending cap of population growth + inflation really is the vehicle for Grover Norquist’s dream of shrinking government to the size that it can be drowned in the bathtub.
There are responsible ways to curb government spending while still investing in vital government services. TABOR isn’t it.
“For example, what if general inflation stays about the same, but the price of fuel goes up .50?”
Pssst…I’m gonna let you in on a secret: something like this just happened to the general population of this state over the past year or two. They might have grumbled about higher gas prices but they coped by adjusting their spending patterns. This is exactly what our little piggies need to do as well. If they need more money for A, B, and C, then by all means go for it by reducing X, Y, and Z.
The problem with TABOR in Colorado was not the P+I limit but rather that the law was poorly drawn. TABOR worked great all through the 1990s but when the Clinton bubble popped in 2000, Colorado under TABOR had to reduce its state spending to the sharply lower revenue stream. Unfortunately the TABOR law then applied the P+I percentage to the sharply lower tax revenue in 2000 and 2001 even though tax revenue quickly returned to its former level and more. A well-drawn TABOR initiative would define the baseline better (P+I+catchup from recessions) so that a temporary economic downturn doesn’t permanently depress state spending below its long term trend.
What are those “responsible ways to curb government spending while still investing in vital government services”? The past practices of our little piggies certainly aren’t it!
Gobs of outside money from banking and defense lobbies financing John Spratt doesn’t bother the obstructionist editors one bit.
Out-of-state lobbyists sending Jim Clyburn on dozens of junkets abroad is no problem for them, either.
SOCIALISM FOR THE RICH
“The rich have learned to adapt socialist policies to their own benefit. For example,
the city of Riviera Beach, Florida, is planning to demolish a working class
neighborhood under its power of eminent domain, in order to prepare the way for a
marina for yachts, luxury condominiums and an upscale shopping district. What will the
city of Riviera Beach get out of all this? More taxes from higher-income people,
enabling local politicians to spend more money on programs to attract votes. Meanwhile
the rich get rid of lower-income folks without having to pay them the value of their
homes and businesses that will be demolished. As in so many other cases, eminent domain
is Socialism for the rich.” – Thomas Sowell
For the full article, click here:
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2006/10/03/socialism_for_the_rich
I’ll stop complaining about my taxes when the government stops wasting it. Jim Clyburn’s bridge, Bernice Scott’s personal paving service, Glenn McConnell’s toy boat, massive duplication of effort at the higher ed level, higher ed costs increasing much faster than inflation, etc. etc. etc.
I’ll also stop complaining when we have an equitable tax system in place that uses the value of property to determine how much a taxpayer should pay for services. I pay three times the taxes that another homeowner who lives in a $100K house. I pay more to use the library, the schools, the rec department, the police and fire service. I pay more property taxes on one car than the other regardless of how many miles I drive. The property tax system is lunacy combined with bureacracy. I hope to see property taxes eliminated in my lifetime and will do everything I can to support politicians who share that belief.
An ideal tax system would be a flat income tax with minimal deductions, a sales tax with minimal exclusions (like newspapers and newspaper advertising, right?), use taxes on gasoline (high enough to replace the car property tax) and elimination of the car sales tax cap, much higher taxes on cigarettes, liquor, etc., and a real estate tax system based on dividing the costs of general services evenly across all homeowners.
A perfect example of the stupidity of South Carolina’s tax system is the 1 cent savings on sales tax that citizens over the age of 85 can request. I’d love to know which political moron felt that was necessary.
But the thing is, no politician would have the guts to eliminate it.
The simple fact is that government cannot continue to grow faster than the incomes of the people for very long. We are already at the point that taxpayer incomes cannot fund the spending, so accumulated savings and wealth is being liquidated to fund programs of dubvious value.
The smartest of the younger generation are leaving the state in droves, which keeps the average income low.
Lee, The State editorial group is one issue only, public education, so they really dont care what Spratt does or where he gets his money from. Plain and obvious. And Clyburn, he will never be criticized, that would be racist after all.
Avoiding criticism of Clyburn may be liberal racism at work. Maybe they are afraid. Maybe they don’t expect much of black politicians.
Politicians make many promises and manage to keep very few. But at least George W. Bush has kept one promise. In 2000 he promised he would not pursue a policy of “nation building”. And so far in Iraq and Afghanistan he’s kept his word. In fact he’s done a great job destroying both.
Given Clinton’s nation-destruction in Haiti, Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo and Macedonia, Democrats cheer every problem in Iraq.
The State editorial group is one issue only, public education, so they really dont care what Spratt does or where he gets his money from. – Dave
Brad’s
Oct 28 on State Super race
Oct 21 on Sanford and out of state money – Sanford made this an issue!
Oct 14 editorial was on Tommy Moore and the NAACP.
Oct 7, Vision vs no vision of governor candidates.
Scoppe’s Oct 31 article on indecency
Oct 25 on taxes, cutting and raising and misperceptions
Fitts Oct 19 article was on Graham
Bolton Oct 26 article on smoking
Oct 23 homeless
Dave you were right on the money with this “one issue – education editorial board”…except for the article on taxes, and smoking, and homeless, and Graham, and vision, NAACP and out of state lobbyists…
Nah, Brad and company endorse Democrats like 52% of the time? And Dave, aren’t you the one bragging about how open minded you are because you’ll stray from the GOP ONCE to vote for an independent?
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