Thursday, January 29, 2009

Arnold Bucks


What happens when California starts paying tax refunds with IOU's - see here.

Thanks to Mock, Paper, Scissors for pointing this one out.

4 comments:

K T Cat said...

How do you figure it's the fault of the Republicans? The legislature makes the budget and it's completely dominated by Democrats. CA is feeling the pain of decades of bloating the budget with handouts.

Kelly the little black dog said...

Arnold wants the credit - so now he gets the blame. And actually it isn't the legislature that created the current problem, its California's initiative system that constrains 75% of the budget.

K T Cat said...

I guess I don't understand what the Democrats' perfect world in California looks like. Businesses are fleeing the state en masse already because of a hostile regulatory and tax situation.

As for the initiative system, you can thank the Teachers' Union for a great deal of the problem as budget constraints are tied mostly to edumacation.

Having said all that, I have to admit a high level of ignorance. Outside of jacking up my exemptions to prevent them from getting my money ahead of time, I haven't worried about it.

Malacandra said...

KT Cat -How do you blame it on Republicans? It's easy. First of all, California requires a 2/3 vote to pass any budget. This means that a minority of either house of the legislature can block it. And that's precisely what they do. The California GOP has been holding the budget hostage, and while the Democrats have conceded cuts, many, many times... the GOP has conceded nothing. Nada. They put their pledge to Grover Norquist to never, ever raise taxes above their obligations to their constituents.

In addition, the Governator won't sign a budget unless it includes non-budgetary measures that gut environmental regulations.

Finally, we'd be in much less of a mess if Arnold hadn't slashed vehicle license fees which put California an additional 3 billion in the red every year since he did so.