TIME WAS, Massachusetts seemed to undergo alternating periods of fiscal famine and feast. The economy would slump, revenues would tail off, and state government would struggle through a couple of lean years. That often meant budget reductions, and sometimes spelled tax hikes.
But when recovery came, it was generally a strong one. Then revenues would come flowing in again.
Comments
The problem is that what passes for cost cutting is usually cost shifting. Ultimately whatever is not paid for is passed down to the people who can least afford it. The right drawing board to fix our fiscal problems is yet to be put in play. However it should have been learned what the shortfalls are in lean times so that a stronger rainy day fund can even things out.
What do you expect when Deval Patrick makes us a magnet for illegal immigrants including Obama's deadbeat relatives ?
Scot I hear you about replacing the functions of state government with private contacting but you seem to be mouthing right-wing talking points this morning. Where are the specifics man? What services specifically are you talking about replacing? And on what precedent are you basing your assumption that money saved would -I'm paraphrasing- "go to other good uses" you know how this works. For low skilled state jobs the biggest reduction in cost that comes with privatization is a reduction in the security that comes from paying for health care and retirement. So the state pays a little (or a lot less) in the short run and ends up responsible later on and the other end when people fall back on the state. What programs are you talking about specifically?
I'd like to propose one specific service to be replaced in Massachusetts: the continued use of police officers on details in which they guard potholes and closed (literally, barricaded!) streets. Whether or not this will amount to a signficant amount of money saved is perhaps debatable. But accomplishing this will, I promise, greatly increase the public's confidence that the quest for public savings in this state is truly being taken seriously. The fact that Governor Patrick never accomplished this continues to be the bellwether of my perspective on why I think he's largely inept as a leader and administrator.
Thanks Singlevoice. That's a good one. Scot?
another benfit of having private firms perform the services is they will probably be able to hire, incresaing the tax base
Well, some of that hiring will be countered by the layoff of corresponding state employees. Even if some staties are hired by private sector companies, the net in tax revenues would be close to nil.
So the state, after struggling to get everyone health insurance, is now going to remove health insurance for it's employees? The T and legislature ripped up retirees contracts a few years ago, which in my mind was a disgrace, particularly for existing retirees who may have seen twenty years go by since they worked last and then faced with substantial health costs. Only the public sector can have a signed agreement to plan with and then have it thrown out by the legislature. Where are we going with all this? To China, India? People are currently realizing the down side of outsourcing so now we're going to re-discover it? We had the battle over organized labor long ago, but there is always someone else, usually historically ignorant, looking to re-invent the wheel and do it all over again. Privitization battles have been fought before also, bvgecause of people entertaining the illusion that honest, economic and competent people are waiting in line to provide excellent service to the state. If you do your homework, you find out its all been done before. The T was privitized many years ago for a time and an old timer told me it was cheaper to take a cab because of it. Also, look at the biggest loss sustained by the T, the recent forging of charlie cards costing millions. Who was responsible? The vaunted private contractor.
We often hear of privatizing certain functions of the public sector. Yet each time I have seen this occure the public has never saved any money it in fact has always been more expensive. Oddly it seems that a "for-profit" orgainzation ends up costing more than a "non-profit" whether it is governmental or a real non-profit. The other interesting thing is every time I've run into this change of service providers, the private sector service is always lacking and under duress always failing. Kind of like those "competing" electric companies that can't seem to operate in snowstorms, snowstorms that when I was a kid the "public utilitiy" didn't seem to have much problem. Probably has something to do with that "profit" thing and that no rreal competition thing.