Thursday, December 11, 2008

The country is doing bad as a whole, but California is doing the worst

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28179777/

"California leads the nation in the sheer size of its budget gap, according to the most recent survey of states by the National Conference of State Legislatures. "

Yep, California budget deficit will reach 41.8 billion dollars by 2010 based on current estimates and Arnold Schwarzenegger himself says that the state is heading toward "a financial Armeggedon". One of the reasons for this would be about how California passes budgets and deals with taxes. Calironia requires "two-thirds majorities to pass a budget" and is "one of seven states that require two-thirds of the votes to pass taxes."

Therefore, Republicans have a much greater power and they have remained stalwart in refusing to raise taxes while they themselves have yet to present their own plan on how to fix the situation.

I am not surprised though that California is in such a pickle but really, that whole things about passing a budget and taxes seems ineffective. That needs to be fixed in all seriousness because whenever there is a crisus (like now), people always disagree on how to fix it so setting such a high requirement doesn't help. I wonder how this will affect colleges and other vital programs though and whether or not they will get cut more to try and fix the budget.

6 comments:

Norman Eng said...

Well, California has been facing an enormous financial problem with the budgets, espeically regarding with taxes and school academic needs. And due to this deficit, we're going to be constantly facing this issue until we find a cure, especially for our Revenue and Production budgets.

sam & jo said...

Yeah, California is pretty bad financially. The failing economy in California is evident in the whole thing with the CSU admissions and the budget cuts. CSU has restricted admissions because of budget cuts. Students can only apply locally or else applying elsewhere will be really hard to get in. The economy has really taken toll on California.

Alex Voto said...

Here's an idea that might, just might help us out.

STOP SPENDING!

I am sick of people who complain about how poorly our schools are funded, then say they would vote yes on propositions to make a high speed transit system from LA to San Francisco because it sounds "cool". We need to prioritize, stop spending on ridiculous luxuries, and begin looking at the deficit and where our funds should really be spent.

According to Yahoo news, the California budget deficit is expected to reach 41.8 billion by 2010. Im speechless.

We all know the drill, California spends on flawed projects, schools get hit hard, and the students suffer. This will undoubtedly lead to more uneducated kids and less opportunities for advancement. Just what our economy needs.

To sum up the educational part of this crisis, Californians become stupid because they spend, and they spend because they are stupid.

If only there were a way for us to get information for voting quickly, from the comfort of our own home. Oh yeah, it's called the internet.

Unknown said...

Doesn't spending get the economy up and running again? Doesn't the consumer buying the project make everything work? I might be wrong but that is what I thought. I am just hoping for the best for California and I am not totally going to believe in the predicted budget outcomes because then again people predicted gas prices to be up to six dollars by the end of this year. Things happen and things change and I am hoping something changes for the better and I am open to any suggestions on how to help control the budget crisis.

Clayton K. said...

I don't pay attention to him very much, but I wouldn't call Arnold a very good governor, and it looks like this article only supports that.

My mom - who is a veterinarian - said that she got a letter from Arnold saying that all veterinary services will be taxed 6%. So now it looks like Arnold is scrambling to get the money to be able to close the budget gap.

Oliver Draper said...

We definitely have a budget problem here in CA. I'm not sure we're doing the worst, but there are issues that need attention. The schools in particular need money, and we have tax problems, too. Hopefully President Obama will help us out. And even if he doesn't, we just need to stop spending. We have too many unneeded expenditures--pork and the like.