Remember just a few weeks ago, when the Republican leadership in Madison was touting their acumen in recovering the Wisconsin economy and a resulting projected $800 million surplus in the coming budget? And after putting the required $200 million or whatever into the rainy day fund they needed to cut taxes to give it back to the ‘people’? And the governor disagreed and wanted to put it into public education instead? The public education that the FitzWalkerstan acolytes gutted and then partially restored before declaring themselves the protectors of public education?
And the GOP passed their bill and the governor vetoed it and the last word was the grand surplus would just roll into the treasury.
Although I’d support more education dollars, I don’t understand how we can spend a ‘projected surplus’. Spending projections doesn’t seem particularly fiscally responsible to me.
Well it’s a good thing that we didn’t…because it looks like there isn’t going to be one and if we are lucky the existing rainy day fund will survive the economic contraction coming our way from this pandemic.
No surplus? Nope! All of those closed bars, restaurants, hotels, theaters, tourist traps, and non-essential businesses aren’t collecting and forwarding sales taxes to Madison.
The 100,000 or so Wisconsinites who have been laid off or furloughed so far aren’t paying state income taxes either.
If it weren’t for the stubborn partisans in Madison we’d currently be spending money that we aren’t going to have. And by the way, if this gets really bad and we need to borrow…how the hell does that work under the balanced budget amendment?
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