California's budget still sucking wind (Sacramento: unemployment rate, transfer, income)

[RedJacket]

What's more dysfunctional? California's state government or the Kardashian family?

[yeahthatguy]

Originally Posted by Dunbar42

Right, but that's a result of the progressive income tax. The biggest tax payers tend to cluster in just a dozen or so states. That means a disproportionate amount of income is sent to DC from a relatively small number of states. As someone else pointed out here, it seems odd for democrats to complain about this phenomenon as it's no different than other forms of income redistribution by the federal government. Can you imagine what democrats would say if someone in Newport Beach complained about their tax money being used to build a school in Compton?



The Tax Foundation - Why Do Some States Feast on Federal Spending, Not Others?

[yeahthatguy]

Originally Posted by user_id

The states with the strongest economies have the largest number of high income folks so what you're really going about is economic strength.

Regardless, moving federal dollars out of states with strong economies and using it to stimulate the economies in weaker economies is good policy. What isn't good policy is maintaining the same flow of funds when the donor state is having major problems. That would be like insisting a higher income individual continue to pay the same taxes even though his income has declined...

With that said, its absolutely annoying that the people that complain the most about welfare, liberals, etc are people that live in states that are receiving large amounts of welfare from the very people they are complaining about.

[Dunbar42]

LOL at both gifs

[Dunbar42]

Originally Posted by user_id

What isn't good policy is maintaining the same flow of funds when the donor state is having major problems. That would be like insisting a higher income individual continue to pay the same taxes even though his income has declined...

I don't see how the state of the economy has anything to do with it. In order to give to the high income states, they'd have to take from the "welfare queen" states. How is that fair to the lower income states? That seems like the same policy democrats so despise (i.e., balancing budgets on the back of the poor.)

[bradleyyo]

If our unemplyment is high, you can blame bankers, who won't give loans, even after WE bailed them out. You can blame greedy corporate CEOs who refuse to give jobs, because we have a Democratic president. Now, you want to hire one of those disgusting, greedy CEOs to be president. Corporations own and run this country and are turning our struggeling middle class into slaves, by paying low wages or simply hiring part time workers. Your enemies are not in The White House...your enemies are in boardrooms across this country and every country. Workers need to wake up.

[BlackShoe]

In breaking news Monday, the governor is trying to bully voters with an "or else" ultimatum. Either approve raising taxes or else. In examining Brown's threats, note that there is no mention of slashing the bloated bureaucracy of the public schools or curbing the power of the teachers unions, only slashing school funding. Also no intention of trimming state payrolls or enacting real pension reform. And finally, nothing at all about eliminating benefits for illegal aliens. Aid to the poor and elderly, most of whom are citizens and truly needy is being cut, while the illegals continue to enjoy the state's generous benefits.
www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_20623732/gov-jerry-brown-slashes-programs-poor-threatens-do

[EscapeCalifornia]

Originally Posted by Dunbar42

I don't see how the state of the economy has anything to do with it. In order to give to the high income states, they'd have to take from the "welfare queen" states. How is that fair to the lower income states? That seems like the same policy democrats so despise (i.e., balancing budgets on the back of the poor.)

And lets say the Feds lowered the income tax rate on California residents to the point where they collected the same amount of tax from California as was spent on Federal projects in California. How does that affect the state's budget, unless of course, the state raises taxes on its residents by the same amount?

[user_id]

Originally Posted by Dunbar42

I don't see how the state of the economy has anything to do with it. In order to give to the high income states, they'd have to take from the "welfare queen" states. How is that fair to the lower income states?

The state of the economy has everything to do with it. But the issue here isn't one of income, but rather economic activity. The donor states are facilitating job growth in the states receiving a net inflow of federal dollars, but this makes no sense if the donor states are creating jobs at a lower rate than the welfare states.

The federal government needs to adjust the flow of federal dollars to help stimulate state economies that are having trouble. But that isn't happening, why? Because this is being used as an opportunity to push the conservative agenda.

[user_id]

Originally Posted by EscapeCalifornia

And lets say the Feds lowered the income tax rate on California residents to the point where they collected the same amount of tax from California as was spent on Federal projects in California. How does that affect the state's budget, unless of course, the state raises taxes on its residents by the same amount?

This would result in a huge stimulus to the California economy which would result in higher tax revenue for the state....the budget issues would be resolved almost over night.

But this isn't the way to do it, the federal government needs to spend more federal dollars in California. Open some new military bases, fund research at California universities, etc.