Another "Oklahoma's Number One" Thread--Deficit

[guido911]

Oklahoma apparently has the largest state budget deficit in the country. 

http://www.newsok.com/oklahomas-budget-has-countrys-biggest-deficit/article/3426247

I'll be the first to blame Bush.

[Red Arrow]

We're finally NUMBER ONE at something!

[guido911]

We're finally NUMBER ONE at something!

Yep. We worked hard this year, sacrificed much, but it paid off.

[shadows]

The winds of change are preceding the storm.  It took 4 years in 1933 for the blunt of the storm to be felt. In the 30' the stimulus money was given to the unemployed by "made work" job creations while this time it is passed out to established  corporations to trickle down to the unemployed.  The CEO's are depositing it in off shore investment.  In the balance of trade the only thing we have left is the land, buildings and industries which foreign investors, using the devaluating dollar are buying which allows them to immigrate their employees.  Even the jobs of the Grapes of Wrath are filled. 

[waterboy]

Yeah, we're pretty well screwed. Might as well buy up all the Rosetta Stone you can and start learning Chinese and Spanish.

Why would we blame Bush and the boys? They were only in control of the executive office for 8 years of the last decade and legislatively half of the previous decade. No use looking back though. Certainly not if you voted for them.

amend: it just occurred to me that I might have been too sarcastic. Frankly, we've been headed down this path a long time. Both the country, the state and the city. It had to end up in disaster when your state legislators decide to return tax funds during good times instead of building up reserves and funding previously deferred infrastructure maintenance. The tax returns were pitifully small but got them all re-elected since Okies think all taxes are the work of the devil. Now we're stuck with a declining quality of life, huge debt and a depressed populace.

For what its worth, I feel optimistic that we will pull out of this faster than you might think. And, seriously, I don't blame the Bush-meister. He was just one of many players who contributed.

[guido911]

Why would we blame Bush and the boys? They were only in control of the executive office for 8 years of the last decade and legislatively half of the previous decade. No use looking back though. Certainly not if you voted for them.

What did Bush and the boys do to increase Oklahoma's deficit to the highest level in the country? You don't think that the Oklahoma's dem controlled legislature (80 years in the house and how long in the senate?) and dem governor had anything to do with it?  Nah, because your post makes no mention of their party identity.

I do not understand your beef about returning tax funds "during the good times"? You sound as if the state government should just keep money that does not belong to the them (as if it ever did to begin with) when its not needed, instead of letting people who earned the money and that rightfully belongs to them keep it, is some stupid mistake. Also, I did not know our state government was in the business of forcing tax payers to fund an additional rainy day account.

[nathanm]

forcing tax payers to fund an additional rainy day account.

Not having a rainy day account is even more stupid on a governmental level than a personal or corporate level.

I can't believe that you argue with a straight face that government should have no reserves to see its operations through a year or two's recession without having to exacerbate the problem by raising taxes or cutting services/jobs. Said reserves also allow for a more orderly transition to a lower level of service should the revenue decrease continue indefinitely.

It sure feels good to get a check from the government, though! Sort of like it feels good to blow your savings on a vacation or whatever. Kinda sucks when it turns out you needed the money after all.

You complain about government being incompetent and irresponsible, but you apparently don't want it to be competent and responsible, either.

[rhymnrzn]

I will gladly donate my change bucket to this cause.

[waterboy]

Not having a rainy day account is even more stupid on a governmental level than a personal or corporate level.

I can't believe that you argue with a straight face that government should have no reserves to see its operations through a year or two's recession without having to exacerbate the problem by raising taxes or cutting services/jobs. Said reserves also allow for a more orderly transition to a lower level of service should the revenue decrease continue indefinitely.

It sure feels good to get a check from the government, though! Sort of like it feels good to blow your savings on a vacation or whatever. Kinda sucks when it turns out you needed the money after all.

You complain about government being incompetent and irresponsible, but you apparently don't want it to be competent and responsible, either.

Couldn't have said it better Nathan. Everyone is so insistent that government be run like a business. Show me any successful business that doesn't keep a safety stock, a reserve built up during good times to weather the downturns. These have been irresponsible, selfish, shortsighted legislators.

Guido, your partisan rant is without substance. Most Dems in OK would be Repubs ANYWHERE else. Most of the candidates are registered that way cause so many Okie voters are registered that way-voters who haven't voted for a Democratic senator, congressman or president since '65. There is no doubt we're one of the reddest of the red states. OK is divided up by rural vs city issues, not partisanship.

[Red Arrow]

Most of the candidates are registered that way cause so many Okie voters are registered that way-voters who haven't voted for a Democratic senator, congressman or president since '65.

Jim Jones and Mike Synar were pretty well supported along party lines.  Gerrymandered districts kept Jim Jones in office long past what should have been his "retirement".  I think it was illegal to vote Republican in Little Dixie until recently. You certainly took your life in your own hands if you did.  I think even I voted for David Boren for Senator, so that has to have been since 1971.  Your premise is probably correct but not as early as the 60s, more like late 80s to 90s. More in line time wise with the Democratic party's diversion farther left at the national level.

[rwarn17588]

Not having a rainy day account is even more stupid on a governmental level than a personal or corporate level.

Agreed. If you have the capability, why is it bad for an individual or business to stash away money so they can ride out unexpected hard times? That's just common sense.

I, for one, am very glad the state has a rainy-day fund.

[waterboy]

Jim Jones and Mike Synar were pretty well supported along party lines.  Gerrymandered districts kept Jim Jones in office long past what should have been his "retirement".  I think it was illegal to vote Republican in Little Dixie until recently. You certainly took your life in your own hands if you did.  I think even I voted for David Boren for Senator, so that has to have been since 1971.  Your premise is probably correct but not as early as the 60s, more like late 80s to 90s. More in line time wise with the Democratic party's diversion farther left at the national level.

Its a perspective thing. People around here thought that the Democratic party started going leftward when they embraced the Civil Rights Act of 1965 and thereby blew off the South, (including OK). From my perspective, it was the Republican party that lurched hard right during the 80's-90's when they embraced Reagan, Bush etc. Such a hard jolt that even Goldwater had difficulty with the party direction. I had been a moderate Democrat and suddenly was being called a liberal.

The registrations are misleading. Everyone knows someone who's still registered as a Dem after 40 years because "their parents were", or "they were only 18 and didn't know better" or "they survived the depression and vowed never to vote republican again". With little exception (Synar, Jones, Boren) our senators and congressmen have been universally conservative, regardless of party affiliation, throughout my lifetime here. For every Boren there are several Nickolls', Inhofes', Coburns', Sullivans'.

I still believe that until recently, (the emergence of Sally the anti-gay crusader, HB1804, 10 commandments on public property etc.) the defining character of state and local politics in OK is the wildly divergent interests of rural vs city (in our area it permutates-big city vs suburban cities). Rural almost always wins in states like ours. That is why we keep getting Dem governors. They are perceived as acceptable to rural interests because they work hard to represent them and their Dem affiliation is conservative and palatable. Remember the surprising loss of the very popular, likeable conservative Steve Largent on a statewide level? The only folks surprised were from partisan oriented Tulsa. Around the rest of the state he was perceived as a city kid from Tulsa who bolted for an even bigger city....ON THE LEFT COAST! A modern day carpet bagger. It was compounded by the fact that the Southern half of OK just doesn't care for the NorthEast corner of the state and vice versa.

[Red Arrow]

I don't know how to do it but the Republican party needs to shed the likes of Sally Kern and her type.  I can and have voted for some Democrat candidates but I cannot buy into the Democratic party in general.  As we well know, in order to have any real say in the candidates presented for the general elections, you have to be either D or R to vote in primary elections. (The subject of many threads before this.)  Isn't politics wonderful?

[nathanm]

Its a perspective thing. People around here thought that the Democratic party started going leftward when they embraced the Civil Rights Act of 1965 and thereby blew off the South, (including OK). From my perspective, it was the Republican party that lurched hard right during the 80's-90's when they embraced Reagan, Bush etc. Such a hard jolt that even Goldwater had difficulty with the party direction. I had been a moderate Democrat and suddenly was being called a liberal.

The Overton window is real, and the proof is the modern-day conception of the Democrats as being largely liberal, when in substance they are exactly the same as Republicans on all but a few peripheral social issues.

The Republicans (socially at first, and in more recent years economically) moved so far to the right so quickly that it changed people's perception of the Democrats.

As far as the people actually in office at a national level, we don't really have a left and right now, we have "slightly more corporatist" and "slightly less corporatist." The social issues are just window dressing.

And when I say that I'm not saying corporations in general are a bad thing, although they (like the people that run them) tend to move in that direction in absence of rules, I'm just saying that the corporate form has been elevated to a status of religion amongst a large number of our fellow countrymen, and it shows in the ever-relaxing regulations and the return to near monopolies in many markets. The pendulum has once again swung too far, IMO.

And FWIW, in my opinion the whole "run government like a business" meme is incredibly misguided. Government is not a business and should not be a business. Its purpose is not to make a profit, nor should it have the short term horizon most businesses do. Government's focus should be on where we want to be three to six years from now, not three to six months from now. They're just completely incompatible philosophies, although that could be again due to the movement of the Overton window. 40 years ago business was run with an eye to the longer term, and the whole idea of running government like a business made a certain amount of sense. Today, with the focus solely on stock price and this quarter's earnings, the two should not be married.

[Red Arrow]

...nor should it have the short term horizon most businesses do.

That's one of the problems with business today, they have no long term plans to survive. Everything is geared around short term profit.  It's OK to sell off part of your infrastructure today to maximize this year's profit.  Let someone else worry about the fact that in five years the company will wish they hadn't sold it. (Taken from an actual situation that happened many years ago.)

I agree that government is not a business in the sense of making a profit. Where would the profits be distributed?  There are obvious government duties like national defense.  Much beyond that and we start going our separate ways.