Thread: California Budget: Unadulterated washout for working people

The California Budget: Unadulterated washout for working people


by Prof. Ann Robertson
Global Research, February 25, 2009


On February 19, the California legislature, after weeks of wrangling, passed a special budget to address the historically high $42 billion deficit. It represents an unadulterated washout for working people who are attacked on almost every front by the Democratic Party, which controls a broad majority in the legislature.

For example, public education’s $58 billion budget for K-12 (kindergarten through high school) will be slashed by $8.4 billion, even though California currently allocates less money than almost all other states to education. The state college and university systems will be cut $163 million and $115 million respectively, resulting in many faculty and staff layoffs, despite the fact that both systems are currently turning away qualified students, due to lack of funding. Meanwhile, student tuition will be raised.

Regressive taxes will be imposed, meaning that they will represent a heavier burden on working people and the poor than on the rich, including a sales tax increase from 8.5 to 9.5 percent and a vehicle license fee increase.

But while paying more, working people will receive considerably less from the state. Public transportation will be slashed while health and human services will be gouged by a $1.6 billion cut. And state employees will continue to be forced to take two days off per month, with no pay, of course.

But what went unreported by The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle is that those on the other side of the class ledger – the corporations – enjoyed a startlingly different fate. According to the Los Angeles Times, “About $1 billion in corporate tax breaks – directed mostly at multi-state and multinational companies – is tucked into the proposal.â€

Mexifornia needs to stop being a sanctuary state. That would solve a lot of their budget shortfalls.

I heard that California was considering giving the Feds notice of States Rights violations. If that is true, and they suceed from the Union and end up in Mexico's greedy hands, it will only be a matter of time, when the illegals head to other states willing to give them the full array of "illegals benefits packages". They know, cheap Mexico wil give them squat.