New York State government has long been known for it fiscal follies in order to balance the budget. They have done almost everything except the one thing they truly need to do, cut spending, or at the very least reduce the increase to somewhere, oh you might say maybe the inflation rate.
The Welfare program cost in New York State is a split between federal, state and local government. The state and local portion of the cost of the program is evenly split between the state and county governments, New York is one of a few states that require counties to match dollar for dollar the cost of the program.
This could change if Paterson has his way with this budget, thus shifting the cost to local property taxpayers, all the while they are singing the song of capping local property taxes.
This year New York State's spending is expected to rise 5%, the Medicaid shift will bring them about $40 million in revenue and this is only one of the cost shifts being proposed. If they just reduced the spending increase to a mere 3% it would reduce their budget by 2.35 billion dollars.
Given the current state of the economy and the fact that 20% of the state's revenue comes from Wall St. this is the opportune time to cut spending. The Spitzer administration, short lived as it was, added 2,000 state employees, local property taxes should not pay that kind of reckless management.
"A government big enough to give you everything you want,
is big enough to take away everything you have"
Thomas Jefferson
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