I dunno… sure does sound like a definitive statement of fact to me:
The Legislature cannot raise taxes.
But of course, that’s not true. The Legislature can raise taxes. It would require a remarkable display of bipartisan support—exactly the kinda bipartisanship the Seattle Times editorial board so often breathlessly pines for—but it can be done, even under the unconstitutional two-thirds strictures of I-1053.
For example, let’s say there was some kind of devastating natural disaster, a tsunami or an earthquake that required hundreds of millions of dollars in immediate emergency spending for relief and reconstruction… could (and should) the Legislature raise taxes to meet these needs, despite statewide voters “emphatic votes on three separate ballot measures” this past November?
I’d like to think so. So isn’t this really just a question of priorities? And isn’t that what politics is always about: priorities?
So no, neither the Legislature, nor the governor, nor the voters, nor the Times gets off that easily. We can raise taxes, if we want to. And if we don’t raise taxes to help offset the proposed devastating cuts to education and social services, then the human suffering and long term costs these cuts create is on our heads.
The Times pontificators are being hortatory, of course. Not thoughtful, just oratical. If they thought about it at all, of course the voters want government services without paying taxes for hem. Every time! Show me an American and I’ll show you someone who wants, nay, expects free. After all, the highly touted private sector has spent the last 100 years conditioning American consumers to pay $2,500 for a $2,000 rebate on a new car. So why wouldn’t stupid voters expect to get their government for free, too? One way the Cynicals of the world try to get free government is by expecting government workers to work without pay — even though they would never expect anyone in the selfish for-profit sector to do that. What Goldy is really arguing is that we should expect legislators to have more brains than the voters who elect them, and he’s got a point, because if legislators are mere common cloth, no better than the people who vote for Eyman initiatives, then we’ve had it as a society. So, cross your fingers and hope a majority of the legislators are smarter than the Times rhetoriticians and the idiots they pander to in their vain hopes of getting freebie-hunting consumers to pay money for newspaper copies. C’mon, Frank Blethen, you should know better than that! If you want people to read your paper, it has to be free. After all, you’re a Republican newspaper serving a Republican audience, and Republicans never pay for anything.
Raising state taxes isn’t actually a tax increase, it’s a smaller tax cut. Washington residents have given themselves massive tax cuts over the last three years, to the tune of billions — and did it without initiatives or legislative action — simply by not buying cars, furniture, and stuff. That’s right, in this state, which depends on the sales tax for most of its government revenue, all you have to do to cut your own taxes is not buy stuff and that’s what people are doing.
So, if residents cut their own taxes by billions by not buying stuff, and the legislator raises taxes by a few hundred million to save schools and keep violent felons locked up, that’s still an overall tax cut.
Oh yes they do – they want all but the “owner” class to be paid as little as possible. They just have an extra rhetorical tool with government worker – the leverage the hate for OUR government that they’ve been sowing for decades.
The ST is doing its part in closing the Overton window.
Rather than serving to lay out all options and honestly debate the merits of raising taxes or not within the context of the services we as citizens want, the Times is simply a mouthpiece for the Republican Party, which is itself a tool of the very very rich. The goal of such an editorial is to close off whole areas of debate – make them beyond the pale – and thereby limit options from the first place to a narrow set that is acceptable to the master class in this country.
@2
Amen, brother.
It’s important to note that, most of the spending cuts don’t equal savings. We’re shifting costs, we’re opting for 9 stitches later instead of one today. We’re making it harder for places like Spokane to attract higher wage employers and higher income families by closing the Museum of Arts and Culture.
The state should be closing tax loopholes and investing and rebuilding right now. Real savings come from reinvestment, smarter healthier people, more high wage employers, reduced bottlenecks on the roads, better use of water and power.
This race to the bottom crap we’re engaged in is, well, crap.
In many programs, we’re also giving up a dollar of federal matching funds every time we cut a dollar of state spending, so that’s a loss of $2 worth of services every time we cut another $1 from the state budget. When we cut, that federal money goes to other states.
Taxing the rich grows the economy. The rich horde money. Taxes keep the money moving.
Corporatists like the Blethens want the whole pie, vs growing the pie for the benefit of all.
Maybe we should “experiment” and give the Republicans the 3rd world nation they pine for so much by getting rid of taxes. It would have bright gleaming beautiful shopping malls full of private for-profit businesses…COOL! But sadly no roads to get to them (they’re ALL paid for by our socialist central government for the “common good”, which sounds Communist to me). Even if you could take your horse down a dirt trail to the mall, you’d be beset by armed robbers all the way since the police force is gone (more central government socialists) and the mall itself would be under attack constantly robbed since we have no police or courts to prosecute anyone (more central government). Not that our kids could understand what’s happening because none of them can read now that we closed the schools, reading is the devils tool anyway and just teaches you that Satanic science stuff. The PERFECT Republican world.
@7
Yup!
Some of the most conservative people I personally know of live in Clark County. They complain just as much as any others of their ilk about their oh, so terrible tax burden, while taking their non-state-taxed paychecks across the river and making their major purchases in no-sales-tax Oregon.
OK, so the statement is technically false, but effectively true. Here’s one that’s true “the Washington Transportation Commission can’t raise ferry fares without legislative approval” and one in the same category as the Times’ editorial “the legislature won’t pass needed ferry fare increases.” So this means that initiative 1053 mandates legislative micromanagement of the ferry system. This is ridiculous and no way to run an efficient transportation system. So the only logical course of action is to privatize the ferry system. I suggest this be put into place right away.
@12:
Or just shut down the ferry system entirely, and watch Rep. Barbara Bailey’s head explode.
She’s against communist-socialist-big-government. Unless it’s serving her or her district. Then it’s our patriotic duty to have everyone pay for the ferry system so she can get home more quickly and cheaply.
Xar @ 13
At the risk of alienating my friends living on Vashon…
Absolutely. Stop subsidizing the ferries.
Or better yet, privatize them. Let the “free market” determine the fare.
Everyone benefitting from the ferries, with the exception of San Juan County, voted for I-695.
Why should I pay for their ferries, their sprawl, their higher standard of living? Especially since they’re not willing to pay for my roads.
I rode the ferries for a while. Fees when up after I-695. The passengers freaked. What did they think would happen when they cut the funding? Duh.
Let them eat cake.
Ten Years After’s I’d Love to Change the World
Everywhere is freaks and hairies
Dykes and fairies, tell me where is sanity
Tax the rich, feed the poor
Till there are no rich no more?
I’d love to change the world
But I don’t know what to do
So I’ll leave it up to you
Population keeps on breeding
Nation bleeding, still more feeding economy
Life is funny, skies are sunny
Bees make honey, who needs money, Monopoly
I’d love to change the world
But I don’t know what to do
So I’ll leave it up to you
World pollution, there’s no solution
Institution, electrocution
Just black and white, rich or poor
Them and us, stop the war
I’d love to change the world
But I don’t know what to do
So I’ll leave it up to you
Goldy, I appreciate the perspective that you continually provide. Recently there was your pointing out of the remarkable juxtaposition of Gregoire’s comments that the state budget is “immoral” against State Sen. Zarelli’s statement that it’s a “step in the right direction”, which indeed was a stark ideological contrast.
Now, you write, again in the context of the state budget, “So isn’t this really just a question of priorities? And isn’t that what politics is always about: priorities?”.
Nicely said, again. I am stunned these days by the seemingly mindless anti-tax fervor that’s now in the public sphere, even among my educated friends, so it’s nice to see perspectives like yours, which, imho, provide at least very good food for thought, and should be part of the mainstream.
Keep up the good writing!
Gregoire spending up 34.5% while State GDP up 15%.
What part of unsustainable overspending don’t you understand folks?
@17
I’m not against cuts, I’m against cuts that will cost us more in the long run or that just shift the cost from the state onto some other flat broke person or entity.
I don’t have the answers to what we need to do and I don’t think anyone else does either. I think we need to work together to figure out a new way forward.
re 17: …unsustainable overspending….
Am I to assume that Republican overspending is the sustainable kind?
Mr Cynical @ 17
Your numbers are meaningless without context.
The number to watch is state budget as percentage of state GDP.
You missed your calling as an economist. You have so much to teach us.
@17: What part of “recession” do you not understand? Also, automatic stabilizers such as unemployment insurance, kick in during economic downturns, addding to public spending.
Our problem is unsustainably low revenues*, even in good times.
Driven by “tax revolts” which, in turn, are driven by the fact that we continue to shift income upwards.
lucy @ 19
Exactly.
Predator drones, naval carrier groups, privatized prisons, depleted uranium bullets, government protected monopoly, and corporate tax loop hole is an investment to ensure that corporation can sustain their torrent of campaign contributions.
@18,19,20,21…
He’s a know-nothing (and soooo proud of it) flame bot.
He gets his “economics” from Fox and this moron: http://www.christopherchantrill.com/
@17
Gregoire spending up 34.5% while State GDP up 15%.
The last time Cynical tried to float this lie, the GDP figure was 12.8%. You can find the comment here.
I pointed out the real facts in this comment.
Republicans lie. Repeatedly.
I was just driving home from Pho with my 14 year old son. There was a story on the radio about the first responder health bill and how it had been blocked until Jon Stewart and others started raising hell – and he said, unprompted, “Republicans are nasty awful people!”
I felt like a successful parent.
(Not unlike when he said to me, in all earnestness of youthful discovery, “Dad, have you ever heard of Jimmy Page? He totally rocks!!”)
@14 “Or better yet, privatize them. Let the “free market” determine the fare.”
As I recall, the state ferry system evolved from private ferries that couldn’t make a go of it.
After conservatives strip every last dime of private profit to be had from something, whether it be public lands or running ferries across Puget Sound, they dump it on the taxpayers — and call it “socialism.”
@25: You are truly a fortunate man.
@26
One of the old Mosquito Fleet boats is still on the water, running people between Port Orchard and Bremerton; it’s owned by Kitsap Transit. I ride it a few times a year, lots-o-fun.
Doe Joe @ 24
Mr Cynical’s arguments are remarkably fact free.
Really good rebuttal.
Here’s a fixed link.
http://horsesass.org/?p=31703#comment-1050517
You seem knowledgable about such things. If you agree with the following statement, maybe you could help me refine it. I’m trying to “frame” in a sound bite that’s “ah ha!” obvious why higher taxes = growth whereas tax cuts = decline.
Economic growth requires activity. The rich horde money. Taxes keep the money moving.
@25, 28
“What are you, a Republican or something?” is used by my 10yo niece and her friends as an insult.
I still say, show me a cut that doesn’t leave us worse off in the future and I’ll approve it (good luck). What this really does is make the person calling for spending cuts defend their position and make them the bad guy when people see the long term effects of the cuts.
I support optional buyouts for state employees that are nearing retirement as a way to bring costs down. But. you’d probably have to spend more in the short term to achieve that. If we can’t raise taxes or spending we can’t do this and save ourselves a little green.
Energy and water efficiency updates on state owned buildings would also save us some money, but oops, you’d have to raise spending in the short-term to get the savings.
The big takeaway/talking point should be that spending cuts ≠ savings.
@30
Thanks for fixing the link. I’m still learning the foibles of trying to edit things on the iPad where keyboard shortcuts don’t exist. I have to remember to delete the “http://” in the link dialog before pasting the URL.
The best way to think about the idea you want to espress is in terms of incentives. According to Republicans, the incentives for the wealthy are so strong that we have to give them special tax cuts that the rest of us don’t get, but the same prospect of an increase in income is so weak for the unemployed that we have to end unemployment benefits in order to get them to look for work.
A shorter version: in the Republican world, the wealthy must have tax cuts, but people who can’t find a job don’t need unemployment benefits.
@17 – Like a typical conservative, you’ve carefully cherrypicked your numbers. Here are some more relevant numbers for you:
Gregoire’s proposed budget shrinks the budget to what it was in 2000.
Since 2000:
Cumulative inflation has been 28%.
Healthcare has gone up 60% (not that the state spends much on THAT, oh, no).
Gasoline costs more than twice what it did in 2000.
Washington’s population is 14% larger.
The prison population is 21% larger.
With the high unemployment rate, the need for a variety of public services is higher than ever.
Hmmmm, lower revenue, higher expenses. What part of UNREALISTIC don’t you understand?
@34
Nice take down.
The Times even disagrees with the Times
But they are correct the people have spoken. It’s too bad they are being promised a phony bill of goods from Eyman and his banker and oil company friends. Oil companies and bankers would never screw us.
20. Jason Osgood spews:
Think about what you just said Jason.
I said with Gregoire.. spending up 34.5% while State GDP up 15%.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to conclude that State Budget as a % of State GDP would have increased.
Comprende?
The problem was government grew under Locke in correlation to an economic bubble..a bubble that would inevitably pop, which it has.
Now the problem is ratcheting government back to a more sustainable level in relation to the current economic conditions. Had Gregoire & Locke not gone on spending sprees, we wouldn’t have this trainwreck to deal with.
24. Don Joe spews:
The Spending is for a 6 year period. The 12.8% GDP growth was only for 5 years. 15% is for 6 years.
@17
Where do you get your information? Are you just making crap up?
Even the State Republicans show a decrease in state spending as of the 2009-2011 budget.
2cents–
From Gregoire’s very own State OFM website.
http://fiscal.wa.gov/expenditures.aspx
I’ve posted this link many times.
It shows the 10 year expenditure history for the Operating and Capital Fund.
2 cents–
You also have to look at the Supplemental Budgets.
2 cents
Show your source for State Republicans showing a “decrease” in 09/11 Budget.
@42
Senate Budget
Mr Cynical @ Everywhere
You cherry pick data support your argument. All the time. Logically fallacies and misrepresentations are your hammer and chisel.
What don’t get you get about spending / GDP over time? Context. That’s the over time part.
¿Comprende?
Which reminds me, yee of little courage, you still haven’t explained your previous statements about the proper role of government.
In your libertarian utopia, who pays for the administration of our elections and courts?
Defend one of your statements. Just once. Prove to me you’re not just a hatebot.
Find it yourself fuckwit.2cents even gave you a CLUE!
You can’t do it can you….