looking around the world

[hnpcc]

Catching up on what's happened in the rest of the planet since Friday.

California may have to cut it's prison population by 40% due to budget constraints. That could have interesting implications down the track. Also in California layoffs are looming in the State Government.

The sentence that got me was:

Running short of cash, California last month started delaying $3.5 billion in payments to taxpayers, contractors, counties and social service agencies so the state could continue funding schools and making debt payments.

Seriously? Screw the debt payments. If it comes down to keeping the money in circulation, or servicing the debt, I'd be going with the circulation myself. Then again, I don't currently have a $US11.2 billion dollar hole in my budget.

(Thank God.)

Wow, it really is 1983 all over again. Fires taking out Victoria, mass unemployment in the UK.. actually, what else happened in 1983? Besides fluoro socks and big T-shirts with "YES" and "NO" on them of course.

Delaware is trying to work out what to cut to fix the holes in its budget. The options presented are schools, public service jobs (like, 75% of them), Medicaid, or basically everything else. The list in Everything Else includes shutting all state parks, the State Police, the National Guard, the State Fire crews... it's quite a list actually.

Can I just say that I'm kind of glad we haven't hit that point yet?

I feel like it's been really cold today, but I think that's just in comparison to the last couple of weeks. I am still wearing a T-shirt after all - I'm just wearing jeans for the first time in a while.

There was an Israeli election. Counting's still going on, could be interesting.

Comments

[bungo.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the Delaware link. I suppose this is because all those DE-based corporations aren't doing so well. Seems a bit melodramatic though... at $600M, that's about $1000 per inhabitant. Roughly the scale of the State Bank of South Australia collapse. I predict:

• Increased tolls on I-95
• Longer lines at the DMV

If they really need money, they could always introduce a sales tax.

[hnpcc]

I think I'm mostly just stunned by the "oh we'll just cut the police. And the schools."

Not that I'm saying it didn't happen here in the early 90s or that it won't happen again here now, but it always kind of surprises me when it does.

[valamelmeo.livejournal.com]

Adding to the serious economic mess is the fact that some US states (not sure how many, but I'm fairly sure it's a significant proportion) are required by their own constitutions to have a balanced budget. Most of these do have provisions for emergency deficit spending, but in a lot of cases the requirements to authorize this are very steep.

Of course, Delaware is hit hard because that's where all the big banks are based, because it has the fewest banking regulations. Interstate commerce FTW. Or not, given what's happened.

[hnpcc]

Most of these do have provisions for emergency deficit spending, but in a lot of cases the requirements to authorize this are very steep.

Surely they'd have to be approaching them now?

[valamelmeo.livejournal.com]

What I meant is, some states require a special election for a referendum to authorize deficit spending, or a near-unanimous majority of the state legislature voting for it, or both. This sort of insanity is one reason the states rely so much on FEMA during natural disasters--if they don't already have the money in their budget, they can't spend it.