A much-heralded cap on property taxes championed by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo is encountering resistance as some communities across New York chafe at what amounts to a restriction on their spending and seek to exempt themselves from the new limits. This article ran back in October, but it highlights an issue that people don’t often…
Category: Austerity
A Self-Inflicted Mess?
Although Rick Perry is no longer a presidential candidate, he still governs more than 25 million people. In the early stages of his candidacy last year, Texas’ budget struggles made headlines as they called into question his self-avowed fiscal conservatism. Although they often disappear from the headlines once the final budget is approved, state budget…
What a Drag | Jared Bernstein | On the Economy
A simple and elegant statement of why balanced budget laws and cutting government spending aren’t necessarily economically responsible, even as they are touted as the height of fiscal responsibility. Unlike the feds, states have to balance their budgets every year, which means they either raise taxes or cut services. They haven’t done much on the…
Fiscal policing in Europe
The Times editorializes about the austerity plan adopted at the E.U. summit: The fiscal pact imposes substantial fines on any signatory nation whose deficit averages more than 0.5 percent of gross domestic product over a full economic cycle, a condition the United States would have had great trouble meeting over the past three decades. The summiteers…
Austerity overseas
Quick repost on austerity, again, from the New York Times. Austerity has been a hot topic as papers cover the E.U. Summit, which started yesterday in Brussels. The summit will presumably finalize the terms of a deficit treaty and rescue fund for troubled European economies. While austerity seems to have lost little of its political…