Dear Everyone;
For the Libertarian Perspective of the California Libertarian Party I wrote the following op-ed as a way to address California's budget crisis. Now if only MSM would pick it up and publish as an alternative to their same old same old increase taxes as the only way to save the State budget from a fate worse than death.
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
California Smackdown 2008-09
California faces a $20 billion budget deficit, the result of politicians' erroneous financial assumptions, a housing market downturn with reduced property taxes, and a possible recession brought on by the federal government's inflationary monetary policy.
California's government itself is a part of the deficit problem. It's a huge behemoth with 500 agencies, departments, and divisions in eight broad categories. There are 345,000 state employees averaging $85,000 annually in pay and benefits, which costs taxpayers $29 billion alone. In comparison, private industry per capita pay and benefits average $45,000.
One method to cut the state deficit would require California state employees' pay and benefits to be scaled to meet an average equal to private industry's pay and benefits. This $40,000 cut per state employee would reduce the budget deficit by $13.8 billion in one short stroke.
There are other ways to trim a bloated, deficit-ridden state government budget.
Go here for the full op-ed: http://ca.lp.org/lp20080519.shtml