Tag: Boomergeddon
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The GOP’s Hail Mary Pass
Faced with a chronically slow-growth economy, expanding deficits, mounting federal debt, and a looming funding crisis for the U.S. welfare state, Republican congressmen are, to borrow a football metaphor, throwing a hail Mary pass into the end zone in the desperate hope of scoring a winning touchdown. They are gambling that tax cuts combined with…
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Bacon Bits: Film Flam, State Workers, Fun & Games with Chicago Debt
Film incentives a money loser for state. Incentives for producing films in Virginia doubled under the McAuliffe administration, reaching $14.3 million in 2015-2016 and totaling $43 million over five fiscal years. But Virginia’s film industry has returned about 20 cents for every dollar it received in tax credits and 30 cents for every dollar in grants over…
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Entitlements, Fiscal Limits and the Looming Age of Rage
Now that Democrats are close to parity with Republicans in the House of Delegates, there is renewed talk of Medicaid expansion in Virginia. Meanwhile, in Washington, President Trump and Republicans are pushing a tax-cut plan that would spur economic growth but, even with stronger growth, would increase deficits by $1.5 trillion over the next ten…
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How to Build Strong, Resilient Cities and Towns
Cities and counties across the United States are experiencing chronic fiscal stress, and the reason has nothing to do with Republicans or Democrats and everything to do with what Chuck Marohn calls the “growth Ponzi scheme.” “Why are cities going broke?” he asked at a forum hosted by the Partnership for Smarter Growth, Coalition for…
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Boomergeddon Watch: The Elderly Require Millions in Local Government Services
A decade or so ago when I worked for the Boomer Project, principals John Martin and Matt Thornhill warned that local governments in Virginia needed to prepare themselves for the age wave. The elderly have special needs, not all of which can be met by Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. People in the health care…
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How Medicaid Is Cannibalizing Virginia’s Budget
Three big trends are worth noting from the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission 2017 state spending update, a review of state spending over the previous 10 years. First, General Fund spending has been constrained by limited revenue growth resulting from Virginia’s weak economy. The increase in spending has averaged 2.0% per year. Adjusted for…
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Disaster + Fiscal Insolvency = Puerto Rico
I can watch only so much CNN and MSNBC before I get nauseated, but I have seen enough the past day or two to be appalled at how the media are spinning the post-hurricane disaster of Puerto Rico: It’s another Katrina. The Trump administration hasn’t responded fast enough or aggressively enough to help the battered…
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Uh, Oh, Look Who’s “City B”
The city of Richmond is “City B,” the unnamed locality, which, along with Petersburg, Bristol and two unnamed counties, was noted by the Auditor of Public Accounts as in severe fiscal stress, reports the Richmond Free Press. While State Auditor Martha S. Mavredes has not identified Richmond publicly, the city’s name is included in a…
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Boomergeddon Watch: U.S. Virgin Islands
The borrowing window has slammed shut on the U.S. Virgin Islands, reports Reuters. With about 100,000 inhabitants, the U.S. protectorate, acquired from Denmark during World War I, owes more than $2 billion to bondholders and creditors — the biggest per capita debt load, about $19,000, for every man woman and child, in the country. And…
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Boomergeddon Watch: Illinois and Puerto Rico
S&P Global has warned that Illinois’ debt could be downgraded to junk bond status if the state doesn’t get its fiscal affairs in order. Paralyzed by partisan gridlock, the Prairie State hasn’t had a budget in two years. Since the Great Depression, no other state has gone for more than a year without a budget,…
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Boomergeddon Watch: Higher Interest on Debt
Today’s Wall Street Journal editorial page explores the ramifications of the Federal Reserve’s decision to dial back years of Quantitative Easing and near-zero interest rates. Higher interest rates will translate directly into higher debt payments for the world’s largest debtor, Uncle Sam. Interest on the debt rose $28 billion for the six months of fiscal…
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The Biggest Lie of All: Government Can Pay Its Pensions
Many people get infuriated by President Trump’s many inconsequential falsehoods — does it really matter how big his inaugural crowds were? — but they remain sanguine about the trillion-dollar untruths that our public pension system is built upon. The big lie that governments will make good on retirement promises to their employees is not merely mendacious but it is…
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No Magical Solutions for Trump
Someone in the national press corps is finally focusing on an issue less ephemeral than Donald Trump’s tweets: the fiscal disaster that looms if all of the president’s programs are enacted. Writes Rachel Blade and Josh Downey in Politico: “I don’t think you can do infrastructure, raise defense spending, do a tax cut, keep Medicare, Medicaid…
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More Hidden Deficits: Bad Bridges and Bad Metro
Update on America’s hidden deficits: Nearly 56,000 bridges across the country are structurally unsound, according to the American Road and Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA), as reported by USA Today. More than one in four of the bad bridges are at least 50 years old and have never had major reconstruction work, according to the ARTBA analysis.…
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Chesterfield Finds $83 Million Unfunded Liabilities
Our society is riddled with unfunded liabilities. Nowhere is the magnitude of short-term thinking more egregious than the federal government. As case in point, the U.S. military has put off maintenance and repairs to the point where we don’t have the money for the military we have, much less the military we would like to have. “The…