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ATR BLOG POST ON PAWLENTY AMENDMENT
By Luke Hellier | November 16, 2009
Minnesota Budget Shouldn’t be Based on Money Politicians Hope to Have
Year after year states build their budgets around what they expect to raise in tax revenue for the upcoming fiscal year. This means that states budget revenue for programs and services with money they currently do not have. More often than not, their estimates come up short and politicians resort to further tax increases to pay for what they consider “shortfall.â€
No where else do we see this kind of behavior. Individuals don’t budget and spend money they think they’ll have in the coming year. And if they do realize their estimates were wrong they don’t use force to extract money from other people to make up for their mistake.
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24 Responses to “ATR BLOG POST ON PAWLENTY AMENDMENT”
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November 16th, 2009 at 10:58 PM
Luke
“No where else do we see this kind of behavior. Individuals don’t budget and spend money they think they’ll have in the coming year.”
What an absolutely stupid statement. What the heck do you think a budget is? Every company and person who makes a budget has to base it on expected revenue. If your employer cuts back your hours then your budget prediction is wrong and you have to adjust it. If your sales forecast is wrong again you have to do something. A budget is a plan if things change you have to adjust your plan, cut back, get another job, raise prices, whatever. A yes sometimes government needs to raise taxes.
November 17th, 2009 at 1:40 AM
Jude,
There you go again with your rigid ideology. The difference between individuals and the government is that individuals can’t forcibly take someone else’s money when their family budgets are short of projections. Government can, but that doesn’t mean it should. Government should never hike taxes when those tax hikes harm the economy.
November 17th, 2009 at 7:08 AM
I was struck by the same sentence as Jude. Of course a budget is a plan for money individuals think they will have in the future but don’t have now. And the fact that people are required to pay taxes, in a way that they are not required to hold jobs, means that such budget projections are more reliable, not less.
November 17th, 2009 at 8:34 AM
Jude says, “A budget is a plan if things change you have to adjust your plan, cut back, get another job, raise prices, whatever.”
With the current Minnesota budget, Jude misses the point. Republicans and Democrats had differing views of what the budget plan should be, not that outside forces changed things after the fact.
Democrats in the state legsilature knew what the budget forecasts were going into the negotiation the past year, yet they acted has if that shouldn’t be a factor in setting the spending forecasts.
Revenue Forecast Feb 2009
(millions)
FY 08/09 32,323
FY 10/11 30,700
Spending Forecast Feb 2009
FY 08/09 33,891
FY 10/11 35,506
With the Pawlenty budget amendment, the spending proposals would have been capped at over 3 billion less in FY 10/11. With the current economic situation – and with the Pawlenty amendment in place, there still would need to be more than 1.5 million in spending cuts to balance the budget without raising taxes. The federal stimulus to the state could have wiped away most of the need for those spending cuts.
The more I digest Pawlenty’s proposal, the more I like it. Democrat like Jude can still take pride in raising taxes, they just won’t be able to spend them until the next budget cycle.
It would be nice to see an analysis of how spending would have looked over the past 10-20 years if this amendment were in place.
http://olmstedgop.org/wp/?p=352 shows a graph on how much steeper spending increases have become since 1990.
November 17th, 2009 at 8:59 AM
Just as a practical matter, to the extent we are framing budget matters as constitutional issues, ultimately we are turning them over to courts to decide. I think it’s interesting that a party that tells us that judicial activism is a bad thing is so willing, so eager even, to turn matters which are in their essence political issues, over to the courts.
November 17th, 2009 at 9:29 AM
“Individuals don’t budget and spend money they think they’ll have in the coming year …”
And if they do realize their estimates wre wrong they don’t use force to extract money from other people to make up for their mistake.”
First of all Jude/Hiram, Those aren’t Lukes words, they come from the article he links to.
The first sentence should have been phrased better. The second sentence shows what I believe to be what the author meant.
Second, most individuals have either decreased or not increased spending this year due to layoffs, fear of layoffs, wage freezes, cuts in salary, money lost in investments, etc. Democrats in the state legislature went full speed ahead with proposals for huge massive tax and spending increases.
November 17th, 2009 at 9:39 AM
Hiram, as a practical matter, constitutional amendments prevent the courts the engaging in judicial activism much more than they encourage it.
If the amendment passed, what scenario do you see where the courts would be judicial activists?
November 17th, 2009 at 12:14 PM
‘constitutional amendments prevent the courts the engaging in judicial activism much more than they encourage it.’
In this case, you would be expanding the role of the courts in budgetary matters. Every issue in the governor’s proposed amendment creates a basis for litigation.
The enactment of a consitutional amendment does one of two things. It creates an enforceable right, which means assigning the courts a role in deciding exactly what that right means and how it is to be applied, or it doesn’t. If what happens is the former, the role of the judiciary is increased requiring them to be more active. If what happens is the latter, what’s the point of enacting the amendment?
November 17th, 2009 at 12:47 PM
“constitutional amendments prevent the courts the engaging in judicial activism much more than they encourage it.”
Can you name a single instance of judicial activism that isn’t rooted in the constitution, and in all the likelihood, a constitutional amendment?
I really and truly think we wouldn’t have had the civil rights litigation which is what most of us think of when the charges of judicial activism are raised. Certainly the arguments would have been much more difficult.
November 17th, 2009 at 12:47 PM
“constitutional amendments prevent the courts the engaging in judicial activism much more than they encourage it.”
Can you name a single instance of judicial activism that isn’t rooted in the constitution, and in all the likelihood, a constitutional amendment?
I really and truly think we wouldn’t have had the civil rights litigation which is what most of us think of when the charges of judicial activism are raised. Certainly the arguments would have been much more difficult.
November 17th, 2009 at 12:53 PM
Hiram, the amendment wouldn’t be a “right.” It would be a constitutional mandate.
“Every issue in the governor’s proposed amendment creates a basis for litigation.” No it doesn’t.
Democrats might try to make an issue out of the amendment, like they did with Proposition 8 in California. Both before and after the amendment passed, the courts laughed at them.
You’re throwing out judicial activism as a red herring. (Throwing out red herrings is something you do a lot.) But for the sake of arguement, let’s say that all those years of watching Judge Judy have paid off and the courts strike down the amendment. So what?
Hiram, if don’t pass laws or amendments out of fears that judicial activists will overturn them, then the judicial activists have won!
November 17th, 2009 at 4:35 PM
“It would be a constitutional mandate.”
If that means it wouldn’t be enforceable, then what’ the point of enacting it?
“Democrats might try to make an issue out of the amendment, like they did with Proposition 8 in California.”
I am not raising the issue of validity. I am raising the issue of how it would be applied and enforced. If, in your view, the courts would have no role in construing and applying the amendment, then it amounts to nothing more than a suggestion, one anyone is free to disregard at any time.
November 17th, 2009 at 4:45 PM
Hector,
You’re going off the deep end. The point of amending the Constitution is to take issues out of the hands of judges and politicians and to put them into the hands of the people. A recent example of this is the Legacy Amendment where the people of Minnesota voted to amend the Constitution to provide for a 3/8% sales tax to go to the arts and outdoors. If you think that’s putting the political question into the hands of judges, I’d ask where’s the lawsuit?
November 17th, 2009 at 8:02 PM
“The point of amending the Constitution is to take issues out of the hands of judges and politicians and to put them into the hands of the people.”
The people express their will through the electoral process as voters. So if the voters elect politicians who violate a constitutional provision, there can be no recourse to the courts. Whether the constitution is obeyed or not is determined by the whim of the electorate, or the politicians the electorate puts into office.
As for the legacy amendment, what, exactly, the arts and the outdoors? The general fund pays for those things too. What happens when politicians raid the legacy fund, to pay for things the state would otherwise pay for, effectively negating the amendment? Who is going to make sure that doesn’t happen, if not the courts? But on what basis can the courts make their decision other than on political considerations involving speculation about the motivations of the other two branches of government?
November 17th, 2009 at 11:38 PM
Hiram, let’s pass the amendment and then let you moonbats come back with a frivolous lawsuit. Not only will you look lose, you’ll look like assholes for for ingnoring the will of the voters!
“What happens when politicians raid the legacy fund, to pay for things the state would otherwise pay for, effectively negating the amendment?”
That happens every day with park referendums and school referendums. Cities and schools “raid” the referendum funds to pay for capital improvements and repairs that would normally be covered with operating budgets. We don’t hear about too many lawsuits.
By the way Hiram, voters are not a branch of government.
November 18th, 2009 at 12:32 AM
Hector,
You’re a space cadet. I’m sorry but every amendment to the state constitution does not require litigation. Who challenged the voting age amendment? The lottery amendment? Horse racing? Veterans’ bonuses? What about highway bonds?
These are all examples of amendments to our constitution which have been passed by the voters. If the voters are bright enough to elect officials, aren’t they smart enough to decide issues their elected officials deem worthy of a vote of the people?
November 18th, 2009 at 2:34 AM
Hiram, what ever happened to the Minnesota State Treasurer?
November 18th, 2009 at 7:55 AM
“let’s pass the amendment and then let you moonbats come back with a frivolous lawsuit.”
Do you think we will be the moonbats filing the frivolous lawsuits? How likely do you think it is the Democrats will obey the spending limits if they don’t have to?
“That happens every day with park referendums and school referendums.”
Of course it does. And the constitutional arguments are basically ignored. So it seems to me you are arguing that we shouldn’t worry about enacting additional constitutional restrictions in this area, because we will just ignore them anyway. And because we will dismiss any effort to enforce them in the court as frivolous. Isn’t that a very pure form of hypocrisy?
“I’m sorry but every amendment to the state constitution does not require litigation.”
You are right of course. And that’s the argument being made here. Let’s enact this amendment, we are told upfront, but let’s do it with the understanding that it won’t be litigated, that as with the other constitutional provisions dealing with spending limits, that both parties will tacitly agree to ignore them when they are inconvenient.
November 18th, 2009 at 8:02 AM
By the way, there is some confusion here. I don’t question the validity of the amendment itself. I see nothing unconstitutional about it. What I am saying is that once it is enacted, the application raises all sorts of issues that can be litigated.
For example, the Legacy Amendment. I fully expect that at some point, if we haven’t reached that point already, the state will reduce appropriations to the outdoors and the arts, because it knows they are getting funds from the legacy amendment. Theoretically, that’s unconstitutional, but how do you enforce it in practice without going to the courts?
November 18th, 2009 at 4:24 PM
Hector,
You should stick to your day job. There’s nothing unconstitutional with the legislature cutting funding to the arts and outdoors in the normal appropriations process so long as they are spending the constitutionally dedicated funds according to the law.
November 18th, 2009 at 11:56 PM
“Theoretically, that’s unconstitutional, but how do you enforce it in practice without going to the courts?”
The only constitutional requirement for spend even a nickel on arts and “clean water” was created last year with the 3/8 % sales tax. That money can only be spent the arts and “clean water.”
Going forward, will Peter be robbed to pay Paul? Of couse. That’s a certaintly. Could a serious lawsuit occur over his, it might. I actually hope it does. It would be Democrats suing Democrat.
With this budget amendment, the state will would limited in total spending. Now matter how the state slices of its spending pie, the size of the be will be determined by the constitution.
November 19th, 2009 at 8:13 AM
“Could a serious lawsuit occur over this, it might. I actually hope it does. It would be Democrats suing Democrat.”
I think, actually, it would be the outdoors people suing the governor.
“With this budget amendment, the state will would limited in total spending.”
But it’s you position that the amendment will not be enforceable in courts. So it amounts to nothing more than a suggestion, with no force of law.
November 19th, 2009 at 2:35 PM
While Tim Pawlenty is currently circumnavigating the country on behalf of his 2012 Presidential Campaign, he supports Minnesotans paying out over a BILLION dollars to build the Vikings a new stadium.
With the next Biennium for 2011-2013 facing a $9 BILLION dollar deficit, where does Pawlenty get the idea the state has the money?
November 19th, 2009 at 3:26 PM
“There’s nothing unconstitutional with the legislature cutting funding to the arts and outdoors in the normal appropriations process so long as they are spending the constitutionally dedicated funds according to the law.”
Below is the relevant language from the constitutional amendment:
“The dedicated money under this section must supplement traditional sources of funding for these purposes and may not be used as a substitute.”