A rose is a rose .. (are you sure, Arne?)

BY ARNE CARLSON, GOVERNOR ARNE CARLSON'S BLOG

June 24, 2011

As we head into the final days before a state government shutdown, there will be increased proposals for settlement and more speculation on what will likely transpire.  The June 22nd Star Tribune contained an interesting editorial essentially suggesting that the healthcare provider tax be increased and that this increase be regarded as a surcharge and not labeled a tax increase thereby saving face for legislative Republicans.   Ultimately, this surcharge would produce some $600 million in new revenue which would come from state providers and the federal government.  The benefit would not only be the additional money but, more importantly, the preservation of MinnesotaCare and keeping some 85,000 to 140,000 people on the insured rolls.  Further, it would prevent thousands more from being disenrolled from Medicaid.  Overall, it is a huge step forward.

However, relative to the overall settlement it still leaves the Republicans and the Governor approximately $1 billion apart.

In terms of politics, the editorial is disturbing.   Allowing disagreements to be settled in a way that saves face is as American as baseball and the hotdog.  But saving face is considerably different than the perpetuation of a fundamental untruth.

It has to be said once and for all that a variety of taxes were increased under Governor Pawlenty and no amount of camouflage can mask that realty.  As a matter of fact his “borrowing” of some $400 million from the health care access fund has helped precipitate this crisis.

In addition, the current Republican budget proposals contain some $400 million in property tax increases (http://www.scribd.com/doc/55548698/5-16-11-Compromise-Budget) on top of a variety of other cost increases.  It should also be noted that Republican legislators (Sen. Julie Rosen-Fairmont and Rep. Morrie Lanning-Moorhead) are the authors of legislation to provide public funding for the building of a Vikings stadium in Ramsey County.  This increase in the sales tax in Ramsey is a tax increase just as Pawlenty’s support for a Twins stadium was a tax increase in Hennepin County.

It should also be remembered that when oil company executives testified in Congress against the removal of public subsidies for oil, many Republican leaders declared that any withdrawal of subsidy funding would constitute a tax increase.  If that is to be the case, then what about the thousands of Minnesotans thrown out of healthcare and told to go on “vouchers” to pay for policies that are beyond the financial reach of low-income people?   Is that not a tax increase?  How about the student losing state support from institutions of higher learning and having to pay higher tuition?  And what about the rest of us who will pay higher healthcare premiums to accommodate the costs of the uninsured receiving emergency care?  One must also add to this list of growing tax increases the likely wage losses that would be suffered by public and private sector employees who are laid off as a result of the shutdown.

Frankly, this debate could use a lot more honesty and far less propaganda.  The bottom line is that both budget proposals contain revenue enhancements or tax increases.   It is not a question of labeling, it is a question of who pays and how

Arne Carlson

Arne Carlson served as governor of Minnesota from 1991-1999.

The Worst Idea in Washington DC

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/the-worst-idea-in-washington/2011/03/10/AFzQaOIC_blog.html

By Ezra Klein

Bruce Bartlett takes a look at the Balanced Budget Amendment all 47 Republicans signed their names to and pronounces it “quite possibly the stupidest constitutional amendment I think I have ever seen. It looks like it was drafted by a couple of interns on the back of a napkin.”

I think “stupid” is the wrong word. “Dangerous” is more like it. And maybe “radical.” This isn’t just a Balanced Budget Amendment. It also includes a provision saying that tax increases would require a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress — so, it includes a provision making it harder to balance the budget — and another saying that total spending couldn’t exceed 18 percent of GDP. No allowances are made for recessions, though allowances are made for wars. Not a single year of the Bush administration would qualify as constitutional under this amendment. Nor would a single year of the Reagan administration. The Clinton administration would’ve had exactly two years in which it wasn’t in violation.

Read that again: Every single Senate Republican has endorsed a constitutional amendment that would’ve made Ronald Reagan’s fiscal policy unconstitutional. That’s how far to the right the modern GOP has swung.

But the problem isn’t simply that the proposed amendment is extreme. It’s also unworkable. The baby boomers are retiring and health costs are rising. Unless you have a way to stop one or the other from happening — and no one does — spending as a percentage of GDP is going to have to rise. This proposal doesn’t interrupt those trends. It simply refuses to acknowledge them — or, to be more generous, it rules them unconstitutional. This is the equivalent of trying to keep your kid cute by passing a law saying he’s not allowed to grow up.

Another problem: In a recession, tax revenue plummets and GDP stops growing, but spending has to be sustained, or even increased, to a) give people unemployment insurance and Medicaid and other services they need and b) keep the economy from contracting violently. This amendments includes no provisions for recessions, meaning that when the economy contracted, the government would have to contract as well. That is to say, we’re still not out of one of the deepest recessions in American history, and every Senate Republican has co-sponsored a constitutional amendment to make future recessions worse. It’s just breathtaking.

A world in which this amendment is added to the Constitution is a world in which America effectively becomes California. It’s a world where the procedural impediments to passing budgets and raising revenues are so immense that effective fiscal management is essentially impossible; it’s a world where we can’t make public investments or sustain the safety net; it’s a world where recessions are much worse than they currently are and the government has to do more of its work off-budget through regulation and gimmickry. I would like to say something positive about this proposal, say there’s some silver lining here. But there isn’t. This is economic demagoguery, and nothing more. It’s so unrealistic that it would’ve ruled all but two of the last 30 years unconstitutional, which means it’s so unrealistic that there has not yet been a Republican president who has proven it can be done. And that doesn’t just suggest it can’t be done: It suggests that when Republicans are actually in power and have control of the budget, they know perfectly well that it shouldn’t be done. They’re just pretending otherwise for the moment.

By Ezra Klein  |  03:28 PM ET, 04/01/2011