Senate President Thomas Mike Miller said Maryland residents would “rather have some tax increases” than cut the budget. Where did he do his research? Talking with himself? If our readers and letter writers can serve as evidence, Maryland residents overwhelmingly want the state to cut its spending.
Fortunately the General Assembly did not pass any tax increases this year. But a projected $1.5 billion deficit next year means our legislators must find a way to reconcile revenue with spending.
Kudos to State Comptroller Peter Franchot for pointing out Friday the gap may be even bigger than anticipated because of declining sales tax revenue. Last month receipts fell 3 percent from February, the first month-to-month drop in four years. In a letter to Gov. Martin O?Malley, Miller and House Speaker Michael Busch, he said the decline “may also be signaling a broader weakness in the state?s economy. Should that turn out to be the case, the decisions required to resolve the structural deficit by the end of the 2008 legislative session will be that much more difficult.”
But bigger deficits should come as no surprise. A Maryland Public Policy Institute study released late last year showed state spending anticipated to increase 41 percent, dwarfing revenue growth of 25 percent, from 2006 to 2011.
The issue is how to deal with them. And the answer is not, as Franchot and Miller suggest, to raise taxes.
That is the easy way out for legislators, who refuse to do the hard workof examining which state programs actually deserve funding and passing structural reforms to curb skyrocketing costs of entitlements, among other programs. MPPI estimates that the state will spend nearly 20 percent of its budget on medical assistance by 2011, up from 15 percent in 2006.
The rest of us must match our spending to income, unless we don?t mind huge credit card debt and plummeting credit ratings, making it more expensive to borrow money. State legislators must too, if they expect our support in the next election.
The MPPI report made laudable suggestions for how the state could balance its budget. Setting spending caps, cutting money losing ventures like Rocky Gap Golf Course and Conference Center and reforming Medicaid to give patients more responsibility for their care ? and to make prevention the focus ? are a few of the group?s reform ideas that would bring spending in line with revenue. At the very least Marylanders deserve legislators who treat their money with the same care they give to their own household spending. Tell Sen. Miller what you think about raising taxes. Contact him at [email protected] or 410-841-3700.
