Posted on 09/26/2012 5:42:59 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Texas has been on a roll recently. Fueled by a booming energy sector, the state has easily outpaced others in job growth. Business executives consistently rate it among the most desirable places to invest in, and Texas has made a habit recently of poaching jobs from places like California. Although Texas legislators did confront a budget squeeze a few years ago, the booming economy has provided Austin with plenty of fiscal room to maneuver, even as other states confront perhaps another decade of fiscal adjustments.
Now Texas faces the challenge of managing its success over the long term. Although Texas has a reputation as a conservative state, legislators have been spending its prosperity. Its government is bigger than you might imagine, and Texas has its share of inefficient and at times even frivolous government expenditures that are unsustainable over time. Other states in the past have squandered their prosperity. Will Texas, too?
Texas revenues have increased robustly over the past decade thanks to economic growth, but so have state and local spending. State expenditures from all sources grew from the 1998-1999 two year budget cycle by 120 percent to $187 billion through the 2010-2011 biennial budget. Even though Texas is still among the more frugal of state governments based on a spending per capita basis, over those years expenditures grew 50 percent faster than the rate of inflation plus population growth.
Local government spending in the state has similarly risen, doubling over a decade, according to the federal government's census of state and local government finance. That high level of spending forced legislators to scramble, when tax revenues skidded in the fiscal downturn, and cut the state budget by billions of dollars, though Texas largely did so with one-time gimmicks that didn't really balance the budget.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearmarkets.com ...
Agreed. It’s the school taxes that are killing us. They’re out of control. Spending money hand over fist like there’s no tomorrow and dumbing the students down every year. I’ve seen those ELS classrooms and it’s nothing but playtime. Literally, playtime. Outside playing football. Just because they’re illegal, doesn’t mean they don’t already speak English. Back in my day, we had one principal and an office secretary. Today, they have a principal, three vice principals, 2-3 counselors, a registrar, 4-5 secretaries, a couple others who babysit troubled or lazy kids, etc. Back in my day, we had one teacher per room with 35-40 students (iirc, 42 was the limit). Today, every teacher has to have an aide because she can’t handle a class of 17.
That’s what’s ridiculous, I say you can achieve the same level of education if you got rid of the 90% of the School District staff. When did it get so difficult to have classes of more than 30 students...my teachers didn’t have aides, that’s for sure.
Guess we “back in the old days” folks just have too many ideas that just won’t work any more. Get tired of being told I don’t understand. They are right that things are different now. I went to a small one-room school house with 38 kids from grades 1 to 8 and only one very capable teacher who put up with no nonsense. Certainly one of the benefits was that all the students could hear what was being taught to each level and so had everything repeated a whole lot of times. As a result, I had a very good base education which I have never forgotten.
I would suspect that there are very few teachers out there who are actually capable of filling my grade school teacher’s shoes.
Amen and amen.
More like four or five. Come on, it’s the end of September and it’s 91 degrees outside.
Perfect fishing weather.
Going on Saturday if the weather holds.
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