And it’s not because your car disappeared into the Wal-Mart parking lot.
Connecticut has some $29 billion of assets but the bills are about $63 billion. We’re not in for an easy time any time soon, despite the recent revelations of a budget surplus. Read more here from Raising Hale:
Connecticut named ‘sinkhole state’ by accounting institute | Raising Hale.
Although the Administration claims there is a $2 trillion math error, the damage has been done. Standard & Poor’s has lowered America’s credit rating and given us a “negative outlook.”
We wait eagerly to see what Monday will bring for the markets but the effect could be severe.
Speaking like gown-ups to children, S & P said in its report,
The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable than what we previously believed. The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy. Despite this year’s wide-ranging debate, in our view, the differences between political parties have proven to be extraordinarily difficult to bridge, and, as we see it, the resulting agreement fell well short of the comprehensive fiscal consolidation program that some proponents had envisaged until quite recently. Republicans and Democrats have only been able to agree to relatively modest savings on discretionary spending while delegating to the Select Committee decisions on more comprehensive measures. It appears that for now, new revenues have dropped down on the menu of policy options. In addition, the plan envisions only minor policy changes on Medicare and little change in other entitlements, the containment of which we and most other independent observers regard as key to long-term fiscal sustainability.
Your taxes went up today. Just wanted you to know.
Starting on Aug. 1, the state will begin to capture the boost in the income tax for 2011 approved by lawmakers in May, which is retroactive to the beginning of the calendar year.
That means all of the tax increase for this year will be collected in the next five months. You can calculate your new withholding amount using the tables at the bottom of this story. The W-4 form explains the codes on the withholding table.
Single and joint filers earning $50,000 a year will see about $200 in additional withholding through December, as will joint filers earning $100,000. Single filers making $100,000 will see about $605 disappear from their paychecks.
It starts to jump up for joint filers at the $125,000 level when $510 in additional taxes will be taken out.
At the top end, if your adjusted gross income is $1 million, by the end of December you will have contributed $17,400 more to the state of Connecticut, while those hauling in $2 million in salary will send in $19,400 in additional taxes.
“You are going to see a bit of a jolt in August, but it falls again in January,” said Sarah Kaufman, spokeswoman for the state Department of Revenue Services, as the new rates will be spread out over 12 months rather than five.
More here, if you are brave enough to read it:
Connecticut income tax going up; calculate the bite out of your pay – News – West Hartford News.
… Before the rocks start falling on your head. I hate to sound like your dad, but this problem is not going away. In fact, it is only just beginning. If we face it, there is hope. If not, prepare for our nation to look like a Third World country, just with bigger buildings.
Even though the U.S. financial system nearly experienced a total meltdown in late 2008, the truth is that most Americans simply have no idea what is happening to the U.S. economy. Most people seem to think that the nasty little recession that we have just been through is almost over and that we will be experiencing another time of economic growth and prosperity very shortly.
But this time around that is not the case. The reality is that we are being sucked into an economic black hole from which the U.S. economy will never fully recover.
The problem is debt. Collectively, the U.S. government, the state governments, corporate America and American consumers have accumulated the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world. Our massive debt binge has financed our tremendous growth and prosperity over the last couple of decades, but now the day of reckoning is here.
And it is going to be painful.
The highest unemployment rate of the recession has been reached: 8.9%.
The good news in November’s numbers — when unemployment fell to 8.2 percent from 8.8 percent the previous month — apparently was a mirage.
Economic forecaster Nick Perna said, “I honestly thought the December rate would look better. And I was wrong.”
Danbury mayor and possible gubernatorial candidate Mark Boughton, in his personal blog (which posts also to his widely-distributed Facebook page) says we’re on the brink.
Here is a news flash…the State of Connecticut is broke. Busted. Cleaned out.
Here is another news flash…it is not going to get any better anytime soon.
It is time that we all recognize that we have entered a new economic era, and that we seize this moment to redefine the role of state government, examine the nexus between the state and the municipalities, and look at the services that we should offer, and most importantly, how we fund them.
Property tax reform has to be the first and foremost item on an agenda of reform. It is an unfair tax because it does not measure the ability of the property owner to pay. Many people in Danbury and across Connecticut are land rich and yet cash poor.
It’s refreshing to see this level of candor.
The New London Day, which isn’t exactly Connecticut’s answer to World Net Daily, says the state Democrats may face “well-earned losses” if they can’t muster up some courage here.
Frozen with fear when confronting a monster largely of its own making, the Democratic leadership in the General Assembly is readying to “gavel in and gavel out” when legislators return Tuesday for a special session, ordered by Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell to deal with a budget deficit approaching $500 million.
In other words, the Democrats in control of the legislature may once again ignore the fiscal crisis that confronts the state and instead head home for the holidays.
Alas for the Day and for your wallet, in 2009 State and Federal legislators have become deaf and blind to the angst (and phone calls) of those who merely pay the taxes.
More here: Dithering While Connecticut Sinks In Red Ink
More hard choices coming up. These are only some of the first.
Chantal Kouoh’s voice cracked Tuesday as she said how disappointed she was to be shut out of a state-subsidized nurse-training program because of budget cuts.
“I feel like a part of my life is gone,” she said to an audience of other students, state legislators, journalists and nurse advocates at a press conference at the Legislative Office Building organized by District 1199, New England Health Care Employees Union.
“As a single mother with a very low income, I really can’t afford to go to a private program.”
Heath Fahle at Connecticut Local Politics summarizes our State’s problem as only a taciturn New Englander can do: we have no money.
Governor Rell
Governor Rell is proposing steps to reduce the budget gap:
In an attempt to halt the 2010 budget’s slide into deficit, Gov. M. Jodi Rell released a $337 million package of proposed budget cuts Tuesday afternoon, slashing funding to programs for the poor and sick, local governments and state agencies….
“It is deeply painful even to suggest these cuts – and yet they are unquestionably necessary,” Rell said in a written statement released with her budget plan. “State government cannot afford, literally or figuratively, to allow this budget – which has only been in effect a few short months – to grow any further out of balance.”
Many of Rell’s proposals will require legislative approval, and she said she would call lawmakers back to the Capitol to enact cuts soon. A Senate aide said they anticipated reconvening what has come to seem like an endless budget debate sometime in mid-December.
Democratic leaders did not immediately respond to the substance of Rell’s proposed cuts, saying they would spend the coming days reviewing her plans with their colleagues.
Will a tax revolt this be the ultimate trickle-down economic effect? Revenue is drying up not only at the Federal level but is now doing so, as was inevitable, at the State and local levels. I’ll go out on a limb and predict that the local level is where the pushback on taxes will occur, not only here but nationwide.
Here’s a little foreshadowing of the fun that awaits us in 2010: a number of stories from around the State which show us why we are about to become California – or one of many Californias.
The Town of Winchester uncovers a “mystery” problem:
The town of Winchester’s budget situation is so bad that there may not be enough money to make payroll next month, according to the newly elected Winchester Board of Selectmen, which voted to set up a process that would allow the town to borrow up to $2.5 million against future tax payments in order to keep the town running.
The process involves using tax-anticipation notes to pay for budget shortfalls, which may reach a critical point next month. If the town goes ahead with the plan, a special town meeting and referendum would be required to allow the town to borrow against future proceeds.
Mayor Candy Perez said she first heard about the seriousness of the budget problem on Nov. 4, (emphasis added) the day after this year’s municipal election, when then-Town Manager Keith Robbins said the crisis was bad enough to warrant tax-anticipation notes. Robbins submitted his letter of resignation to Perez a week later.
In Naugatuck, there are some unhappy days at the Board of Ed, and a $2 million shortfall looming.
Teachers overwhelmingly condemned the performance of embattled Superintendent John Tindall-Gibson Thursday, while the school board continued to search for ways to make up a projected $2 million budget deficit.
The Naugatuck Teachers’ League voted 320-8 in a symbolic gesture to show they have no confidence in the 62-year-old school chief, who has been here since September 2006.
We know where that ends.
And looming Statewide… a projected $3.2 billion shortfall in 2012, according to the State’s Office of Fiscal Analysis. (Click to download as PDF or view above.)