Caution, Kansas newspaper editorialists. Your ideology is showing.
Seeking to minimize the fallout from this week’s elections in Kansas, Kansas City Star editorialist Yael T. Abouhalkah warns the governor that this election didn’t really mean much, after all. (See No, Sam Brownback, Kansans didn’t give you a mandate for more tax cuts.)
This op-ed, like many others that appear in Kansas newspapers, are useful for exposing the ideologies of their writers. Here’s an example from Abouhalkah: “Already, the first round of tax cuts have cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars in anticipated revenues.”
The corollary of this is that Kansans have saved hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes. That’s money that has stayed in the productive private sector. For those who believe that government spends wisely and efficiently, I can understand how they think there’s a problem. Everyone else thinks it’s an improvement.
The only framework — ideology? — in which tax cuts are a cost to government is if we believe that government has first claim to citizens’ money. This is a difference in fundamental beliefs. There is an ideology expressed here, one that says government spending is more important than people and their property rights.
Here’s something else from Abouhalkah’s keyboard:
And things could get worse, because the state already is more than $40 million short of its expected revenues for the current fiscal year, which is one-third of the way over.
What does that mean? Budget cuts are ahead, and public education would top the list, given the large amount of spending provided by the state.
This is the standard plaint, also voiced by the editorial board of the Wichita Eagle. Because tax revenues are lower, budget cuts are ahead. Except by budget cuts, these advocates of government spending really mean to say that government services will be cut.
It doesn’t have to be this way. There is a plan — a policy brief — for balancing the Kansas budget immediately. This plan fully funds the increases in school spending and social welfare caseloads that the non-partisan official state agency Kansas Legislative Research Department projects for the future.
But there’s a problem.
As they lambaste conservatives for blind adherence to ideology, the editorial writers at the Kansas City Star and Wichita Eagle have their own ideological blind spots. In particular, they’re not likely to read anything produced by Kansas Policy Institute, much less give it the consideration it deserves.
Oh well. It’s all about the kids, after all.
The policy brief I referenced may be downloaded from KPI at A Five-Year Budget Plan for the State of Kansas: How to balance the budget and have healthy ending balances without tax increases or service reductions or alternatively from Scribd here (may work better on mobile devices). A press release from KPI announcing the policy brief is at 5 Year Budget Plan Outlines Path To Protect Essential Services and Tax Reform.