Quote from jem:
It does not take a rocket scientist to balance the budget.
Not when you have an obscene state income tax, large property taxes and massive income from formerly highly profitable corporations.
I disagree.
California is caught in pretty much the same storm as General Motors.
You have a horrible economy that is dramatically cutting the corporate tax revenues (sales) while the pension expense and health benefits for State employees is a very large part of the budget that legislators cannot even begin to touch.
Yes, spending went out of control under Gray Davis, and Arnold did not do much to reign it in. Instead, he offered a political "gimmicky" rollback of the vehicle registration tax and he wound-up getting elected over the outrage with Gray Davis and subsequent recall.
In fact, Arnold hasn't shown much in the way of leadership skills whatsoever . . . You would have thought that he would have been able to forge some strong relationships with people in the State legislature by this time, but no. Nadda.
In any event, it's not just out of control spending that is hurting California . . .
It's a huge decline in tax revenues, a horrible economy with unemployment over 10%, a State constitution that is the 3rd oldest
Constitution in the world today ( behind India and Alabama ) that requires a 2/3rd's super-majority - - - hence nothing ever gets done. Not too mention Proposition 13 which doesn't even begin to pay for hardly anything.
California's economy is one of the largest in the world. It's budget is complicated, and humongous ALL at the same time. People want all kind of services, but they don't want to pay for them. But let's make no mistake, the corporate tax revenues and property tax revenues simply aren't there anymore to support all of these employee pensions, state funded programs, services, etc.
On another note, the budget for the University of California and its 10 campuses including med schools, along with the California State College System, and the Junior College system is at $41 BILLION!!!
( Compare this with total budget expenditures for the state of Nevada at $22 Billion. A state I might add that is currently facing a 15% or $3 billion dollar short fall ).
And make no mistake . . . tuition at this education level has been raised every single year for the past several years.
Again, California is challenged by a variety of factors and issues on a magnitude that faces most Countries, not states.