The people of this country know when they're over taxed and being fleeced by the public sector, and it's not surprising that it galls the people that are the recipients of the largesse.
I applaud any state legislators that will stand up to the phony tales of underfunding by those who are raping the taxpayer, and my only hope is that they'll not be cowed into changing their minds under the constant pressure they receive from the special interests.
The tales of woe from those in the public sector who are forced to live under the same kind of budget that most every family in America has to live under is enough to make a sane person want to puke. Is there anyone who doesn't know that every cent budgeted in the public sector is spent, whether needed or not, so the budget for the following year won't be cut? Is there anyone too dumb to see that anytime a cut to the public sector is contemplated, the response from that public sector to the proposed cut is to cut a service that will try to hurt the public as much as possible? Who can forget the gov't shutdown when the public parks were blockaded off so people couldn't walk past a war memorial while at the same time Obama is going on multi million dollar trips. Or, since it's tax season, how can we not mention that the IRS is not even sending out tax forms as usual, supposedly because they are so strapped for money, but all the while they can't even get rid of tax cheats who work for the IRS. The universal response to proposed cuts is to try to make it as painful as possible to the public while never cutting anything of significance to the public sector workers themselves.
And I have at least as much disdain for the projections that are pulled out of someone's rear end that supposedly prove whatever the special interest needs to prove to extract massive amounts of money out of taxpayers. Take those wasteful investments in movies, for example. The commerce dept's of states use bullsht projections handed to them from the movie industry to get public funding, and hope that their state never actually see what the real return is on the so called investment. Because the states that have done audits have discovered that the projections of returns to the states on the movie deals not only didn't make the type of returns they projected, they lost vast amounts of money for the states. I suspect that one of the reasons that the movie industry attempts to fleece the public through the gov't is that movie industry limited partnerships sold through broker dealers have had such poor returns that they can no longer fool unsuspecting investors.
Or how about the recent projections of revenue losses to North Carolina from the tax rate reductions and broadening of the tax code? From the screaming and yelling, you'd almost think the state was losing real money and was almost destitute. But then you realize that these were only projections, not real money, and nobody in the public sector has been fired yet. Not that many of us wouldn't like for a very large part of them to get fired and go find a real job.
How about we just see what the real revenue is when it comes in, compare it to other states so as to adjust for national and regional economic influences, and evaluate it from there? But no, the left and the rhinos would rather evaluate revenue based on projections. And then they get the growth rate data from Moody's Analytics, who's chief economist is the go to guy for journalists who want intellectual support for big gov't.
Another amusing anecdote is from teachers who insist that if they no longer had to teach classes because the teaching was centralized over computers, that there would be a need for more teachers. Relieve teachers of a large part of their responsibility and you need more of them. How mind numbingly dumb would the public have to be to fall for that? Just how much utter contempt for the public that pays the bills does the teachers union have to even suggest such an absurd thing?
The constant whining about the need for more and more money and a greater role for the public sector is worn out. The shifting of the tax code to exempt half the people in the country from paying taxes is evidence of that. It's easy to get votes from Paul when you're robbing Peter to pay Paul. Could they get all those votes if the voters had to pay the taxes themselves?
Gov'ts at every level are massive depositories of waste of taxpayer money and the need to resort to deceit like they used in obamacare to get bills passed is prima facie evidence of that. The truth doesn't sell.
Migration data showing people fleeing from high tax states to low tax states comes from historical records of the IRS itself. People voting with their feet is better evidence of the success or failure of any initiative than some wild eyed, bs projection conjured up and well paid for to prove somebody's point that more gov't is needed.
The country grew to be the largest and strongest in the world with much smaller gov'ts at every level and now we're told that the country will collapse unless the gov't gets more funding.
I have no hope whatsoever that it's going to change because where has it ever changed? Gov'ts increase until the tax base supporting it crumbles beneath the weight and that's the way it's always happened and that's the way it's always going to happen. And no matter how exceptional America is, it's no exception to this rule. Gov't investment generates less return than private investment, and when gov't begins taking over more and more of the investment function of capital within a country, how can the country's growth rate not suffer? Politicians making investment decisions with other people's money? What a joke.
First they try and tax the money away from the citizens to fund their largesse and redistribution schemes, then they move on to borrowing the money, then when that spigot runs out they're left with no choice but financial repression via zero interest rates and monetization of the debt to keep the ball rolling. We're at the end game right now in public finances. The only way they can keep up the charade is print the money out of thin air. They couldn't fund all their pet projects any other way. How long the monetization will last is anyone's guess, but I don't know of any other steps they have left other than going full commie.
And it all hinges upon the starting point of fooling people into believing they just can't live without a bigger gov't.
I disagree with many of your assertions. Let's start with the North Carolina Film Tax Credit and take a look at the hard numbers.
Let's start with the definitive study, “A Supply Chain Study of the Economic Impact of the North Carolina Motion Picture & Television Industry”, by North Carolina State University Poole College of Management distinguished professor Dr. Robert Handfield. The entire study in PDF can be found here.
"Beginning in 2007, when the incentive was first enacted, through 2012, the film and television industry has spent $1.02 billion in the state, and generated a projected $170,000,000 in tax revenue. The cost of the credit over the same time period was $112,000,000. The result means that for every dollar of credit issued, the industry generated $9.11 in direct spending and contributed $1.52 in tax revenue back to North Carolina."
Below are highlights of the study’s key findings:
• The direct spend by the film and television industry in North Carolina from 2007-2012 is $1,020,000,000. When compared to the cost of the credit ($112,000,000) over the same period of time, the result is for every dollar of the credit issued, the industry spends $9.11 within the State.
• The projected tax revenue collected as a result of film and television production from 2007-2012 is $170,330,307. When compared to the cost of the credit ($112,000,000) over the same period of time, the result is for every dollar of the credit issued, the industry generates $1.52 in tax revenue back to the State.
• For 2012 alone, the production tax incentive contributed a net positive cash flow of $25.3 million for North Carolina. This is the difference between the 2012 cost of the incentive ($60.14M) and tax revenue collected by state and local government ($85.4M).
• The incentive has allowed North Carolina to maintain a permanent crew base, providing 4,259 jobs at an average wage of $66,000, which is over a third higher than the national average for private industry ($41,750).
• Using predictive modeling forecasts, the study finds that if the production incentive is allowed to expire, 4,046 jobs would be eliminated and the industry’s tax contribution would shrink to $4.3M. Additionally, research predicts a loss of over $164M in business revenue to more than 1,000 small businesses across the State.
• The predictive model shows a significant benefit to the State associated with extending the production incentive. Empirical survey results and cost model projections suggest the industry would grow to a projected $587M, which would begin to rival the size of the industry in Georgia ($880M). The extension would also result in a projected work force of nearly 31,000, nearly 6,400 of which would be full-time production jobs.
The study was released ahead of the upcoming General Session, scheduled to begin in May, in which state lawmakers are expected to discuss the merits of the 25% refundable tax credit that is offered to filmmakers who have a qualified direct in-state spend of at least $250,000 and whether or not to continue the program. The tax credit is scheduled to sunset on January 1, 2015.