Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

Ezra does sort of step in it on the not-quite assertion of "Senate Rs are causing local government layoffs". That the Feds--in an election year--are taking the "Ford to city: Drop dead" approach is not surprising.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

He says,

Isn't that exactly correct? It may not be surprising as politics, but it is fucked up.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

How has the US Senate "decided" to layoff state workers? Even if the Senate decided to send money to the states to keep those people employed (NB: I hadn't heard that the House had passed a bill to do this), how can the Seante *force* the states to keep them on the payroll? Do you really think Christie wouldn't say "no, thanks" to the funds unless it were enough to pay for all of their costs of employment for at least a couple of years? And how well would that play in state X that isn't getting anything close to the same deal?

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

The Senate has decided not to send money to the states, predictably resulting in lay-offs. State governments are laying people off because they need to balance their budgets. If the federal government sent them money to cover the budget shortfall, they wouldn't need to can people. I'm not sure why you're complicating things by talking about multiple years. If the costs are covered this year, they don't need to can them before next year. Next year is a year away.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

But canning them this year reduces the budgeting problems for next year, and it's the "next year is a problem for people of the future" is largely what's gotten us into this mess, especially at the state level, and especially in Cali and Illinois.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

First, this chart has no description of its axis/axes.

Second, big fucking Yes!!!!! Its too bad its not more than 159,000.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

X-axis is months; Y-axis is ,000 jobs.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

"Next year is a problem for the future" doesn't work if you're using accounting tricks to push money into the next budget. It does work if you're hiring people for one more year because you have the money now.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

So, you lay them off next year? And what about the added year of pension accrual?

Many state governments need (desperately) to right-size. Yes, right now isn't the best time to do so, at least from an employment perspective. But, given the dynamics of politics and public employee unions, the only time you can get the staff reduction in is when the budget is upside down, which generally only happens in a recession.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

Exactly. Burn the leeches off when you can.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

Or, if people were to exercise their second amendment rights en masse. Bum rush the show, sts.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

If necessary, yes. State revenues are often highly cyclical, so the hope is that you don't need to do that because the economy comes back.

If that's a cost, and it is, then the state should budget appropriately when it decides how many people whom it otherwise would fire need not be fired thanks to the federal aid.

From a macroeconomic perspective, it's the very worst time to do it.

eta: People don't see the harm in having all these workers and factories doing nothing. It's huge. Instead there's this myopic notion that government spending is bad because it displaces private spending. Ordinarily it does. But not now!

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

come November first week, a lot of this will be fixed.

Re: Election 2010: Teabaggin' the Ds & Rs
 

[outable] i am in DC from 11-4 to 7 [/outable]. Should I stay for election day? Any good partays?