Pennsylvania Budget Fails to Provide for Desperate Education Needs of Philadelphia’s Children
Writing for the NY Times, Josh Barro points out: “Kansas has a problem. In April and May, the state planned to collect $651 million from personal income tax. But instead it received only $369 million.” Kansas is one of the states where spending for public education has fallen recently due to tax cutting by its governor and legislators. According to Barro, part of the problem is the way Kansas restructured income taxes for small businesses. It seems the tax cuts are turning out to be bigger than their designers expected. Some now worry that the result will be catastrophic: “Yes, if you cut taxes, you get less revenue,” writes Barro, who adds: “As revenue comes in over the next few months, Kansas will learn just how big of a tax cut it’s given out in the name of small business, and what it will have to do to the rest of the state budget to make the tax cut affordable.”
Despite widespread evidence to the contrary in places like Ohio, where I live, many believe tax cuts are essential for driving a state’s economic growth. About Kansas, Paul Krugman wrote yesterday: “But Kansas isn’t booming — in fact, its economy is lagging both neighboring states and America as a whole. Meanwhile, the state’s budget has plunged deep into deficit, provoking a Moody’s downgrade of its debt.”
Another measure of a state’s strength is the quality of its investment in the education of children and adolescents. In fact tax cuts, added to the lingering effects of the 2008 recession, are one of the reasons why the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities can report that 35 states are now spending less on public education than back in 2007 before the recession. If a state needs to cut expenditures (after tax cuts reduce revenue), the quickest place to go is the biggest line in most state budgets: public education. Schooling is a big investment because of the sheer size of the endeavor; across the 50 statesPennsylvania Budget Fails to Provide for Desperate Education Needs of Philadelphia’s Children | janresseger: