Gov. Jon Corzine has announced what is being described as unprecedented — but that is not necessarily a good thing.
The governor said Tuesday that he will need to cut $812 million from the current-year budget — on top of the $600 million cut included in the original spending plan when it was approved in June. The cuts — which would include antipoverty programs, agriculutural spending, aid to towns and schools and a wage freeze — are designed to close a $2.1 billion shortfall in the $32.9 billion budget. The shortfall is a result of the flagging economy, which has resulted in a massive dropoff in tax revenue. The governor also is expecting money from the federal government and a diversion of debt payments — he had planned to pay more against the debt than required in an effort to retire some of it early — to close the gap, according to the Ledger.
“These are deep cuts that touch every corner of state government,” the governor
said. “We scraped the bottom of the barrel,” added state Treasurer David Rousseau. “There were accounts that we found that had 99 cents left in them.”
There also could be tax increases included in the budget that will be proposed in March.
There is nothing good about this kind of news, which is likely to slow the state’s recovery from the recession, as Paul Krugman has pointed out. But the balanced-budget requirement and the state’s political culture — tax hikes tend to trigger ugly reactions — have tied the governor’s hands.
Of course, legislative Republicans are using the budget as a political club, purposely ignoring the difficult decisions he already has made — and forgetting (conveniently) that Republican Gov. Christie Whitman used fiscal sleight-of-hand to pass her tax cuts, only cutting spending that was popular among Democrats and leaving much of the state’s bloated government intact.
That said, the Republicans — and tentative Democrats — are only responding to political realities. We — meaning New Jersey’s taxpayers — have never been good at making sacrifices. Because of that, the budgetary pain we are feeling is only going to get worse.
Hank Kalet 