Monday, March 18, 2013

Marylanders; overtaxed, overregulated, overwhelmed


Marylanders: overtaxed, overregulated, overwhelmed

 

Recently Maryland’s Governor Martin O’Malley released the state’s budget for the next fiscal year, a number so large that any rational mind would have trouble conceptualizing it for such a small state. Ceremoniously, the Governor noted the new state budget would be 37.5 billion dollars. To provide some sense and perspective to this number, another very blue state was chosen for comparison, California. The Golden State has a population of 38 million, Maryland’s comes in at under 6 million. Geographically Maryland has approximately 7% of California’s square mileage. Though Maryland has only 15% of the left coast’s population and 7% of its land area, the Free State’s budget is 25% of California’s 146 billion dollar fiasco. The question arises: Why does Maryland need this level of funding to survive? Maryland is not at war, except with its taxpayers, therefore it requires no payments to support an army. A close analysis of the budget notes it floods a bloated state workforce with pay increases and incentive bonuses. Public Schools are overfunded with billions of dollars of gravy that will not improve education, but will bring in the votes from teachers, to keep the democrat horde in power. Higher education now needs more funding since illegals were given the right to pay in-state tuition during the 2012 election. Medicaid will be budgeted at record levels instead of attempting to innovate this program to reduce costs. The Rainy Day Fund will be further enhanced, to quietly feed choice programs of the Governor.  Nowhere in this monster budget is their relief for the poor taxpayer. Regulations continue to pour out of the Maryland legislature to extort money from businesses to feed this behemoth. Our state Comptroller’s office is busy sending out thousands of letters each week, finding new and creative ways to burden the population in order to pay for O’Malley’s financial follies. Ironically, this newest state budget assumes more not less revenue from the feds. If the latter is not satirical, the state accountants believe the 4% tax increase on six figure incomes, approved last year, will also enable this fantasy budget to be funded. Once before millionaires were selected out for surtaxes and somehow 1,000 of them vanished from state tax rolls.  Governor O’Malley is blind to the financial disasters now plaguing other blue states. The crunch will soon come when taxpayers understand the motivations of our lawyer governor. Maryland is a Mecca for the entitlement crowd. Democrats feed this crowd to stay in power. We all know who these people are and the fringe benefits they receive just for existing. Many counties and cities throughout the country are facing bankruptcy, it is only a matter of time before Maryland has to pay the piper. O’Malley and his minions will not be around when the downturn comes, his aspirations are west of Annapolis. Maryland’s overreach will be the same hand that buries the state financially, unfortunately there may be no other hands to bail the state out. Mark Davis, MD

President of Healthnets Review Services, www.healthnetsreviewservice.com

platomd@gmail.com Manager of the political group on LinkedIn, Government in Transition. Please join in and comment.

No comments:

Post a Comment