House Budget Plan Would Cause Huge Job Losses, According to Official Estimate: The House plan to cut $23 billion from the state budget, including $7.8 billion in school formula aid and more than another $1 billion in school grants, would have a devastating impact on employment and the economy in our state. That assessment comes not from outside critics of the House budget but from lawmakers' own expert in-house budget analysts at the Legislative Budget Board.
The LBB analysis says the state would have 272,000 fewer jobs in 2012 and 335,000 fewer in 2013 under the House budget coming to the floor for a vote on April 1. These figures include private-sector job losses totaling 117,000 in 2012 and 146,000 in 2013. Of course the estimated total job losses also imply massive reductions in public employment at all levels. The overall effect would be to boost the state's unemployment rate above 10 percent and stunt economic growth.
The LBB was required to prepare this impact statement under an astute amendment to the House rules proposed by Rep. Mike Villarreal, Democrat of San Antonio, early in the session. Rep. Villarreal yesterday voted along with the other Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee against this latest version of HB 1. He said today: "The voters did not elect us to eliminate hundreds of thousands of jobs. We have to be smarter than this. We can't grow the Texas economy with a budget that destroys jobs, hurts neighborhood schools, and makes college more expensive. If Republicans were willing to fix the $10 billion budget hole they created in 2006 and tap the Rainy Day Fund, we could save these jobs and save our schools."
It was in 2006 that the legislature, prodded by Gov. Rick Perry, forced school districts to cut local school taxes and promised to replace the lost school revenue with proceeds of a new state business tax. That business tax has never produced the revenue needed, and the state now has a structural shortfall of $5 billion a year as a result.
The LBB analysis says the state would have 272,000 fewer jobs in 2012 and 335,000 fewer in 2013 under the House budget coming to the floor for a vote on April 1. These figures include private-sector job losses totaling 117,000 in 2012 and 146,000 in 2013. Of course the estimated total job losses also imply massive reductions in public employment at all levels. The overall effect would be to boost the state's unemployment rate above 10 percent and stunt economic growth.
The LBB was required to prepare this impact statement under an astute amendment to the House rules proposed by Rep. Mike Villarreal, Democrat of San Antonio, early in the session. Rep. Villarreal yesterday voted along with the other Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee against this latest version of HB 1. He said today: "The voters did not elect us to eliminate hundreds of thousands of jobs. We have to be smarter than this. We can't grow the Texas economy with a budget that destroys jobs, hurts neighborhood schools, and makes college more expensive. If Republicans were willing to fix the $10 billion budget hole they created in 2006 and tap the Rainy Day Fund, we could save these jobs and save our schools."
It was in 2006 that the legislature, prodded by Gov. Rick Perry, forced school districts to cut local school taxes and promised to replace the lost school revenue with proceeds of a new state business tax. That business tax has never produced the revenue needed, and the state now has a structural shortfall of $5 billion a year as a result.
Just remember that the superintendent has already raised our taxes 3 times in the last 3 years.
ReplyDeleteDistrict officials, though, say they are unfairly strapped for cash. The state has capped their funding at 2005 or 2006 levels.
ReplyDelete"It's easy to understand the funding crisis that school districts across the state have when you consider that state funding to schools is frozen, but our costs are not," said Karen Collier, of the Humble Independent School District.