MA: Regional Budget (In the works)

[Badger]

I just glanced at this and haven't calculated the numbers to see if the region's in the black or not, but you're to be commended on the structure you've set up here. Very therough.

[Badger]

FYI, this is being worked on as promised. Problem is trying to figure out the likely outcome by comparing the RL numbers of over half a dozen RL state budgets and tax systems.

Please be patient.

[Badger]

FYI, this is being worked on as promised. Problem is trying to figure out the likely outcome by comparing the RL numbers of over half a dozen RL state budgets and tax systems.

Please be patient.

No problem. Let me know if you come upon another large/important tax I left out. I'm pretty sure I covered all the majors.

Update: I've reviewed some websites that I think will help give an overview of basic taxes and spending:

http://sunshinereview.org/core/state-budgets
http://sunshinereview.org/index.php/State_budget_issues,_2010-2011#Per_capita (click any state in Mideast)
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/#usgs302a (Ohio listed just for example; also click on taxes tab at top).

The info from the middle link frankly makes my head spin. All I need is some time to add the RL spending of "Mideast" states and compare the total to the proposed budget, then compare RL tax rates for those states to the proposal, and reasonably guesstimate the resulting surplus/deficit.

The last link provides some good ratios of RL state spending priorities in pie graph form, btw.

Any/everyone feel free to chime in with thoughts or questions (or even take the lead in calculations ).

[Badger]

We also need to figure out which statutes we'll want to grandfather in, and how they'll affect the budget.

However you guys want to do it is fine by me. You can review statute by statute to determine what effect they have on the final budget, or you can simply "punt" and assume the final numbers you decide on "include" any/all relevant prior statutes. The federal Budget Process Committee ultimately had to settle for this latter option, so again I'm fine with the region doing so too.

If there's anything historical that simply can't be ignored for the final numbers I'll let you all know, but I'll admit up front I'll be too busy to go looking.

FYI, my trial today plead out so I hope to have time to assess the budget proposal this afternoon. I'm going to try my darnedest to have my assessment to you all before the holiday.

[Badger]

If the Reichstag Assembly would please take a break from trying to enact the editoral page of The National Review into law, I might get a chance to work on data for the budget.

[Badger]

If the Reichstag Assembly would please take a break from trying to enact the editoral page of The National Review into law, I might get a chance to work on data for the budget.

You are free to leave that debate up to the Assembly and other members of the region if you would like to be able to focus on the budget then

I'd like nothing more, A-Bob. But with the Assembly and Governors office entirely consisting of right-wingers (minus Junkie), it feels like its fallen to me to be the de facto opposition representative of anyone in the Mideast to the left of Attila the Hun.

[Badger]

If the Reichstag Assembly would please take a break from trying to enact the editoral page of The National Review into law, I might get a chance to work on data for the budget.

You are free to leave that debate up to the Assembly and other members of the region if you would like to be able to focus on the budget then

I'd like nothing more, A-Bob. But with the Assembly and Governors office entirely consisting of right-wingers (minus Junkie), it feels like its fallen to me to be the de facto opposition representative of anyone in the Mideast to the left of Attila the Hun.

I vote we all push to the Hard Right just to annoy Badger.

Mission accomplished.

Besides, it'll just annoy A-Bob as yet another free spot on my calander is spent acting as the self-appointed Mideast's voice of reason rather than crunching the regional budget numbers.

[Badger]

If the Reichstag Assembly would please take a break from trying to enact the editoral page of The National Review into law, I might get a chance to work on data for the budget.

You are free to leave that debate up to the Assembly and other members of the region if you would like to be able to focus on the budget then

I'd like nothing more, A-Bob. But with the Assembly and Governors office entirely consisting of right-wingers (minus Junkie), it feels like its fallen to me to be the de facto opposition representative of anyone in the Mideast to the left of Attila the Hun.

I vote we all push to the Hard Right just to annoy Badger.

Mission accomplished.

Oh, you haven't seen "Far Right" yet. You're just seeing somewhere between Moderate and Conservative.

The fact that you honestly seem to believe that is....concerning.

Don't fly too close to the sun, young Icarus. The voters of this region are still largely moderates.

[Badger]

If the Reichstag Assembly would please take a break from trying to enact the editoral page of The National Review into law, I might get a chance to work on data for the budget.

You are free to leave that debate up to the Assembly and other members of the region if you would like to be able to focus on the budget then

I'd like nothing more, A-Bob. But with the Assembly and Governors office entirely consisting of right-wingers (minus Junkie), it feels like its fallen to me to be the de facto opposition representative of anyone in the Mideast to the left of Attila the Hun.

First off, I somewhat take offense to being labeled a right-winger, as my record both in the Senate and as Governor reflect otherwise. On several pieces of legislation, I have rejected some of the Assembly's rightist requests, and tried to compromise. Similar to the position Mitt Romney was in as Governor, there's not really a whole lot I can do, as the conservatives have numbers to override me. So the best I can do is tone down the legislation a bit. You act like you're being completely ignored, and that's not the case. I've taken in your suggestions on multiple occasions, especially on the union bill, and have made amendments to meet your requests.

Badger, you keep whining and moaning about the work being done in this Assembly. You know, we wouldn't be passing all these right-wing bills if we'd have something to work with from the GM's office. All you've given us to this point is a vague unemployment number that shows the work we've done in the past few months has lowered our unemployment numbers. Maybe instead of constantly complaining about the work we're doing and messaging every single moderate or liberal in the region, urging them to run for the Assembly or for Governor, you could actually do your job and give us the reports we've been asking for since you took your job several months ago. And if you really have a problem with the work being done in the Mideast, why don't you run for office yourself?

Gov:

1) No offense, Issac, but notwithstanding opposition to capital punishment and and commendable support for animal welfare, you are still quite conservative. Not Sharron Angle or Ken Buck conservative, but still decidedly well right of center. Yes, you can and do compromise and have an equally commendable pragmatic streak, but when a rather staunch conservative such as yourself has become the "political center" for the Mideastern government, well that kind of proves my point.

2) Honestly, I would love nothing more than to be able to be GM. I actually have had the printed out paperwork to run the budget numbers (and FWIW, recruited Dr. Cynic last week to help) for weeks. This is literally the 3rd or 4th afternoon or morning I've had free and planned on crunching the numbers but felt I had to respond to the Reichstag's Assembly's head long lurch to the right (which as Cathcon has indicated, maybe has only just begun).

I'm not going to apologize for that. This region's government has long been a well balanced mix of parties and ideologies, then after the last election its suddenly 100% RPP and everyone but Junkie, a moderate, is a staunch conservative--and at least 2-3 of them are hard right conservatives well out of step for this region. Looking at the voter census, only about half the voters are RPP or Pops, but the government is acting like it wants to be the new IDS. And you expect the rest of the region to be silent about this? I'm only sorry that others like Ben and Happy are too busy in Nyman and others not active enough that I'm the only one voicing such concerns (publically at least).

3) Yes, Issac, I've PM'd 3 people looking for some balance in the regional government. As I've noted above, it desperately needs it. Again, I'd love nothing more to be full time GM again rather than voice of reason/de facto opposition leader. I don't want to have to lead recall and initiative petitions, but faced with this government, what are the options? Ignore it? And I'm asking others to take up that banner so that I don't have to!

And for the record, I'm more than committed to this job as GM. I've turned down offers to run for VP and President in the last week to do it. But if things don't slow down, yes, I may be forced against my very dear wishes to stay GM to instead run for governor to put the brakes on. I really don't want to, but....

4) I'm sorry you're frustrated with my distraction from GM duties to actually be active in regional government. So am I. BUT, just among many many examples, when we have the Speaker of the Assembly and RPP candidate for governor literally proposing to prohibit free speech and association rights to prohibit union organizing in private businesses, and then pushes legalization of blacklisting union organizers for employment, what is one to expect? (Yes, your opposition to both is duly noted, but A-Bob wasn't alone in supporting this either, and as Cathcon noted above there's no plans to stop....)

In short, I only spend so much time objecting because there is an unprecedented amount of objectionable stuff being proposed. With respect, Governor, I believe most Mideasterners would consider the government's abandonment of centerism to be the problem here, rather than my objections to that development.

[Badger]

If the Reichstag Assembly would please take a break from trying to enact the editoral page of The National Review into law, I might get a chance to work on data for the budget.

You are free to leave that debate up to the Assembly and other members of the region if you would like to be able to focus on the budget then

I'd like nothing more, A-Bob. But with the Assembly and Governors office entirely consisting of right-wingers (minus Junkie), it feels like its fallen to me to be the de facto opposition representative of anyone in the Mideast to the left of Attila the Hun.

First off, I somewhat take offense to being labeled a right-winger, as my record both in the Senate and as Governor reflect otherwise. On several pieces of legislation, I have rejected some of the Assembly's rightist requests, and tried to compromise. Similar to the position Mitt Romney was in as Governor, there's not really a whole lot I can do, as the conservatives have numbers to override me. So the best I can do is tone down the legislation a bit. You act like you're being completely ignored, and that's not the case. I've taken in your suggestions on multiple occasions, especially on the union bill, and have made amendments to meet your requests.

Badger, you keep whining and moaning about the work being done in this Assembly. You know, we wouldn't be passing all these right-wing bills if we'd have something to work with from the GM's office. All you've given us to this point is a vague unemployment number that shows the work we've done in the past few months has lowered our unemployment numbers. Maybe instead of constantly complaining about the work we're doing and messaging every single moderate or liberal in the region, urging them to run for the Assembly or for Governor, you could actually do your job and give us the reports we've been asking for since you took your job several months ago. And if you really have a problem with the work being done in the Mideast, why don't you run for office yourself?

BTW: Please don't try to place the responsibility, Governor, of the above bolded part as a lack of a budget analysis from the GM's Office. Much of the Assembly seems quite committed to its cause of action regardless.

You wrote a very well reasoned post, Isaac, albeit I disagree with it as previously noted. As far as that silly line, however, I'm calling you on it.

But hey, if a budget analysis will really distract the Assembly even temporarily with something new and shiny, I'll be on it in an hour after coming back from lunch.

[Badger]

OK, Mideast: Here is a preliminary comparison of the proposed budget's spending to RL spending. First, a couple of ground rules:

First off: CHECK MY WORK AND COMMENT FREELY IF YOU THINK I'M FACTORING/ADDING THINGS WRONG. While, yes, the GM has the final say on what is "reality", but I trust a group's review of facts more than my individual judgment (as long as I'm part of that group, of course  ).

Secondly, this is a review of spending only. A comparison of tax rates and resulting surplus or deficit will come later once Dr. Cynic has provided me the review of RL state tax info I've requested.

Third, A-Bob's quite therough budget outline paralleled the NathanNewmann Budget Simulation the Atlasian federal government adopted. A very good choice. The only problem is that there is no similar on-line model for RL state budgets (at least that I've found), let alone one that combines several state budgets like the Mideast region. Accordingly I've been basing the RL spending on this website. My point here is there's going to be a certain amount of trying to fit a round peg into a square hole between the Assembly's outline and these numbers. I'm going to rely on the regional government to translate between the two.

Finally, I didn't include DC in the calculations as "state spending" is largely a misnomer there and skews the numbers. Also numbers and percentages may not add up exactly due to rounding. (But don't hesitate to point out any errors that are apparently bigger than mere "rounding").

So here is a comparison to RL FY2010 spending in the states comprising the Mideast (in $ Bil):

TOTAL SPENDING: $325.8 Billion

Pensions: $42.7 (13.1%)

Health Care: $99.7 (30.6%)

Education: $67.9 (20.8%)

Welfare: $36.5 (11.2%)

Protection: $19.2 (5.9%)

Transportation: $25.8 (7.9%)

Other: $35.0 (10.7%)


FYI: The total RL budget shortfall of "Mideastern" states is 35.5 Bil, but that has no bearing on the Mideastern numbers until tax rates are completed. (Dr. Cynic just forwarded a list of RL sales taxes for my review, so we're making progress there--thanks Doc!).

A couple notes on these numbers: Do you all see what I mean about fitting the square peg of the Assembly's budget outline into the round hole of these numbers with their only 7 broad spending categories? Since you've all been chomping at the bit to do something, it'll be up to you guys to figure out if the budget priorities are where you want them by comparing these broad catagories to your own proposal. I'll offer any additional detail requested if possible. I suggest first looking at the other two links I provided earlier in the thread.

I'll simply note two observations without judgment: First, there is no provision in the Assembly's outline for pensions; that will have to be addressed as the GM's office will assume the regional budget, like the RL states, carry a heavy load of such expenses. How you want to address it is up to you, of course. Secondly, although the outline spends over 10% more money than RL, it still spends considerably less (at first glance) on education and health care. Much of this seems to stem from the $160 Billion in tax credits that may be more applicable to the federal budget at first glance (though obviously there's no reason the Mideast can't adopt regional level tax credits).

This should give you all enough to do until I get the analysis of the tax proposal done. Thanks for your patience, and the floor is open for questions, comments, invective, etc.

[Badger]

I see how I've missed pensions though as pensions are addressed via tax credits but not as budget spending.

Well, sort of. The tax credits you refer to....

Pension & Retirement Deductions ($46.49 billion)
$17.55 billion ..... Employer-paid Pensions (No Change)
$15.55 billion ..... 401Ks & Keogh plans (No Change)
$2.41 billion ...... IRAs (No Change)
$10.12 billion ..... Group and personal life insurance benefits (No Change)
$0.86 billion ...... Other retirement benefits (No Change)


....are federal tax deductions for various pension and retirement payments, but not the actual pension/retirement plan payments themselves. The payment of pensions is a separate matter to address. I'm really not sure if these deductions match what the various "Mideast" states in RL lose from exclusions from state taxation or not. Anybody?

However, if you put a gun to my head and forced a guess I'd say the deductions would be a smaller percentage compared to the federal budget, simply because state taxes rely more on sales and property taxes than income and estate taxes.

If someone wants to do even "tip of the iceburg" level research on this, using even just one RL "Mideastern" state, please feel free as it could save the region a lot of revenue. Calculating the relative share of tax breaks/exemptions for regional "spending" compared to the federal budget's share of "spending" would be a good first step.

I'd take a few minutes with a calculator and do it myself, but I gotta get to court.

[Badger]

Are you in the assembly Badger? You should if your not.

Been there, done that. It was some of my happiest time in Atlasia. Nope, just a happy busybody. AS GM that's kinda my job.

[Badger]

Here's an initial calculation of "sales" (i.e. "ad valorum") taxes in the Mideast. Again, the key here is please check my work and make corrections, comments where you believe my numbers are wrong.

Here is the report SoIA Dr. Cynic prepared at my request re: RL sales taxes (Thanks Doc!):

IN - 7%
KY - 6%
MD - 6%
MO - 4% (rounded)
VA - 4%
WI - 5%

MI - 6%
OH - 6% (Rounded)
IL - 6% (Rounded)

Those are the sales tax figures

I advised him to not include DC or WV for now. Assessing the first 6 states as "size 1" states, and the latter 3 as "size 2"--and thus giving them double weight for averaging the regional sales tax--this averaged a RL sales tax of: 5.67%. It was too hard to average in WV as a "size 1/2" state, so I'll say their 6% sales tax bumps up the RL regional average to: 5.7%

Based on the website below (also linked at the bottom post of page 1 in this thread:

http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/#usgs302a

I added the total RL revenue of all ad valorum taxes (more on the distinction between these and sales taxes later) to be: $76.4 Billion

Translating that from an average 5.7% sales tax rate to the 1% sales tax rate proposed for the Mideast results in net revenue of: $13.4 Billion. This is a shortfall of $63 Billion from real life which would have to be cut further from the budget---maybe....

First, I haven't yet calculated what revenues will be raised from other taxes like income, etc. Dr. Cynic hopes to have a similar rundown of RL state income tax rates in Mideastern states over the weekend (thanks again, Doc--you rock! ).

More importantly, the "ad valorum" taxes in RL don't include property taxes. The Mideast is proposing a rather unusual tax structure. In RL property taxes are almost entirely assessed by local governments rather than state (regional) governments, and have been so for about a century. Now, I'm not sure I personally oppose the RL theory of emphasizing property taxes over sales taxes as the latter are far more regressive. But that's a policy decision for the region.

There are, however, 2 major factors to consider: First, these state regional property taxes would be in addition to all property taxes currently assessed by local governments and school districts, which are no less heavy in Atlasia than in RL. While the region would have a really low sales tax rate (only a couple states are lower in RL), it would be a bitch to property owners.

The second factor is that is going to be an absolute bitch for yours truly to even guesstimate the revenue produced by such a region wide property tax. I can add and estimate RL comparisons for sales tax, income tax, etc. to compare, but a state-wide property tax is absolutely without comparison.

While I really don't want to stifle creativity, I'm going to at least float the idea of giving Mideastern property owners a break (as well as the GM ) and seriously consider replacing the property tax for an increase elsewhere in taxes I can actually measure like sales, income and excise.

Thoughts?

[Badger]

I had sales tax low and property added to spread revenue out, though I wouldn't be opposed to just a higher sales tax, though I'd like the rest of the numbers completed first since spending should be lower than all the states RL combined and then we can go from there.

Por que'?

[Badger]

I had sales tax low and property added to spread revenue out, though I wouldn't be opposed to just a higher sales tax, though I'd like the rest of the numbers completed first since spending should be lower than all the states RL combined and then we can go from there.

Por que'?

As you already said, the states combined at almost 36 billion in the hole. Plus there's a whole lot of waste. Illinois is approaching the 10 billion mark on education and have nothing to show for it (btw that's over half of Colorado's entire budget )

"Nothing to show for it"? Cite?

Wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that IL has about 3 times CO's population would it?

[Badger]

Any observations/problems with the calculations we produced for sales tax revenue? FWIW, if you eliminate the regional property tax (please, on behalf of beleaguered property owners and GM's everywhere ) and raise the sales tax to 5.7%, the GM's office estimates that it will raise the same "ad valorum tax" revenue as RL--$76.4 Billion.

BTW: I forgot to mention, these calculations include an exemption on sales taxes for groceries and prescription medication which most Mideastern states have in RL. Any increases/reductions in that 5.7% rate (0% on groceries and prescriptions) will accordingly increase or decrease revenues from that $76.4 Bil level.

[Badger]

I would be fine supporting this proposal. However, we may not need to even raise it all the way to 5.7%. It will be much more clear on where we can cut and balance taxes once we get everything in, but I see no problem with this, especially wit hthe exemptions you mentioned.

Whatever level you guys want to set it at is your collective decision. My simple point is that, upon (hopeful ) elimination of the regional level property tax, the "baseline" level for sales tax is 5.7% (with exemptions for groceries and prescriptions)= $76.4 Billion in revenue.

[Badger]

Good news. I've found some websites with income tax rate info.

http://swz.salary.com/salarywizard/layouthtmls/swzl_statetaxrate_oh.html

http://www.bankrate.com/brm/itax/edit/state/profiles/state_tax_Ohio.asp

I won't have much chance to work on this stuff until Friday, and I have <gasp> non-forum stuff planned all weekend. If anyone want to even try averaging the non-flat income tax states rates out in the meantime to speed things up I won't complain.

[Badger]

Wait a minute, A-Bob. At the risk of seeming ungrateful---and I am for the elimination of the property tax; it'll keep the region from having the highest home taxes in the country as well as make my job easier---please don't feel you have to change the income tax rates just to make my job easier. Seriously, once I figure out an "average" RL income tax rate for states in the Mideast, comparing and calculating the income produced by a regional income tax rate will be a snap. Besides, the rates you're changing to are consistant with Ohio's RL rates only, but vary widely from most other states in the region.

It'll be tricky to "average" tax brackets, but I can do it. Tell you what, since its little work once the RL "average" income tax is determined, I'll do revenue analysis for both proposed tax rates.

Thanks for trying to make it easier on me anyway.

[Badger]

$4.99 billion ..... Other Corporate Tax Breaks (No Change)

Is this going to be defined by statute, because it is worryingly nonspecific....

Feel free to look up every law pretaining to corporate taxes in the multiple Mideast states if you so choose to do so

This is based off of Atlasia's budget btw so they have the same thing going on. Obviously this game/simulation is never going to be as hard core as actual government where we spend our entire lives devoted to this budget.

Actually, I think you guys are going to be pleasantly surprised about that section, but I have to finalize some details in a conference call with a forum tax expert.

[Badger]

OK, another piece of the puzzle falls into place. Good news for the region actually.

My thanks to Torie for his help in analyzing the tax proposal (being a lawyer with significant tax background). Please review the section of spending entitled "Tax expenditures and Tax Cuts" totaling $163.75 Billion in "spending" (an odd use of the term based on the NathanNewman budget sim's terminology, but whatever).

Upon consultation with wise graybeards , it would appear that these deductions are already included in state taxes the same as federal taxes. As I am calculating regional revenues based on comparing regional tax rates to RL tax rates and the revenue it produces--which, again, are already subject to these same tax deductions--these deductions have no effect on regional revenues for the starting budget as the current deduction level is not being changed in any category.

Bottom Line: We can remove the $163.75 Bil in "spending" from the budget as the deductions will already be included in the calculation of regional revenues. That should give some serious breathing room.

But before we celebrate too much, please note there's still some serious red ink I predict. I hope to have an analysis of income tax revenue done before the weekend.

[Badger]

Wouldn't the tax cuts be subject to the current budget though? As in here's the 10% rate say for something, but you only have to pay 8% this year?

Still, I'm win with save $163.75 billion

Sorry, I'm not sure I understand your question, A-Bob. In a nutshell the above listed tax deductions are included in the upcoming budget to the same extent as allowed in RL (which according to Torie most states will allow deductions to the same extent as the federal government does). As there is currently no proposed change to the level of such tax deductions, they will already be included in the final calculation of revenue collected and therefore don't impact "spending" levels at all. If such deductions are to be expanded or reduced from present levels in the future, however, that will then obviously affect revenue levels.

BTW: IF they are well-behaved tomorrow (the big key being whether our 5 month old demands to be held for hours straight or if he'll nap), then I MAY actually have close to a final analysis for the budget by Tuesday. Keep fingers crossed.

[Badger]

Okay, after talks with Tmth, I'm attempting to get more involved here.

First off, I'm a bit confused as to how this works, as it seems that Badger, instead of calculating the tax rates of the Mid-East region, it seems you are calculating the real life tax rates/spending of the states that the Mid-East region would occupy if in real life. Is this true? I'm trying to understand how this works.

RL numbers is the only way we can make this somewhat realistic. Otherwise Badger would be pulling numbers out of thin air which is more or less what has happened with the GM position before governments started to actually create deatiled budgets.

Right. I'm comparing the amount of revenue raised by RL states with their RL tax rates, and using that as a basis to calculate how much revenue the tax rates set by the Assembly and Governor would raise.

[Badger]

So, looking over the thread, it seems that the number that we have is either 76.4 billion, or 163.75 billion. However, the second numer is the number you mentioned that we'd save. I'm trying to figure out from what the rest of you are saying, how much we have to spend here.

no..... We have $163.75 billion in tax credits which we can subtract now and $76.4 billion of revenue from the sales tax to be at that 5.6% rate was it?

Close. The budget currently has $196.4 Bil allocated for spending, and a 5.7% regional tax rate (with groceries and prescription meds exempt) will raise $76.4 Billion in revenue.

Income tax analysis being typed up now.