IDS Budget and Tax Committee

[Yelnoc]

Thank you, Emperor PiT, for setting this up.  I want to apologize for my absence; I haven't had time for much else than a few posts in the 2012 forum this week.  I don't have much to report on the budget as of yet.

As the first action of this body, I propose that each co-chair present his findings in this thread one day out of every week, effective this week.  This way, the committee won't slip our minds quite as easily.

To the citizens of the IDS: Please Help!  This is a big task; we need all the help we can get.  If you remember reading somewhere about something related to the South/Southeast/Dirty South/Imperial Dominion of the South's budget, please let us know.

With that said, may the fun begin!

[Yelnoc]

     I am fine with that proposal. Actually, I think I might make one post at the beginning of each week & edit it to include any new findings as the week progresses. That should be a good way to keep my thoughts organized.

Sounds great.

I was looking through wiki and, unless I read it wrong, the only laws cataloged are initiatives.  I realize this is probably outside the scope of this committee but, if that's correct, something must be done to update it.

[Yelnoc]

     I am fine with that proposal. Actually, I think I might make one post at the beginning of each week & edit it to include any new findings as the week progresses. That should be a good way to keep my thoughts organized.

Sounds great.

I was looking through wiki and, unless I read it wrong, the only laws cataloged are initiatives.  I realize this is probably outside the scope of this committee but, if that's correct, something must be done to update it.

     Indeed, not a single law has been catalogued since the creation of the Legislature. I have a lot to do this weekend, but I'll try to get at least a couple of laws up on the Wiki.

Sounds good.  Do you, by any chance, know where to find the old legislative threads?  Search didn't turn up anything.

[Yelnoc]

Heartily endorsed! This is something I hope all regions will undertake in some form in the foreseeable future.

Please let me know how the GM's Office can be of assistance.

Thank you.  If you happen to be looking through any old papers in your office that have (one of the south's many) names on it and a $ figure next to the name, please let us know. 

[Yelnoc]

Cataloging the Legislature

My first step will be to catalog every spending bill passed by the Southeast/IDS legislature.  I'll edit this post.  PiT, if you would do the same for the initiatives I would be very grateful.

*     *     *

Imperial Dominion of the South's Legislature

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-page 13; April 18, 2010

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-page 17; May 11, 2010*

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page 33; July 23, 2010*

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-page 44; September 23, 2010*

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-page 58; November 28, 2010
NOTE: This is the Highway Fund from the federal government (I think)

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-page 59' November 20, 2010

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-page 60; December 1, 2010

2010 Federal Stimulus Act
-page 61 (old copy); December 3, 2010

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-page 61; December 5, 2010
NOTE: This somehow ties in with the 2010 Federal Stimulus Act (How?)

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-page 68; December 30, 2010
NOTE: With the passage of this bill, $300 million is left from money allocated by the Federal Government for infrastructure projects

[Yelnoc]

My first post exceeded the 11,000 character limit so below is the rest of it.  So that's everything money-related in the Legislative thread.  I did notice some bills without any monetary specifications but budgetary implications (just about everything that doesn't have to do with the rules, function and names of government).  Do I need to go back and log all of that so it can be taken into account when we create the budget or can we just use Georgia law in these grey areas.  Also, when it comes to our baseline tax revenue, should it be based off the actual total population of the United States southeast or should be use a mathematical equation based on our in-game population to arrive at that total?

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-page 73; January 20, 2011
NOTE: I'm feeling quite stimulated

Atlasia Dispatch-Herald

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-page 16; April 29, 2010

[Yelnoc]

Also, when it comes to our baseline tax revenue, should it be based off the actual total population of the United States southeast or should be use a mathematical equation based on our in-game population to arrive at that total?

     For the stimulus bills, I came up with apportionment figures for the states based on the assumption that their populations were the same as in real life. As such, for the sake of consistency, I think we should use the actual populations of these states.

Sounds good.  I was thinking, if this is just a one-time thing it will be a complete waste.  Once we have our budget, tax, and debt figures, we should maintain them.  Thus, I propose we eventually repeal the law that the repealed the Regional Budget Creation Initiative (or preferably write our own).  The budget could (and should) be based off the previous years so we don't have to write up a new one and can be compiled by the Attorney General and Governor and then ratified by the Legislature.

[Yelnoc]

Let me offer some general ideas for a framework based on what the Mideast has done. I emphasize "general" and "framework" as the IDS will characteristically do its own thing.

Check out the links in the following posts in the budget thread:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=128143.msg2756417#msg2756417
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=128143.msg2769048#msg2769048
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=128143.msg2774577#msg2774577
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=128143.msg2789445#msg2789445
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=128143.msg2789731#msg2789731

The benefit here is it allows comparison to real life for several broad spending and taxing catagories. The structure makes it relatively simple to assess the results of taxing and spending decisions based on RL comparison. The actual taxing and spending levels within that framework are 100% your own.

Thoughts?

Phew!

That's a lot.  A very good suggestion but it will take some work.  Looking down that list, I noticed categories that the SE has never past spending bills related to.  Should we assume that we were spending in these categories during the past few years or not?  If we don't, we will have an unrealistically large surplus without any of the negatives associated with not spending any money in some of the categories.  However, that seems like a bit of a realism killer.

[Yelnoc]

Regional Revenues

This is the IDS taxation history based on the information from my catalog and PiT's work.  Remember, these are only state taxes; the citizens would also be paying federal taxes (would they be paying state taxes?).

$2 Billion surplus as of April 29, 2010

Corporate Tax
July 1-December 31, 2010: 10%
January 1, 2011-present: 8.6%
All businesses created after May 11, 2010 did not have to pay taxes for the remainder of 2010 and will only pay 5% for 2011; after December 31, 2011 they will pay the full 8.6%.

Excise Taxes
$1.00 per alcoholic beverage
Nuclear and biomass power are 80% less than what it would be under law
$0.08 per liter of liquid fuel
$1.00 fee on driver licenses to pay for Sex Offender Database
$5.00 fee for license plates; one-time only

Sales Taxes
Nuclear power is 10% less than what it would be under law (is there another law related to this?)

Property Taxes
Nuclear power plants pay $50,000 per megawatt generation capacity

Tax Credits
$1,000 to households with full-time student beginning in Fall 2010; only applies to households with income under $250,000
$500 to households with part-time student beginning in Fall 2010; only applies to households with income under $250,000

Miscellaneous
80% of ticket sales from Giant Pentagram

[Yelnoc]

Federal Charity

Highway Fund
$15 Billion total (Federal Money)
$750 Million authorized to the IDS
$140 Million for Duke Greenway
$100 Million for Blanche-Lincoln Boulevard
$510 Million authorized
$14,760 Million total (Federal control)

Stimulation Station
$5 Billion for Infrastructure + Sewage and Water treatment/filtration + Power Grid updates and maintenance
$3 Billion for Education
$2 Billion for Coal to Liquid Plants
$400 Million for Wind Power Plants
$500 Million for Solar Power Plants
$5 Billion allocated to the states for infrastructure
$3 Billion spent on Education
$2 Billion spent on Coal to Liquid Plants
$990 Million spent on Worker Retraining Program
$10 Million spent on Regional Building Renovation
$2 Billion spent on Education (Clause 4, Sub-clause B is not a valid part of the 2010 Federal Stimulus Act
$1 Billion for the construction of Coal to Liquid Plants
Balanced- all money spent as allocated.

[Yelnoc]

As of April 29, 2010, we had a $2 Billion dollar surplus.  That means that, regardless of our actual spending levels before then, we ended up with a $2 Billion surplus.  Badger, If we discover that this doesn't match up can you just use your handwave powers so that we can still have a $2 billion surplus.

[Yelnoc]

As of April 29, 2010, we had a $2 Billion dollar surplus.  That means that, regardless of our actual spending levels before then, we ended up with a $2 Billion surplus.  Badger, If we discover that this doesn't match up can you just use your handwave powers so that we can still have a $2 billion surplus.

It all depends. The economy tanking has had a real hit on tax revenues.

It'll all come down to tax revenue and spending, but I doubt you'll have anywhere near that amount of surplus to begin with.

Could you link the $2 Bil surplus estimate, please?

Right Here.https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=101096.msg2467899#msg2467899

And I meant that we had a surplus as of the time we were told we had a surplus.  What we have now will be different, probably a lot less.

[Yelnoc]

As of April 29, 2010, we had a $2 Billion dollar surplus.  That means that, regardless of our actual spending levels before then, we ended up with a $2 Billion surplus.  Badger, If we discover that this doesn't match up can you just use your handwave powers so that we can still have a $2 billion surplus.

It all depends. The economy tanking has had a real hit on tax revenues.

It'll all come down to tax revenue and spending, but I doubt you'll have anywhere near that amount of surplus to begin with.

Could you link the $2 Bil surplus estimate, please?

Right Here.https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=101096.msg2467899#msg2467899

And I meant that we had a surplus as of the time we were told we had a surplus.  What we have now will be different, probably a lot less.

Gotcha, and thanks.

Again, let me offer this piece of advice: To maintain consistency in budgeting its very important for the GM's Office and the IDS Region to be on the same page and using the same structure.

For that reason I suggest using this website. If you pick a state in the IDS (Texas for example) and click on spending for 2011, the lower right hand corner will show the State's real life spending divided into 6 major categories (pensions, health care, education, etc). If you click on 2011 in that graph, it takes you to a slightly more detailed breakdown of spending with a couple additional spending categories ("general government", "interest", etc. see Texas here), and each of those spending categories can be expanded to various subcategories (e.g. Education subdivides into spending for pre-primary through secondary education, tertiary education, and education not definable by level; each of those subcategories can also be subdivided into sub-sub categories of spending for even more details on spending.

The taxes link for each state offers similar breakdowns of tax revenues from various sources in different levels of breakdown, from general to detailed. Whether you guys want to use the most detailed breakdowns available with all the spending/taxing subcategories available, or if you want to just use the most basic breakdown of about half a general categories listed here, is totally up to you. Likewise, the actual spending and taxing levels are totally up to you gas well.

However, propose using this website's basic structure to design your own regional budget. It allows me as GM to make ready comparisons to RL spending and tax revenues levels, and again keeps us all on the same page. Its been invaluable in getting the Mideast budget off the ground.

But as always, its your game and your decision. Any thoughts or comments here?

That's a splendid idea; thank you very much for showing us that website.  This will make the project a lot easier.  I think we'll go as in-depth as we can in certain areas and leave the rest in the "basic" format if that's possible. 

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I couldn't figure it out, but then my legalese isn't the greatest.  If you can point out the problem, I'll be glad to adjust the balance.  Also, great job with cataloging the initiatives.

[Yelnoc]

Budget

This category organizes previously passed initiatives, bills, and the like into Badger's categories.  Once we have hard numbers, I'm going to put this all in a spreadsheet for aesthetics' sake.

Regional Spending

Pensions
-Base: 39.6 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Healthcare
-Base: 152.4 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Education
-Base: 210.7 billion (not including Puerto Rico)
-School Choice Initiative
-Southeastern Educational Incentive Act

Defense
-Base: 0.6 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Welfare
-Base: 48.7 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Protection
-Base: 64.5 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Transportation
-Base: 56.1 billion (not including Puerto Rico)
-Duke Greenway Road Creation Act
-Road Creation Act- Blanche Lincoln Boulevard- Monticello, Ark.

General Government
-Base: 22.3 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Other Spending
-Base: 111.8 billion (not including Puerto Rico)
-Pentagram Creation Act

Interest
-Base: 25 billion (not including Puerto Rico)
1%

Total Spending
-Base: 823.3 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Gross Public Debt
-Base: 726.8 billion (not including Puerto Rico)

Regional Revenues

Bottom Line

Balance

Non-Budgetary Statistics

Population
Alabama           4,708,708
Arkansas          2,889,450
Florida            18,537,969
Georgia             9,829,211
Kentucky           4,314,113
Louisina            4,492,076
Mississippi         2,951,996
North Carolina   9,380,884
Puerto Rico        3,967,288
South Carolina   4,561,242
Tennessee         6,296,254
Texas               24,782,302
Total                80,882,282

Federal Deficit: $401,040,000,000 (as of November 2010)

[Yelnoc]

Badger, we're going to need your help with the "Interest" section.  Also, has there been inflation in Atlasian currency since July 23, 2010?

Looking through those categories, I think I will need to go back and add bills to the categories that do not explicit allocate money but imply that there is money involved so that we can get a better overall picture.

[Yelnoc]

     2.e.4.B is this:

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Hmm...the copy of the act on page 1 only went through section Section 2, Sub-section A, Clause 10. 

[Yelnoc]

     There shouldn't be a 2.a.10 in the bill. For reference, this is the bill.

Thanks, my copy on page 1 looks outdated.  I will update the balance.

[Yelnoc]

Badger, we're going to need your help with the "Interest" section.  Also, has there been inflation in Atlasian currency since July 23, 2010?

Looking through those categories, I think I will need to go back and add bills to the categories that do not explicit allocate money but imply that there is money involved so that we can get a better overall picture.

Replied to your PM asking this (Florida was great last week ), but I'll note it here for everyone.

Interest has been, and continues to, run at a minimal rate of about 1% annually. If you want to jack everything up (revenues and expenditures) by about 1%, or just leave it as is for simplicities sake is fine with me.

Sounds good. 

Sorry to everyone for not getting much done; track season is in full gear.  Maybe I'll be able to put some time in Thursday.

I was thinking about something.  Each category should have a base, the budget that was (hypothetically) created when this region was formed.  All initiatives and bills should effect this base value rather than creating a new value.  With that said, where do those starting numbers come from?  Should we find this the same as population and add up real life state spending and revenue?  The problem there is that we would be heavily in debt yet we are supposed to have $2 billion surplus.  Could a item called "moderator love" be added to the "Interest" category to right this?

[Yelnoc]

Badger, we're going to need your help with the "Interest" section.  Also, has there been inflation in Atlasian currency since July 23, 2010?

Looking through those categories, I think I will need to go back and add bills to the categories that do not explicit allocate money but imply that there is money involved so that we can get a better overall picture.

Replied to your PM asking this (Florida was great last week ), but I'll note it here for everyone.

Interest has been, and continues to, run at a minimal rate of about 1% annually. If you want to jack everything up (revenues and expenditures) by about 1%, or just leave it as is for simplicities sake is fine with me.

Sounds good.  

Sorry to everyone for not getting much done; track season is in full gear.  Maybe I'll be able to put some time in Thursday.

I was thinking about something.  Each category should have a base, the budget that was (hypothetically) created when this region was formed.  All initiatives and bills should effect this base value rather than creating a new value.  With that said, where do those starting numbers come from?  Should we find this the same as population and add up real life state spending and revenue?  The problem there is that we would be heavily in debt yet we are supposed to have $2 billion surplus.  Could a item called "moderator love" be added to the "Interest" category to right this?

     I suggest that we adopt the sum of the current revenue & spending of all the states that comprise the region in real life to be the base figures for the region.

Added to expenses.  I'll do it for revenues on Thursday.

I wasn't sure whether to add up the state totals for interest and gross public debt; in the end I did but I can remove it if that was wrong.  Also, does anyone know where to find budgetary statistics for Puerto Rico?  Badger's excellent site did not include PR.

[Yelnoc]

     I don't know where I placed the link I had, but the region's laws are based on the 2006 Georgia statutes. As of 2009, Georgia had multiple income tax brackets, ranging from 1-6%.

     To my knowledge no significant changes have been made in that area. I do not think that any significant changes have been made in re sales tax either, though we now have a sales tax on marijuana, something which no real life state does for obvious reasons.

As far as revenues go, we should probably average up all the tax rates from different states rather than base it off Georgia; otherwise we will be severely in debt.  And I have a full schedule today and tomorrow; hopefully by Wednesday I will find time.

If anyone wants to help, average up the revenues.  I'm not asking you, PiT (you've done plenty already), but we have two legislators, a Viceroy, an Attorney General, and two senators who are more than welcome to pitch in

[Yelnoc]

     I don't know where I placed the link I had, but the region's laws are based on the 2006 Georgia statutes. As of 2009, Georgia had multiple income tax brackets, ranging from 1-6%.

     To my knowledge no significant changes have been made in that area. I do not think that any significant changes have been made in re sales tax either, though we now have a sales tax on marijuana, something which no real life state does for obvious reasons.

As far as revenues go, we should probably average up all the tax rates from different states rather than base it off Georgia; otherwise we will be severely in debt.  And I have a full schedule today and tomorrow; hopefully by Wednesday I will find time.

If anyone wants to help, average up the revenues.  I'm not asking you, PiT (you've done plenty already), but we have two legislators, a Viceroy, an Attorney General, and two senators who are more than welcome to pitch in

     The problem is,  we already did base it on Georgia.

Meh.  Laws can be repealed.  If my interpretation of that initiative is correct, it is utterly nonsensical.

[Yelnoc]

     I don't know where I placed the link I had, but the region's laws are based on the 2006 Georgia statutes. As of 2009, Georgia had multiple income tax brackets, ranging from 1-6%.

     To my knowledge no significant changes have been made in that area. I do not think that any significant changes have been made in re sales tax either, though we now have a sales tax on marijuana, something which no real life state does for obvious reasons.

As far as revenues go, we should probably average up all the tax rates from different states rather than base it off Georgia; otherwise we will be severely in debt.  And I have a full schedule today and tomorrow; hopefully by Wednesday I will find time.

If anyone wants to help, average up the revenues.  I'm not asking you, PiT (you've done plenty already), but we have two legislators, a Viceroy, an Attorney General, and two senators who are more than welcome to pitch in

     The problem is,  we already did base it on Georgia.

Meh.  Laws can be repealed.  If my interpretation of that initiative is correct, it is utterly nonsensical.

     It does offer up a problem in that the laws passed by the Legislature are not "initiative laws", & could be interpreted as ineffectual in superseding the laws laid out by that initiative.

     The problem with Atlasia is that laws are often drafted in a haphazard fashion with little regard to consequences or existing statute. Of course, real-life politicians are probably plenty guilty of this as well.

How about you take dictatorial powers for the night and delete in from the wiki?  No one will be any the wiser.

[Yelnoc]

Spending (AL,AR,FL,GA,LA,MS,NC,SC,TN,TX):

Pensions: $38,100,000,000
Health care: $121,900,000,000
Education: $73,400,000,000
Defense: $600,000,000
Welfare: $40,400,000,000
Protection: $21,500,000,000
Transportation: $28,200,000,000
General government: $7,400,000,000
Other spending: $18,700,000,000
Interest: $7,400,000,000
Balance: -$4,400,000,000
Σ: $352,100,000,000

I hate to break it to you, but I already did this about a week ago (check page 3).  My figures are slightly off from yours though, so I think we may have to go back again  

What is the Greek symbol for?

[Yelnoc]

Spending (AL,AR,FL,GA,LA,MS,NC,SC,TN,TX):

Pensions: $38,100,000,000
Health care: $121,900,000,000
Education: $73,400,000,000
Defense: $600,000,000
Welfare: $40,400,000,000
Protection: $21,500,000,000
Transportation: $28,200,000,000
General government: $7,400,000,000
Other spending: $18,700,000,000
Interest: $7,400,000,000
Balance: -$4,400,000,000
Σ: $352,100,000,000

I hate to break it to you, but I already did this about a week ago (check page 3).  My figures are slightly off from yours though, so I think we may have to go back again  

What is the Greek symbol for?

     The discrepancies are pretty large, too. However, I'm pretty sure that Kentucky's not part of the region, so that at least explains some of it.

     The letter is sigma. It is used in mathematics to denote summations (I added up all of the other categories under the sigma category), though its use is rather uncommon. It appears most often in the formulation of infinite sequences & series, which first appears near the end of single-variable calculus.

Wait...Kentucky's not....

Damn.

[Yelnoc]

     Looking at the high rate of spending you attributed to education, did you calculate it for both state & local spending? I only did state spending, principally because I wanted to avoid the added complication of dealing with revenue due to local taxes. Leave the municipalities to fend for themselves, I say.

Right now I don't even know.  I'll do it again tomorrow, or if not then by Sunday.