As we edge toward the second year of the legislative biennium in Vermont, politicians on the Left have glommed onto the word “affordability” – a long-time campaign theme on the Right – in an unbelievable attempt to make it their own. I say unbelievable, but if the New York mayoral race was any indication, at least some people believe it. This is like buying into Dr. Jack Kevorkian’s new five-step plan for a longer, healthier, more satisfying life.
Just a quick refresher on what the Left in Vermont did when they had veto-proof supermajorities in both the state house and senate….
They passed the Clean Heat Standard carbon tax scheme on home heating fuels, which would have raised the cost of oil by at least a dollar per gallon, possibly by as much as four. Does this make chilly and long-wintered Vermont a more affordable place to live? No. No, it does not. And the fact that they refused to repeal the temporarily dormant Clean Heat Standard law (Act 18) in 2025 – bent over backwards to avoid even a discussion on the topic — after suffering massive defeats in the November 2024 election in large part because of their support for the Clean Heat Standard doesn’t give me a warm fuzzy that they’ve actually seen the light on affordability.
They passed the Renewable Energy Standard, which will add somewhere between half a billion and a billion dollars to our electricity costs over the next ten years, making it more expensive for Vermonters to keep the lights on, along with everything else that requires electricity. Does this blatant payoff to party donors in the renewable energy business make life in Vermont more affordable? Again, no. And, unlike the Clean Heat Standard, this law is fully in effect, which is a big reason why your electric bills are going up as fast as they are.
They raised your DMV fees by 20 percent despite the Transportation Secretary telling them the department didn’t need the money. Affordable? Ha! They put a brand new $100 million-plus payroll tax on everybody who works for a living. I’m not sure how you can convince anybody that cutting into folks’ take-home pay makes it more likely they can afford things, but as P.T. Barnum said, there’s a progressive voter born every minute, or words to that effect.
Housing? Between Act 250 regulations and the Global Warming Solutions Act building code mandates, it’s no wonder “affordable” housing costs over half a million dollars per unit to build. Which is, need I point it out, not affordable for low-income earners.
Should we get started on healthcare? Oh, yes, let’s. This debacle has been decades in the we’re-progressives-and-we’re-here-to-make-it-more-affordable making. From Howard Dean’s guaranteed issue and community rating mandates, to Catamount Heath, to Single Payer, to One Care all wrapped in an Obamacare bow, the Left has been making health care and health insurance more affordable in Vermont for over thirty years.
How’s that workin’ out? Not well. In fact, the exact opposite of well. Thanks to the concerted efforts of the people who supposedly care the most, Vermont now has the highest health insurance premiums in the nation – by far. We pay the highest prescription drug mark-ups. And the quality of and access to care we get for that premium price? Comparatively speaking, it kind of sucks.
Vermont seniors can’t even get Medicare Advantage anymore because the last two insurance companies willing to do business in the regulatory quagmire we’ve created just left with all the ceremony of a single-fingered salute.
Then, of course, there’s education and the property tax. Since Act 60 became law in 1997, education spending has gone through the stratosphere, as have the taxes to pay for it. The education fund currently consumes all of the sales tax, 33 percent of the vehicle Purchase and Use tax, 25 percent of the Rooms and Meals tax, the lottery proceeds, and the biggie, the education property tax. This you will recall went up on average 14 percent in 2024 and, literally hot off the presses today, it was announced in the December 1 tax letter that it can be expected to go up another 12 percent in 2026 (FY27) – 41 percent over the last five years. Unaffordable! (The Left blames health insurance costs. See previous three paragraphs.)
But are we getting our money’s worth? No. Vermont’s public school system is now performing worse than Mississippi’s while we’re spending more than twice the amount per student. This situation, driven by the powerful, Left-leaning teachers’ union, is both unaffordable for the taxpayer and a tragedy for our children.
It would be one thing if we were blowing all this money to live the high life – a great education system, terrific healthcare, affordable housing, smooth roads, stellar cell coverage — but our progressive politicians have left us drinking generic beer on a champagne budget. It’s a total rip off.
The new head of the Vermont Democrat Party, Lachlan Francis, co-authored a postmortem study of why the Democrats lost so big in Vermont in 2024. One of his conclusions read,
We pursued an agenda that was aggressive, broad, historic, and expensive – during a period of 40-year high inflation while voters were calling out for policies that would lower costs, not raise them, and we failed to convince them that that’s what our legislative work would do.
Yeah. You didn’t convince them because they’re not stupid. Raising taxes to pay for more programs while increasing regulations has never and will never lower costs. Ever. So, when I hear those on the Left talking about affordability, I have to quote the oft quoted Inigo Montoya from The Princess Bride, “I do not think that word means what you think it means.” But will a majority of voters remember what it means eleven months from now? Republicans had better remind them.
