Articles tagged as

Spending

Taxes crushing vermont original Photo by Chris Andrawes on Unsplash

Roper: Vermont’s Insane 9.1 Billion Dollar Budget

Ronald Reagan once quipped that government is like a baby, an endless appetite on one end, and no discipline on the other. No place lives up to – or down to as the case may be — that analogy more so than Vermont. In case you missed it amongst all the hubbub and controversy surrounding … Read more

Spend Spending

Cutting Military Spending Would Make for a Big and Beautiful Bill

Last week, Moody’s Ratings lowered the United States credit rating. Fitch Ratings and S&P Global Ratings had already lowered the US rating. This new downgrade was driven by Congress’s failure to make any efforts to reduce the almost 37 trillion dollars national debt. When Moody’s made its announcement, the House Budget Committee was scrambling to … Read more

A Suggested Email to Some Donchess Donkeys

Let’s start by taking a look at this video of last night’s Finance committee meeting in Nashua, skipping to 1h18min where the mayor stokes discord and vitriol in the chamber against the federal government for cutting some of its funding to the PD and FD, particularly special equipment that also benefits communities outside Nashua.  There … Read more

Flushing-Money-down-the-toilet

No, Federal Contractors Are Not More Efficient than Federal Employees

In late January, the Trump administration issued a series of executive orders that paused Treasury payments to a variety of federal contractors and grantees. These orders also often cancelled contracts with NGOS and other contractors altogether. Soon afterward, we began to see countless media stories about job losses at private NGOs and for-profit federal contractors. … Read more

How Will Trump Changes Affect Vermont? We’ll Know Soon

What do the impending, across-the-board Trump administration and Congressional cuts to federal education, energy, and human services mean to Vermont? Ask this question to legislators and advocates in the State House and the response is like a Greek chorus chanting, ‘We don’t know, we don’t know, we don’t know.’ (Whether the play is a comedy … Read more

WHO LET THE D.O.G.E. OUT

The Department of Governmental Efficiency (D.O.G.E.) reminds me of an old song titled “Who Let the Dogs Out”. The miracle of Google allowed me to review the lyrics! While President Trump and Elon probably would not approve of the lyrics, ironically, the title foreshadows the amazing accomplishments that D.O.G.E. has brought to the USA. The … Read more

Money dollars cash

Money, Money, MONEY – What Would You Cut?

I remember becoming politically aware that our National Debt was rising and never seemed to take a pause. And I was one of the very few who cared while our DC denizens showed little or no concern regardless of party. And now? At one point, I said that we’d find ourselves, mathematically, unable to pay … Read more

US Capitol - caution Original Photo by Andy Feliciotti on Unsplash

Politicians Won’t Solve Our Spending Problem Unless We Make Them

Last Friday, House Republicans opened the first session of the 119th Congress by voting to keep Representative Mike Johnson (R-LA) on as Speaker of the House. Almost every Republican—including pro-establishment moderates, Trump loyalists, and even the “hardliners” that make up the fiscally conservative Freedom Caucus—fell in line behind Johnson. The one Republican who refused to … Read more

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No Transparency – Too Much Spending

In response to Ron Willoughby, who is concerned about school spending in Haverhill, NH (“Haverhill Taxpayers-Are you happy?”, Caledonian-Record), he and every Grafton County resident/taxpayer should be deeply concerned about spending at the Grafton County Complex.  While there is a minority of Republicans who make up the County Delegation and the Executive Committee, with every … Read more

Budget-Cuts

Resolve to Cut Spending in the New Year

Vermont voters screamed that affordability is the number one issue we want the legislature to address in 2025. While lawmakers have little control over what we pay for eggs and hamburger, what they do have control over – total control over at the state level — is what we pay in taxes, fees, and regulatory … Read more

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2024 in Education: Costs Rise, Performance Declines

In 2024, the Green Mountain State saw education costs, aka property taxes, rise more than 13%. All while academic performance continued to decline. The 13% rise could have been higher had the tax rate not been bought down with one-time funds. The low staff/student ratio, increased compensation costs,  the Legislature’s incentivizing local school spending, and … Read more

Faucet spigot

A Simple Way Donald Trump Can End the Ukraine and Israel Wars

Upon his inauguration as president, Donald Trump will become the leader of a United States executive branch mired in two major wars via its continuing pumping of money, weapons, and intelligence into support of the Ukraine and Israeli governments. Trump has declared his opposition to the continuation of these wars. But how can he end … Read more

Budget-Cuts

Want to Cut Federal Workers? Just Cut Spending

Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has been making a lot of noise about all the federal employees it plans to fire. The DOGE people have framed total federal employment as something of a proxy for the total size of the federal government.  Cutting the federal workforce is all well and good, but … Read more

Donchess performing arts center money bag

All Nashua Taxpayers Need To Let These Figures Sink In:

City of Nashua Budget FY2017 $263,823,554 City of Nashua Budget FY2025 $456,635,638 Difference $192,812,084 That is an increase of 73.08% This is all due to Mayor Donchess’ spending programs. So when are Nashua taxpayers going to wake up and realize taxpayers cannot afford to have Mayor Donchess doing our budgets? It looks like Mayor Donchess wants … Read more

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