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KU employees, other Kansas state workers begin receiving furlough notices

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SlevinKelevra

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KU employees, other Kansas state workers begin receiving furlough notices / LJWorld.com

:( very very disturbing and disgusting stuff going on.

Topeka — Thousands of employees at Kansas University and throughout other state agencies began receiving furlough notices Friday as a budget stalemate in the Kansas Legislature dragged into the 106th day of the session.

Lawmakers have until Saturday night to pass a balanced budget plan, including a tax package to fund it, or else all nonessential state employees would be ordered to stay home starting 12:01 a.m. Sunday.

At least 24,200 workers at Kansas state government agencies and state universities would be affected.

Figures provided Friday to The Associated Press showed that almost 71 percent of those employees work at a state university.

Kansas State University announced it sent notices to almost 8,700 employees. The number at Pittsburg State University was 530.

<snip>
At Emporia State University, however, employees received an email Friday saying department chairs and deans would be furloughed, along with student workers. But senior administrative assistants would not be furloughed.
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Department Chairs furloughed over the summer? Brilliant!

Student researchers furloughed over the summer? Double Brilliant.


So glad I followed my head and not heart, and excluded R1 state schools in the Midwest/South (to be closer to family) and instead focused on a smaller balanced research/teaching private university search for my academic appointment. I had a gut feeling 4-5 years ago this would become a growing trend politically. :roll: :(
 
SlevinKelevra said:
KU employees, other Kansas state workers begin receiving furlough notices / LJWorld.com

:( very very disturbing and disgusting stuff going on.




Department Chairs furloughed over the summer? Brilliant!

Student researchers furloughed over the summer? Double Brilliant.


So glad I followed my head and not heart, and excluded R1 state schools in the Midwest/South (to be closer to family) and instead focused on a smaller balanced research/teaching private university search for my academic appointment. I had a gut feeling 4-5 years ago this would become a growing trend politically. :roll: :(
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Oh yea of short memory. This has happened over the course of time in several states, California being one of them.

It happens during budget impasse, and yes, those folks you mention are indeed nonessential state employees. It's right in the part you quote:

Lawmakers have until Saturday night to pass a balanced budget plan, including a tax package to fund it, or else all nonessential state employees would be ordered to stay home starting 12:01 a.m. Sunday.
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Most likely the state you're in right now has the same or a similar provision in place in case of their own legislative budget impasse.
 
SlevinKelevra said:
also, while a GOP Governor was in charge.

Coincidence?
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LOL

The signer and promoter of the some of the most damaging, economy killing legislation in US history was hardly a Republican. Peel off the skin, and a true Progressive robot was lurking.

Any wonder how he married into the Kennedy family?

So, coincidence? Well, actually yes, but not for the reason you tried.
 
SlevinKelevra said:
KU employees, other Kansas state workers begin receiving furlough notices / LJWorld.com

:( very very disturbing and disgusting stuff going on.




Department Chairs furloughed over the summer? Brilliant!

Student researchers furloughed over the summer? Double Brilliant.


So glad I followed my head and not heart, and excluded R1 state schools in the Midwest/South (to be closer to family) and instead focused on a smaller balanced research/teaching private university search for my academic appointment. I had a gut feeling 4-5 years ago this would become a growing trend politically. :roll: :(
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The dysfunctional leadership in Topeka has imposed high and growing costs on Kansas, as described by ratings agencies, among others. Their fiscal damage could have a long-lasting effect, and possibly extend beyond basic services and credit ratings to statewide competitiveness should the education system suffer chronic underinvestment in the aftermath of that damage. A combination of breathtaking fiscal recklessness and underinvestment in human capital development is not conducive to fostering competitiveness and prosperity. Unless the state changes course, it could also begin to suffer brain drain, which would further impair its long-term outcomes.

Last summer, S&P downgraded Kansas' credit rating to AA. The accompanying press release stated:

The downgrades reflect our view of a structurally unbalanced budget, following state income tax cuts that have not been matched with offsetting ongoing expenditure cuts in the fiscal 2015 budget," said Standard & Poor's credit analyst David Hitchcock. In our opinion, recent shortfalls in income taxes will leave both fiscal years 2014 and 2015 with ending general fund balances much less than projected in the enacted fiscal 2015 budget.

From Moody's, which downgraded Kansas to Aa3 this spring:

Kansas' below average issuer rating reflects the use of non-recurring measures to balance its budget, its relatively sluggish economic recovery compared with peers, revenue reductions (resulting from tax cuts) which have not been fully offset by recurring spending cuts, and an underfunded retirement system for which the state is not making actuarially determined contributions. In recent years the state has appropriated funds from or shifted costs to the State Highway Fund (SHF) to help balance the general fund budget.

Notice that Moody's cited an economic recovery that was weaker than that for Kansas' peers. Fiscal gimmickry is no substitute for sound policy. The economic outcomes reflect, in part, the state's suboptimal policy framework.

In the end, I guess one can say Kansas finds itself in a highly competitive race of sorts--a battle with Illinois, among a few other states, for most unsound fiscal policy. In the meantime, Kansas' people suffer the consequences and Kansas' youth could see reckless policy makers undercut their future.
 
SlevinKelevra said:
also, while a GOP Governor was in charge.

Coincidence?
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No, considering the legislature makes that call and the CA legislature has been solid blue for decades. Really, this thing you have for conservatism, you need a bit more education before you consider pursuing it further.
 
TheDemSocialist said:
Its not really that. Its failure of simple math. But its starting to look like its failing on purpose
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Here's what Paul Krugman says about the situatiion:

The belief, Krugman concludes, “that tax cuts are a universal elixir that cures all economic ills is the ultimate zombie idea — one that should have died long ago in the face of the facts, but just keeps shambling along.”

The states, Louis Brandeis famously declared, are the laboratories of democracy. In fact, Mr. Brownback himself described his plan as an “experiment” that would demonstrate the truth of his economic doctrine. What it actually did, however, was demonstrate the opposite — and much the same message is coming from other laboratories, from the stumble in Texas to the comeback in California…

Nothing that has happened in the past quartercentury has supported tax-cut mania, yet the doctrine’s hold on the Republican Party is stronger than ever. It would be foolish to expect recent events to make much difference.

Still, the spectacle of the Texas economy coming back to earth, and Kansas sliding over the edge should at the very least make right-wing bombast ring hollow, in the general election if not in the primary. And someday, maybe, even conservatives will once again become willing to look at the facts.

Paul Krugman: Texas is a failed experiment in “reverse Robin-Hood” economic policy - Salon.com
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Brownback and the conservative crazies thought they had the answer to fiscal success. Instead they proved that the heart of conservative ideology, tax cuts, doesn't work as the driving principle of budgeting.
 
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Joe Steel said:
Here's what Paul Krugman says about the situatiion:



Brownback and the conservative crazies thought they had the answer to fiscal success. Instead they proved that the heart of conservative ideology, tax cuts, doesn't work as the driving principle of budgeting.
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Sometimes tax reductions can make the marginal difference in improving an economy, but economic policy is far more complex. One can't automatically assume that tax cuts will always make an economy more competitive. Sometimes, barriers to competitiveness are structural and have nothing to do with tax policy. One example is labor pool quality and/or growth. Another example is a lack of robust in-state competition.

In terms of the tax cuts, it seems that the tax policy that was enacted was more likely to distort the state's market function than facilitate it.

From The Kansas City Star:

The tax bill currently being debated largely protects a zero income tax rate for owners of limited liability companies and other businesses where profits "pass through" to owners untaxed...

About 330,000 business owners pay no state income tax under a 2012 tax plan that was championed by Brownback.

Kansas Senate halts tax debate to fix bill; House to consider plan to avert furloughs | The Kansas City Star The Kansas City Star

What about other companies? Treatment was not equitable. There's no indication that the businesses receiving preferential tax treatment were, in fact, those that were most competitive, growing fastest, or most innovative. Indeed, the empirical data appears to suggest otherwise, as Kansas lagged behind most of its neighboring states in creating jobs since Governor Brownback took office. To the extent that resources may have propped up a less competitive sector of Kansas' economy, they may well have stunted the kind of market evolution that would typically occur in the midst of competition. Stunted market evolution can have high opportunity costs. At the same time, the state was stuck with a substantial and persistent revenue shortfall.

Put another way, it appears that the Governor decided to pick "winners" and "losers" through tax policy by exempting certain types of companies from taxes (by type of organization, not any kind of economic merit) while treating all the others differently. Now that it's clear what kind of tax changes were enacted, I don't think it's surprising at all that the state's economy fared worse than those of neighboring states on such measures as employment growth and the state wound up with large revenue shortfalls. What's most ironic is that Governor Brownback almost certainly would argue that government should not micromanage the economy, yet by designing his tax program as he did, he engaged in micromanagement of his state's economy.
 
Tax cuts require spending cuts. Tax cuts require proper management. It seems more like the KS State Government is dysfunctional and has very little to do with political lean as much as it does with personalities.
 
The first thing they do when they get in (the GOP) is cut taxes for their wealthy campaign benefactors.

Unfunded tax-cuts that somebody has to pay for (guess who?).

Then, *this* results!

Over and over and over again ...
 
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