Color it Red

In "Chart of the Day: State Buget Gaps 2010," Credit Writedowns points us to a disturbing graphic in a recent report from the Congressional Budget Office, entitled "Policies for Increasing Economic Growth and Employment in 2010 and 2011."

As CW's Edward Harrison notes,

this is not just about California. Come summer 2010, the most severe gaps will be closed via budget cuts or tax increases unless the Federal Government can pull a rabbit out of the hat.

My only quibble: the figure should probably have been rendered in shades of red, rather than blue, to better convey just how bad things are when it comes to the state of municipal finances.

Comments

[M]

Hi!

Can we just speculate that someone has an agenda in the color substitution?

If there was a time for the red color, but obviously someone has a problem recognizing that.

Who made this stupid graphic?

[roger]

The way I see it,People don't realize that this crisis is due to some fundamental
defects in the system, so they keep voting for personalities no matter what party they belong to,noting basic or philosophical,its just plain desperation,and longing for the good old days. Things will get much worst very
rapidly. The scary part is that this is extremely good fertile ground for a
Demagogue.

[Hector]

Guess what so special about Montana and North Dakota has in common not including 0% deficit???? They both have Chartered State Banks not run by the Fed , but by the State...working for public interest and not for private bankers...Why no one says anything about it???

[LauraB]

I think the color blue is perfect for this chart. The bluest of the blue states (i.e. most "progressive"/liberal states) are the one's in the most trouble. That's what happens when politicians are allowed to wantonly and recklessly spend other people's money without regard to their inalienable rights to life, liberty, and property. They turn taxpayers into debt-slaves of the state.

[Hal Horvath]

My bet: This truly devestating state financial shortfall situation will be left until the last minute due to political gamemanship.

By now, even less than sharp Democrats (most) are getting it that if they solve problem in a timely manner (before the problem results in the full catatrophe) that Republicans can spin it that the (timely) Democratic solution *caused* the (reduced) problem.

Since too many voters can't discern reality of this sort, it is better for Democrats to wait for the catastrophe to happen now, so that voters can wake up (from Republican rhetoric) and actually see reality, as it is.

But, there's no guarantee that even if a physical earthquake happened that Republicans could not manage to pin blame on Democrats. Based on the track record, the Republicans could even blame an asteroid strike on Democrats.

We may not be able to get past the Republican smoke screen until we are in a full-fledged depression with 25-35% unemployment.