During and after the 2001 recession, U.S. states did about $30 billion in deficit financing, S&P says. (That is, they borrowed long-term, restructured existing debt, or securitized stuff with the aim of getting cash immediately for operating spe Read More
Lt. Gov. Richard Ravitch today formally released his for achieving structural budget balance, including a proposal to authorize roughly $6 billion in "transitional borrowing" to help close projected budget gaps over the next three years. The borro Read More
Lt. Gov. Richard Ravitch still hasn't publicly released his long-term plan to restore structural balance to New York's state budget, including a rumored proposal to bond out a portion of the state's budget shortfall. But the details emerging so f Read More
State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli today issued a that focuses on the budget process, but his most significant and potentially valuable recommendation deals with debt. Read More
New Jersey imposed a 4 percent cap on local property tax increases a year before Governor David Paterson endorsed the Suozzi Commission's call for a school property tax cap in New York. But unlike Paterson's original proposal, the cap signed into law by New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine in 2007 contained a number of loopholes, including a clause exempting the cost of health insurance benefits. Read More
In a Times on Washington's Wall Street bailouts and New York's economy, the Fiscal Policy Institute's James Parrott says that "the magnitude of the bailout has been so great that it will have wiped out whatever cumulative surplus" New York Read More
From the folks who brought you New York's "millionaire tax," it's ... another millionaire tax. And a stock transfer tax. And a 50 percent Is this a great state, or what? Read More
State and local governments continue to use structured finance to obscure bad fiscal decisions. Today's case: Louisiana's convoluted proposed subsidy structure for the New Orleans Saints. The pending deal shows that conservative Republican Bobby Jind Read More