It's the (Wasteful, Inappropriate, and Low-priority) Spending

Marc Guttman

Most people understand that governments tend to be inefficient, and many think usually the bigger the government, the more inefficient. Government inefficiency is more than just common sense now - it's common and proven knowledge. People tend to submissively shrug their shoulders and make "death and taxes"-type statements.

One well-accepted reason for this inefficiency in a well-intentioned government is a lack of accountability, or rather just not being held accountable. If private industry functioned at our federal government's efficiency level, it would quickly fail, because private industry is held accountable by the consumer who will not purchase products and services at inflated prices without very good reason.

Government's consumer is the taxpayer, who pays the government for providing services, but rarely holds the government accountable when these services cost more than they ought to and do not meet their individual or the community's needs or interests. What usually happens when a program is failing to meet its goals and expectations is that those involved in government or those who want to be in government argue that the wrong persons are in charge and the program is under-funded, and that if you put benevolent people in charge and give them more money they will do it better.

Unfortunately, government rarely "turns things around" or makes programs perform better. All one needs to do is look at our famous federal War on Poverty. A government program, once initiated, will likely continue to exist despite its cost-to-benefit ratio, even if its benefit is negative, as is the case for many well-intentioned government programs. Why do we keep purchasing poor, expensive and deleterious products?

In addition to failed, well-intentioned efforts by government, much of our earned-money has been stolen by politicians due to graft, fraud, cronyism, taxpayer-subsidized decadence for our civil-servant legislators, and legislation passed in favor of connected persons. We have given the wealthy and the unified unfair influence over us by allowing our elected officials to overstep their constitutional restraints, thus making our government, our income, and our liberties saleable items.

In 1992, Coloradoans, understanding that some government services are necessary or preferred, attempted to hold our state government accountable. We are leaders in this respect and this legislation should be appreciated and emulated. Colorado voters passed the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights, in an effort to control the state government's spending and inefficiency. TABOR limits revenue growth for state and local governments in Colorado and requires that any tax increase in the state or any local governments be approved by the voters of the affected government. What the voters in Colorado are trying to accomplish with TABOR is not the under-funding of public education or the transportation system or any other important government functions, but rather improving the efficiency of the delivery of these services and the stripping down of lesser-priority, unneeded and inappropriate services taken on by our state government.

In November, we will be voting on two referendums, C and D, which would suspend TABOR. Referendum C allows the state government to keep and spend, instead of refunding, all surplus revenues collected from existing state taxes for the next five years and sets a higher revenue cap.

Nobel Prize winning libertarian-economist, Milton Friedman said this: "I strongly urge the voters of Colorado to reject Referendum C, or any action that would suspend Colorado's Taxpayers Bill of Rights. I strongly favor the continued and uninterrupted use of TABOR, including it's so called ratchet mechanism. The ratchet is one of the best features of TABOR. It is the only thing that will reduce out-of-control government spending."

According to Doug Bruce, an El Paso County Commissioner and author of TABOR, from "The Dirty Dozen: 12 Reasons to defeat 'C' and 'D'," state politicians have argued that the state has cut spending. By this they mean spending in some areas have had a slower rate of growth than in the past. Total state spending has risen every year since TABOR passed in 1992. State spending in 2003-04 was $13.62 billion, in 2004-05 $14.03 billion, and will be in 2005-06 $14.61 billion dollars, the largest in state history. Referendum C is the largest tax increase in state history with estimates of $3.741 billion. In the first five years, this would cost the average family of four $3,480. Referendum D is estimated to cost another $3000 for that same family, as it is estimated to add $3.225 billion to the current billions in state debt.

Jon Caldara, president of the Independence Institute, stated: "Voters realize that Colorado's budget situation is not a revenue problem it is a spending problem ... The legislature should focus on re-inventing the way the state does business to encourage cost savings without large reductions in governmental service," He is suggesting performance based budgeting, competitive contracting, procurement reform, and sentencing reform as methods to increase government output. The Priority Colorado Report, commissioned by the Independence Institute and produced by the Reason Public Policy Institute, identified more than $600 million in potential savings, pointed out Dick Sargeant of the Colorado Union of Taxpayers.

In "Wasteful Spending by Colorado Government" (http://www.taxincrease.org/files/IP_8_2005_d.pdf), Ari Armstrong, a private citizen "with limited resources," was able to uncover and illustrate "tens of millions of dollars of wasteful spending," giving "real examples of how the state government spent your tax dollars." He line items over $60 million dollars of corporate welfare in Colorado, including the administrative costs of the Economic Development Programs. He explains how each of these subsidies were defended by our legislators and why their logic and philosophy is unlawful, unfair and more often detrimental rather than productive.

Mr. Armstrong's powerful paper also demonstrates how Colorado taxpayers, paid $1.5 million between 2001-2006 in art grants to several of the wealthiest towns in the country, here in Colorado, arguing, "while it is true that some of modest means enjoy the subsidized art, it is also true that many poor Coloradoans who do not benefit from the art are taxed to subsidize it, and the subsidy benefits predominantly wealthy areas."

The paper discusses reports from the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News of gross mismanagement of a benefits program, wasting tens of millions of dollars because of extreme error. It draws attention to the hundreds of millions of dollars this state pays for the capture, sentencing, and jailing of non-violent drug-offenders. Spotted throughout the paper are some of the more laughable and outrageous examples of bizarre state government spending, including 70 chairs costing between $800-$1000 each purchased for state employees, furniture purchased from prison programs that cost 20 times more than market born furniture, Medicaid providing impotence medication to the uninsured, including five convicted sex-offenders, large liquor and travel costs for university staff, subsidizing a publishing company that publishes church ministry resources.

While many taxpayers may be happy their tax-money is subsidizing religious material publishing they may not be pleased to know it is also subsidized artwork featuring female masturbation instruments and programs supplying condoms to minors. Others may have the opposite feelings or any combination of the above. The point is that we are all forced to contribute to these expenditures, approved by the people who work for us, whether we like it or not, so we should know how they are spending our money.

The proponents of Refs C and D have collected over a million dollars to market their position so as to persuade you to agree to use taxpayer's dollars on those who can best influence government. Would you not prefer that the legislators are forthcoming with how our money is spent and explain on an issue-by-issue basis why they need extra amounts of our money, demonstrating how the individual and community will benefit?

In November, let us reaffirm our message to our state government and keep them accountable to us. Let us also begin the process of moving appropriate services to the local level where we can reduce the bureaucracy and inefficiency and increase our control and influence on the services we are providing ourselves, better customizing them to our needs and interests.