California is suffering for its decades of unrestrained spending. When times were good in the “Golden State,” lawmakers lavished taxpayer dollars on all manner of government programs and questionable environmental schemes.
Now, times are not good, and California faces a catastrophic $20 billion deficit. The state has had to send taxpayers IOUs in lieu of the tax refunds they are due. Contractors who had provided services to the state also have received IOUs, rather than payments they are due.
California has been fumbling for ways to dig itself out of its financial mess. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger thought he had found one when he started requiring tens of thousands of state workers to take unpaid days off, to reduce spending.
Now, however, two state judges have ordered the governor to rescind the furloughs for many of the workers and give them hundreds of millions of dollars in back pay. One of the judges said the workers and other Californians were being “irreparably harmed” by the days off, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
So California is stuck between its deficit and an activist judiciary that seems to believe a big part of the purpose of state government is to provide government jobs.
We can’t solve California’s budget woes from Tennessee. But California’s problems should remind us that all levels of government need to be careful with tax dollars, in good times and bad.