Word: surpluses
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California's crisis winds all the way back to 1978's Proposition 13, which cut property-tax rates 57% and forced the state to rely more heavily on income tax revenue. When Californians were wealthy, the tactic generated a surplus, enabling politicians to cut taxes, pad budgets and bask in their popularity. But when times were lean, the state struggled to pay its bills. Governor Pete Wilson encountered this dilemma in 1991, as did Gray Davis in 2003. Now it's Arnold Schwarzenegger's turn to try to wrestle a highly partisan legislature into slashing enough programs to eliminate...
Rolling in Dough 1998 California records a $4 billion surplus. State leaders agree on a $1.4 billion...
...drop in demand for Alberta oil, plus auto-plant shutdowns in Ontario, have pushed Canada's trade deficit for May to an all-time high of $1.2 billion. This is in contrast to to a much smaller merchandise-trade deficit of $346 million reported in April and a healthy surplus of $979 million in March, according to the government agency Statistics Canada. (See 10 things to buy during the recession...
...Last year was a great one for energy and agriculture: corn, crude oil, coal and wheat are major state exports. The boom helped push energy outfit MDU Resources onto the Fortune 500 (the first North Dakota firm to make the list) and the state budget to a $1.2 billion surplus. State workers around the country are being told to sit at home without pay to trim costs; in North Dakota they're getting 5% raises...
...first years after Proposition 13 passed, the state was able to get by because it had a surplus," says David Menefee-Libey, a political scientist at Pomona College. "But because the state is now responsible for funding local government and school districts the demands on state resources became too great. The second strategy followed by [Governors Gray] Davis and [Arnold] Schwarzenegger has been to finesse the fiscal crisis by using budget gimmicks and by borrowing to bridge the yearly budget shortfall. Now both options are exhausted...