by Don Keelan

If I derive one benefit from enduring a flight delay at the airport, it is that I can catch up on reading my small stash of local and national newspapers.

Recently, during a two-hour delay, I was able to read Kevin McCallum’s piece in the April 18, 2026, Bennington Banner: “Vermont’s roads are in rough shape–and likely to get worse.” Within the same edition, Bennington’s State Representative, Michael Nigro’s (he sits on the House Appropriations Committee) column on the Vermont State Budget noted, “After suspending state assistance for school construction in 2007, it will now take an estimated $6 billion to renovate and repair our aging schools.” 

And, closer to home, Rep. Nigro did not mention what appeared in the local papers, VTdigger, and elsewhere: $40 million dollars required to repair the Bennington Battle Monument. 

The flight delay also allowed me to read George F. Will’s April 19, 2026, piece in the Washington Post: “This tax would rain a wealth of unintended consequences.” His article concerns a November referendum in California that, if approved, would impose a one-time 5% tax on billionaires’ net worth. 

Now for the interconnection. 

But first, some data from McCallum’s story on the condition of Vermont’s roads–he notes that the 2026-27 VTrans budget for paving is to pave only 1% of Vermont’s roads. He further notes, “1% of state roads is far less than the rate to keep up with deterioration…the percentage of state roads, in poor or very poor condition, currently at 38 percent would rise to 60 percent by 2030, VTrans predicts.”

Also noted was a comment from Sen. Richard Westman, the chair of the Senate Transportation Committee: “The state is falling behind many of its goals for replacing bridges and repairing roads.”

There is a connection here to what Rep. Nigro noted: Vermont has a potential cost of $6 billion to repair public schools, an issue ignored for nearly two decades.

For now, I will stay away from the dollars required to fund the crises in housing, child care, mental health, and other State programs. It is clear that the State does not have the funds, currently or in the near future, to conduct business. And what I fear is that Vermont’s senior U.S. Senator has been traveling the country advocating a wealth tax on billionaires.  

A wealth tax is not based on income but on the value of a taxpayer’s fine arts collection, yachts, real estate, securities investments, and any possessions of value. In California’s case, the tax, if adopted, would apply to its estimated 200 billionaires. According to Will, about 30% have since fled the state. Vermont has one or two billionaires. Therein lies a problem. 

The tax, if adopted in Vermont, would not be solely on billionaires but on taxpayers with much lower asset values. Furthermore, it would not be a one-time tax on the taxpayer’s wealth, but rather an annual tax. It must be because the State lacks a revenue stream to meet its current and near-term obligations. And there is no appetite within the Democratic/Progressive legislature to control/cut/eliminate the decades-long spending spiral on social issues. Any wonder why there is a lack of funds for education and infrastructure? 

George F. Will correctly notes the possible unintended consequences of California’s potential wealth tax. Vermont has witnessed the unintended consequences of what has taken place in the Legislature in recent years: school consolidation, Act 181, Act 60, health care reforms, and Global Warming regulations. 

Vermont has become a State where the middle class can’t afford to live and is looking to move elsewhere. In order for the State to meet the cost of its ill-advised and mandated programs, the middle class will have to absorb the full brunt by staying. 

In 1876, Vermonters erected the second-tallest obelisk in the country, 306 feet. The tallest is in Washington, DC. 150 years later, Vermont cannot afford the cost to repair this historic structure. This lack of funding may foreshadow the future of the State’s funding capacity. What is it that our State leaders are not telling us?

The Sanders followers know that Vermont’s current funding sources have reached the end of the runway. An annual wealth tax on all of one’s possessions is their runway extension plan.

The author is a U.S. Marine (retired), CPA, and columnist living in Arlington, VT.