No willpower to stop deficit spending – There are 100 days until government funding runs out. Even with budget ceiling cuts Congress is still spending beyond its revenue. With no propensity to raise taxes or reduce spending the deficit will increase from $32T today to $50T by 2040. Exacerbating the problem are Medicare/Social Security payments that will default within 10 years.
Neither Congress nor the President have the willpower to reduce spending and upset their constituency. Democrats support increasing entitlements; Republicans want more defense spending. Washington is never motivated to balance spending to tax revenue but just prints money when short. Fiscal discipline must come from outside of Washington.
Families balance their home budgets as should Congress. Our founding fathers gave us a tool to hone in Congress called the Convention of the States…(COS). Thirty-four states can call a convention to offer a balance budget and term limit amendments to our Constitution. Proposed changes must be adopted by two-thirds present at the convention and require approval by 38 states to be added to the Constitution.
Pundits claim opening the Constitution could attract nefarious constitutional changes from special interests’ groups like making a living wage a right. With the amendment approval threshold set so high by our founding fathers states could easily reject such unreasonable changes.
Twenty-one state legislatures have approved calling a COS and several more are considering it. Without change our economic system will likely collapse. Only COS can provide a check on Washington and restore power to where it belongs: the states. – Frank Mazur, South Burlington
Too taxed to stay – My Montpelier property taxes are going up 45%, my pension gets taxed, my Social Security gets taxed, part-time job gets taxed, I pay to feed lunches to wealthy children in Chittenden County (sorry, South Burlington students no longer allowed to order Grub Hub or Door Dash anymore)… Oh and Act 60 allowed me to pay to educate my brother’s children as he pays less property taxes than I did… Life in Vermont sucks!
Yes, I’m moving to NH and going to sell my house to a flatlander way over market price. Maybe they can pay for state pensions and support all the non-profits… – Maurice Martineau