One solution is a Taxpayer Bill of Rights.

by Rob Roper

The Vermont Senate Republicans dropped a post earlier this week outlining just how out of control state spending is and has been for a long time. Though they cite a figure for FY27 spending of $9.1 billion (projected) and a 1.6 percent year over year increase where I see a $9.34 billion number coming out of the House for a 2.64 percent increase, their main point is well taken: the state is hoovering up our money faster than Homer Simpson at an all you can eat buffet.

The senators note that the budget they are voting on this year will be the largest one in state history. As was the one before that. And the one before that…. Here’s what the spending pattern has been going back to 2019, the year before COVID unleashed that torrent of unchecked, debt fueled cash, and I think most will agree that this is freaking insane.

Over 60 percent spending growth! $9.4 billion for a state of 640,000 people. Total inflation over this period – which included that delightful Biden-era period of 8 percent inflation – was 36 percent.

If state spending had been held in check to just the rate of inflation, today’s budget would be $7.8 billion – a savings of $1.6 billion. If state spending had been held in check to state GDP growth, which has been between 2.28 to 2.3 percent annually, the FY27 budget would look more like $6.95 billion – a taxpayer savings of $2.45 billion.

That is what “living within our means” really looks like. And it is why Vermont desperately needs a Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR) similar to the one Colorado put in place back in the early 1990’s. More on that in a minute, but first I want to point out a critical fact before the pearl clutchers begin to wail about “cruel austerity” and “what about the children.”

Over the past going on eight years of this spending orgy, has this tax and spend machine made our public education system better? No, it’s worse. Has it made our healthcare system better? No, it’s worse. Health insurance market? Nope. Worse. The homeless crisis? It too is worse. The housing shortage? Crime? Childcare? Worse, worse, worse. Are our roads and bridges in better shape. Absolutely not. But we do have more electric vehicle chargers per capita than any other state, so there’s that!

Irrefutable conclusion: all of this spending fueled by increased taxes on property, payrolls, internet services, short term rentals, higher DMV fees, higher professional licensing fees, whatever I forgot, and whatever else they can pass in the waning days of this legislative session are not working to make life better for Vermonters in any way, shape or form. And it could be argued (and, yes, that is what I am arguing) what they’re doing with all this money is actually making these problems – and our lives — dramatically worse. Unaffordable. Our Democratic Socialist politicians are taxing us at champagne rates and giving us generic beer results — along with a Mad Dog 20/20 hangover.

So, can we survive by cutting spending significantly and reprioritizing what we spend money on? Yes. It turns out the root cause of our affordability crisis is our own bloated, ineffective, fiscally ravenous, worse-than-wasteful state government. It’s time to lock the liquor away from these drunken sailors. Which brings me back to TABOR.

In a nutshell, Colorado’s 1992 Taxpayers’ Bill of Rights restricts any increased state spending to a formula based on inflation plus population growth. That’s it. If the various revenue streams end up bringing in more revenue than is necessary to meet that cap, all excess funds constitutionally must be returned to the taxpayers. If the state wants to keep and spend more than the TABOR formula allows, the people have to approve the spending proposal via state referendum. (Note: the citizens of Blue Colorado have never once consented to lift the TABOR cap.) And since enacting TABOR, Colorado has been a steady and, more often than not, outstanding economic success story, despite a political majority that is every bit as ideologically wacky as ours here in Vermont. This is possible because the fiscal liquor cabinet has been locked, and the adults who pay the bills have the key.

In December 2023, just before the 2024 legislative session began, Campaign for Vermont did a poll and asked Vermonters about a Taxpayer Bill of Rights, and – displaying a level of common sense far exceeding that of the people elected to represent us – 67 percent supported the idea for our state, with majority support across party lines. Only 16 percent opposed it. That’s a landslide in favor.

So, as we transition from the legislative session to the campaign season here in the next few weeks, if I were running for office and looking for a surefire win issue to run on…. Just sayin’.

Rob Roper is a freelance writer with 25 years of experience in Vermont politics including three years service as chair of the Vermont Republican Party and nine years as President of the Ethan Allen Institute, Vermont’s free market think tank.