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And that’s just insane.
by Rob Roper
Ronald Reagan once quipped that government is like a baby, an endless appetite on one end, and no discipline on the other. No place lives up to – or down to as the case may be — that analogy more so than Vermont. In case you missed it amongst all the hubbub and controversy surrounding the education reform bill, our legislature just passed a $9.1 billion budget.
$9.1 billion. For a state of 640,000 people. The quick math puts that at $14,200 worth of spending for every man, woman, child, they/them in the state. This is insane. In 2019, the last year before Covid, our annual spending stood at $5.8 billion, and even that was outrageous. Today’s $9.1 billion, $3.3 billion more than 2019, represents a 64 percent increase, way more than double the 25 percent inflation we’ve experienced over the same time period. If state spending had gone up at just the rate of inflation, the budget would be $7.2 billion today, or $1.9 billion less than it is.
In the memo he posted after signing this budget into law, Governor Scott chided lawmakers about sustainability saying, “although this budget spends $30 million less in general fund base compared to the Senate version, it still spends $20 million more than my proposal.” Yeah. Okay. The problem though is it spends overall about $2 BILLION more than it should – at least. That’s if you’re genuinely serious about being all sustainable and such.
But, hey, maybe it’s a rapacious, backbreaking tax burden, but at least we Vermonters are getting a great bang for our taxpayer bucks! (Excuse me while I laugh so hard the milk shoots out my nose.)
No, really…. What are we getting for our $9.1 billion? A functioning public education system? Not even close despite spending more per pupil than any other state in the union. Quality affordable healthcare? HA! After two decades of the “healthcare is a human right” crowd making policy, we now pay more for health insurance than any other state by far, are experiencing doctor and nursing shortages, have driven our lone surviving health insurance provider to the brink of bankruptcy, as well as more than half of our regional hospitals. Affordable housing? Nope. In fact, with all those tax dollars we bought ourselves one of the highest per capita rates of homelessness in the nation. Solid infrastructure? More of our bridges are classified as “structurally deficient” today (79) than there were in 2019 (68). Well, the streets may be crumbling, but at least they’re safe, right? Ask the 174 businesses that signed the letter explaining why nobody goes to downtown Burlington anymore.
This is a record of serious financial and general mismanagement. The issues mentioned above – infrastructure, public health and safety, education, and maintaining the conditions for a growing economy – are the basic functions of government. And none of them are being adequately met. Not because we aren’t giving our politicians record setting, bucketloads of money; because they do not know how (or do they want) to spend it wisely.
And no, the solution is not to increase taxes and spending to four times the rate of inflation as the folks in charge of the current fiasco would suggest. Honestly, we’d be better off piling our $9.1 billion into a big pile on the statehouse lawn and setting it on fire. At least then it would serve some productive purpose in keeping us warm. Of course, if the current crop of decision makers in Montpelier was in charge of such a project, they’d probably apply the torch in late July.
So, how do we fix this?
In my humble opinion, the place to start is with a Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights based on the one passed in Colorado back in the 1990s. The way TABOR works is it caps state spending under a formula based on inflation and population growth. If revenue above the cap comes into the treasury, that money must by law be returned to the taxpayers. If lawmakers want to spend more than what the cap allows it requires an affirmative statewide vote of the people. (Side note: Coloradans have never approved spending above the cap.)
Back in December 2023, Campaign for Vermont ran a poll and asked Vermonters what they thought about a TABOR for Vermont. 67 percent supported of the idea, 38 percent strongly. This included majorities of Republicans, Democrats and independents. Only 16 percent were opposed. This sounds to me like a great opportunity to open a multi-partisan discussion. Cuz what’s happening now, we can’t afford it.
Rob Roper is a freelance writer who has been involved with Vermont politics and policy for over 20 years. This article reprinted with permission from Behind the Lines: Rob Roper on Vermont Politics, robertroper.substack.com
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Categories: Commentary, Legislation, State Government, Taxes
The following back-and-forth is taken from the VDC Creemee Cast article:
https://vermontdailychronicle.com/rob-roper-on-todays-vermont-podcast/
Robert Roper
June 2, 2025 at 12:11 pm
Actually I have proposed a number of solutions. Step 1: Institute a Taxpayers Bill of Rights law modeled after the one adopted by Colorado in the 1990s. It caps state spending growth at inflation plus population growth with all excess revenue raised above that amount returned to the taxpayers. As for education/property taxes specifically, my suggestion was that the legislature 1) Freeze Vermonters property tax bills and make the general fund be the revenue stream of last resort until a long term funding solution can be agreed upon, 2) spend this session looking at the ways 47 other states limit/cap individual property tax bills and pick the one(s) that work best for us. Long term, 3) Set a foundation formula that puts us on a path to pre covid education spending levels that are more in line with other states per pupil spending. 4) Cut the supervisory union level of bureaucracy significantly. 5) Give local school districts greater local control over how money is spent, and, if they can’t make it work give them the opportunity to close their local school and become a tuitioning district. 5) Make it easier for public schools to transform into independent schools. 6) Allow public funding to flow to non-traditional, less costly methods of educating children, such as home schooling, learning pods, etc.
H. Jay Eshelman
June 2, 2025 at 4:53 pm
Thank you. Rob, for making some recommendations. I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge your willingness to engage, at least to a point, my occasional ‘challenges’. At the very least, you are one of a handful of VDC readers willing to do so. And I hope we can expand on this discussion further. So, in that regard, please carefully consider the following.
Re: “Step 1: Institute a Taxpayers Bill of Rights…”
We already have a great Constitution, both Federal and State. The problem rests with those who are elected to manage our affairs. As Ben Franklin opined, “ … this Constitution, with all its Faults,… can only end in Despotism… when the People shall become so corrupted as to need Despotic Government, being incapable of any other.”
If there is a Step 1, it is to convince Vermont’s voters that virtually everything they’ve approved over the last several years has been detrimental to their life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. We, the voters, are to blame for Vermont’s current malaise. Unless and until we come to this realization, nothing will change. In fact, our predicament will only worsen.
Re: “1a) Freeze Vermonters property tax bills… cap state spending growth at inflation plus population growth with all excess revenue raised above that amount returned to the taxpayers.”
With all due respect, the devil is in the details. And the details of your proposals are missing. Your logic doesn’t make mathematical sense. Think about it.
First of all, ‘Limits become Extents’. If spending increases are capped by a specific amount, spending will always increase by that amount. Always!
Every year, people tell us they’re proposing to ‘cut’ spending. When, in fact, they’re simply proposing to decrease the rate of spending increases. That’s why our education budgets keep increasing – even while student populations have declined by 20% over the last decade or so. It’s semantic nonsense. Worse…. it’s fraudulent logic.
As I mentioned above, we’ve already experienced massive ‘spending growth’. Vermont’s pre-pandemic 2019 budget was $5.8 Billion. In May, Gov. Scott signed a $9.1 Billion budget for FY2026. That’s a 56% increase.
In other words, we’re now spending 56% more money every year than we did 6 years ago. Every year! If spending doesn’t increase, that’s 56% more spending every year – not an average increase over 6 years.
And that doesn’t include considerations for various underfunded healthcare, education and government defined benefit retirement programs projected to cost taxpayers Billions in additional taxpayer liabilities.
Consider this: If the 2019 budget increased every year by the rate of inflation, let’s say 3% per year, the 2026 budget would be $7.1 Billion – that’s $2.1 Billion LESS, EACH YEAR, than the amount you propose with a cap.
We shouldn’t be ‘capping’ spending growth. We should incrementally decrease spending until we reach $7.1 Billion annually. Then we can consider capping the growth by the rate of inflation. But again, building ‘growth’ into the algorithm only ensures that growth will occur. Why can’t we ‘cut’ spending every year instead?
Re: 1b) “… make the general fund be the revenue stream of last resort until a long term funding solution can be agreed upon.”
It matters little where the revenue stream comes from. The revenue is too high. Period! It shouldn’t be frozen. It should be cut. Period!
Re: “2) … looking at the ways 47 other states limit/cap individual property tax bills and pick the one(s) that work best for us.”
Fine. Other States, almost all of them, have more control over their spending than Vermont. But other States aren’t Vermont. Most States have several cities with larger populations than the entire State of Vermont.
Look at NH. It has three times Vermont’s population and spends only one and a half times as much money. New Hampshire will spend $15.4 Billion on 1.14 Million people. That’s $13,508 per person. Vermont is spending $14,218 per person.
Meanwhile, Florida has 23.8 Million people and spends $115.6 Billion. That’s $4,857 per person. And Florida’s annual budget actually decreased this year.
Okay. Do as Florida does.
Re: “ 3) Set a foundation formula that puts us on a path to pre covid education spending levels that are more in line with other states per pupil spending.”
See my first point. We can’t attain pre-Covid spending levels by capping the rate of increase on an already massively inflated budget. Again: “We shouldn’t be ‘capping’ spending growth. We should incrementally decrease spending until we reach $7.1 Billion annually. Then we can cap the growth by the rate of inflation.”
Re: “4) Cut the supervisory union level of bureaucracy significantly.”
Why not eliminate the supervisory union bureaucracy?
Re: “5) Give local school districts greater local control over how money is spent, and, if they can’t make it work give them the opportunity to close their local school and become a tuitioning district.”
Bingo! At least with regard to education. But school districts already have the authority to close their local schools. Again, the devil is in the details. And I would love to have this discussion with anyone truly interested in saving taxpayer dollars AND improving student outcomes. Let me know if you’re up for that discussion.
Re: “5a) Make it easier for public schools to transform into independent schools.”
This is a redundant point. Again, school districts already have the authority to close their public schools. And several, having done so, have restructured those same schools, the same school buildings and the same school staff, into approved independent schools. Just look at North Bennington.
“The North Bennington Graded School District provides school choice for grades Pre-K through 6th by budgeting for and paying the tuition cost for North Bennington and Shaftsbury District 1 (SD 1) students to attend approved elementary schools. District One includes Paran Acres, Harvest Hills and neighboring areas.”
North Bennington closed its public K-6 school and transformed it into “The Village School of North Bennington, an independent school which provides a full range of support services and special education services for in-district K-6 students who are determined to be eligible for these services.”
Re: “6) Allow public funding to flow to non-traditional, less costly methods of educating children, such as home schooling, learning pods, etc.”
Again, this recommendation is redundant. Vermont’s ‘tuitioning’ governance already allows funding to flow to non-traditional, less costly education programs. The only thing it doesn’t do is subsidize ‘homeschooling’. And most homeschool advocates don’t want to have anything to do with State funding, because they believe it comes with too many strings attached. Nonetheless, I believe Vermont’s ‘tuitioning’ governance does provide assistance to homeschool parents indirectly. And I’d love to have this detailed discussion with you too.
In closing, for now, remember: We, the voters, are to blame for Vermont’s current malaise. If we continue to elect despots, we will get despotism. Unless and until we come to this realization, nothing will change. In fact, our predicament will only worsen. Perhaps Guy and Paul would be interested in doing a series of Creemee Cast shows on these specific points.
You have mish-mashed two separate proposals into one, the first being a two phase prescription for education funding, and the second a TABOR governing the entire state budget.
Yes, we should be spending at least $2 billion less in the state budget than we currently are, as I said clearly in my above article, complete with colorful illustrated chart. Yes, TABOR should bring us back to that level. But at some point you have to cap spending growth. Maybe it does grow to its maximum allowable extent (inflation plus population growth) every year. But without a cap it’s growing at 2.5 times inflation or more.
“It matters little where the revenue stream comes from. The revenue is too high. Period! It shouldn’t be frozen. It should be cut. Period!” This is in reference to my short-term ed fund proposal. It does matter where the money comes from in this case because the legislature doesn’t have responsibility for the property tax under current law. They are simply obligated to sign off on a rate that meets the spending demands of school budget votes. The general fund, however, they have to vote specifically on whether to raise taxes/revenues or cut other programs. This will put pressure and responsibility on elected officials for the taxing/spending decisions. They are less likely to raise new taxes if they can be held accountable for doing so.
“Why not eliminate the supervisory union bureaucracy?” Because you do need to have some level of statewide coordination and supervision of the entire education system if only to gather and report testing scores.
“But school districts already have the authority to close their local schools.” Yes, but if the current ed bill passes it will make it illegal for a district to close its school and become a tuitioning district. From then on a district that closes its school will have to designate a public school to send their kids to.
“Again, school districts already have the authority to close their public schools. And several, having done so, have restructured those same schools, the same school buildings and the same school staff, into approved independent schools. Just look at North Bennington.” I guess you missed it a couple of years ago when the legislature put a moratorium on any new independent schools being approved to take tuition, thus ending the practice of what happened in N. Bennington. That moratorium would be made permanent under H.454. And no existing independent school that currently receives tuition but has less than 25% (the house wants 50%) of its students currently tuitioning would be barred from accepting tuitioning students. But, it was very difficult and expensive for N Bennington to transition from public to independent. It took years. In my proposal, that process would be streamlined, and even facilitated by the state.
“Vermont’s ‘tuitioning’ governance already allows funding to flow to non-traditional, less costly education programs.” No, all tuitioning allows is for funding to flow to approved, independent schools. It does not help pay for home schooling, learning pods, individual tutors, online options…. It should.
Rob, you ‘mishmashed’ your proposals in your first comment on the ‘rob-roper-podcast’ I referenced. Not that it matters. It doesn’t. I simply commented in that context.
I’ll address your last comment first, in an attempt to keep the discussion uncluttered.
Re: “Vermont’s ‘tuitioning’ governance already allows funding to flow to non-traditional, less costly education programs.” You said “No, all tuitioning allows is for funding to flow to approved, independent schools. It does not help pay for home schooling, learning pods, individual tutors, online options…. It should.”
Rob. Less costly means ‘less costly’. The State’s allowed average tuition for students attending ‘approved’ independent schools is approximately $20K per student per year. Compare that to the $30K per pupil spending in the public schools. Yes. The current education reform bill, despotism at its worst, is intended to eliminate our existing School Choice Tuitioning governance. But it hasn’t passed yet.
Why not keep an open mind? Your governance proposals are just that – proposals. I’m simply suggesting that we use existing governance to facilitate the many various education options you referenced. My wife and I did it with our kids under current governance.
That’s right. We homeschooled a Language Arts program while our kids remained enrolled in our local high school. The high school administrators approved our program. We formed ‘pods’ with other students, provided individual tutoring and online instruction. So can others… before the despots shut the possibilities down completely. If you think it’s difficult to work within the existing education governance, what are the odds that your proposed wholesale changes to the system will be any less difficult?
Apparently, or unfortunately, no one seems to be interested. So much for thinking outside the box. Hopefully, someone will kick these ideas around a bit and reinvent them to suit their own political likeness, if that’s what it takes to get the ball rolling.
As Ronald Reagan once said: “There is no limit to the amount of good you can do if you don’t care who gets the credit.”
As a tax paying Vermonter, yes Vermonter, where do we find a line item budget for this $9.1B boondoggle of a budget ??, I assume it’s public knowledge ??
I hope it doesn’t surprise anyone that Vermont’s budget numbers are presented in such obtuse fashion. If, as a businessperson, I ever approached my lending bankers with financial presentations like this, I’d be politely asked to provide financial statements based upon GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Practices). But not these guys. They’re asking the taxpayers to loan them the money and the taxpayers are in over their head for the most part.
Nonetheless…. here you go.
https://ljfo.vermont.gov/assets/Uploads/GENERAL-383497-v1-FY26_COC_Highlight_Document.pdf
JP Morgan CEO, Jamie Dimon, is telegraphing to his buddies what is coming. When the biggest dog signals the “pump and dump” game is near end – better take heed. He is not doing it for the little peon investors, Mom & Pop, you or me. It is a signal to prepare for the end game, sit back and sip the chardonnay. The billionaires can ride it out, no problem. The rest of us – well, best of luck suckers!
The Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, blew it off and is all in for the crypto – aka digitial currency – aka phantom currency – aka not-in-your-hand-in theirs. Have you bought your Trump coin yet? Good on him for making hay while shining the sun up your backside! The rug pull is set for yanking. Read what Dimon said – then read between the lines – then brace for impact. Depopulation, wealth transfer, reset – globally – not just here.
“Dimon repeated his warnings about the bond market in an interview with Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo that aired Monday, saying the surging US national debt may create a “tough time” for that market as spreads widen.”
“If people decide that the US dollar isn’t the place to be, you could see credit spreads gap out; that would be quite a problem,” Dimon said.It hurts the people raising money. That includes small businesses, that includes loans to small businesses, includes high-yield debt, includes leveraged lending, includes real estate loans. That’s why you should worry about volatility in the bond market.”
Long-term Treasury yields have been climbing in recent weeks, driven by growing concerns over the trajectory of US debt as President Trump’s proposed tax legislation advances to the Senate after clearing the House.”
The leveraging into infinity is hitting the brick ceiling – no matter the printing and inflating. What happens when bond notes come due and can’t be extended or issued for obvious reasons. What happens when the holder demands the cash or can’t sell it to the next sucker? Boom shakalaka outta-lucka – the dominos fall hard and fast.