Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Managing Editor of the Journal Inquirer Chris Powell notes in a recent column that Connecticut’s constitutional cap on spending has over the years been easily surmounted by governors and legislators determined to spend money. And indeed, spending has spiraled in the state. Governor William O’Neill's last pre-income tax budget was about $7.5 billion. Connecticut’s current biennial budget is hovering around $40 billion, and the Democratic dominated General Assembly has not yet finished tinkering with it. By broadening the sales tax while reducing the sales tax rate and removing from under the spending cap pension payments for state workers, progressive magicians in the General Assembly are now in the process of transmuting a multi- million dollar deficit into a multi-million dollar surplus. Spending in Connecticut has tripled within the space of four governors, one of whom was independent Governor Lowell Weicker, the father of Connecticut’s income tax.