L&T Publisher Earl Watt
A famous line by Jack Nicholson as the Joker in the 1989 “Batman” movie is “Who you gonna trust?”
Ironically, the Joker goes on to say, “Me, I’m giving away free money.”
You would almost believe this line comes straight from Washington, D.C., or Topeka. As long as the “free” money is coming we should trust them, or so they would have us believe.
When conservatives put together budgets, they are generally reviewed by other government agencies like the Office of Management and Budget, the Congressional Budget Office, or in Kansas the Consensus Revenue Estimating Group which has representatives from the Division of Budget, the Department of Revenue, the Legislative Research Department plus representatives from the University of Kansas, Kansas State University and Wichita State University.
Who you gonna trust? Obviously these are supposed to be the best economic minds that look at the expenses of government, the revenues produced by government fees and taxation, and then they make projections based on their superior intellect.
I’m not questioning their intelligence. Truly these people are highly educated.
But over and over again policies supported by conservative lawmakers, like reducing taxes and the cost of government, are met with scrutiny and projections that these policies will lead to deficits. Many times they “predict” that there won’t be enough funding to cover basic government functions.
While Republican lawmakers continue to make the case that the reduction in the cost of government coupled with tax relief will spur the economy, the experts simply reject those views and paint a doom and gloom picture that the world as we know it will collapse unless we continue to feed the beast and maintain high tax rates.
Concepts like “A rising tide lifts all ships” is foreign to these expert financiers.
If taxes are cut, in their infinite wisdom, then government doesn’t have the money to function.
But a look at the May numbers in Kansas paint a very different picture. After tax cuts in 2024 by the Kansas Legislature after overriding the governor’s veto (remember the special session last summer?), tax revenues are actually ahead of projectionist.
In May alone, Kansas tax collections beat estimates by 31.7 percent.
Think of that — 31.7 percent more money came in to the State of Kansas than was projected by the financial experts.
Who you gonna trust?
On income tax collections alone, Kansas projected to bring in $170 million but actually brought in $314 million. That was 85 percent more than the estimated income and was 3.1 percent higher than May 2024.
Even Democratic Governor Laura Kelly couldn’t pour enough cold water on the news.
“Surpassing estimates this month is a positive indicator,” she had to admit. “But we remain diligent and focused on maintaining long-term financial health.” She couldn’t resist and is almost duty-bound to reject the fact that Republicans were right in overriding her vetoes which would have prevented tax cuts including the reduction in grocery taxes in Kansas.
In the past, Republicans made cuts in the wrong places that did hurt state government revenues. Under Governor Sam Brownback, property taxes were cut. The problem with that is out-of-state ownership is high in Kansas. Cutting taxes on out-of-staters didn’t benefit Kansas.
But the current Republican leadership cut taxes on Kansas incomes and on Kansas consumers, which put the money directly in the pockets of Kansans. In turn, Kansans were able to add jobs, spend more and reduce personal debt. This strengthened Kansas by resulting in more money coming in to the state treasury while at the same time reducing the burden on the people.
It’s amazing what happens when government trusts the people with their own money.
Yes, the government likes to hand out “free” money in order to keep you committed to high taxes. Republicans chose to let you keep what’s yours.
Who you gonna trust?
