Robo-Cuts: California’s Budget and Health Care Intertwined

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Anthony Wright
Executive Director of Health Access California

Former Governor Pete Wilson gave the Governor's radio address over the weekend, and hinted at what the Governor Schwarzenegger might be thinking, as we head into the week where the budget will be announced.

Josiah Greene at the California Majority Report is right to sound the alarm. Wilson invokes his attempt at Proposition 165, to give him as Governor more budget-cutting authority. It also raises the specter of Schwarzenegger coming back with something similar to Prop 76, which would have allowed the Governor to make unilateral budget cuts in certain emergencies. Both measures failed at the ballot box, and for good reason.

Whether the cuts are "unilateral" or "automatic" doesn't make them better, it makes them worse.

• It means that cuts are made without proper consideration of what is penny-wise and pound-foolish;

• It means that cuts are prioritized over other budget solutions, including raising revenues, and yes, taxes.

• It means that legislators escape accountability to make the tough choices, whether cuts or revenues.

Governor Wilson said in his radio statement that when "our economy does slow down, state law must require that state government slows down its spending, too."

But it already does. The requirement to have a balanced budget in effect provides for this: when less revenue comes in (as it is doing now), it puts forward the challenge to elected policymakers to make the tough choices--including making the cuts that do the least harm, and to raise revenues if need be.

Here's the problem in health care, and other social services: it is exactly during bad economic times, when policymakers are seeking to cut the state budget, that health care services are needed the most.