I’m shocked – shocked – to hear the administration of Gov. Deval Patrick, not yet a year into its promised “Together We Can” utopia for all of us, already making noises about raising taxes. Just like I’d be shocked to find gambling going on in those casinos the governor wants to build in order to suck more money from the “most vulnerable among us” – you know, the elderly and the poor.
The opening gambit comes from his budget chief, Leslie Kirwan, who says the state is facing a minimum $1.3 billion deficit for the coming fiscal year. Most of it, she says, is due to standard inflation of things like health care and contractual salary increases.
To close the gap will require significant cuts in services or – all together now – “new revenues.” We all know the governor would never permit service cuts, which are always “devastating,” so that leaves those of us in the private sector to cover it. We’ll have to pay twice: We face the same inflation in things like health care and energy costs, but we have to cover it ourselves, with salaries that remain largely stagnant. And then, we will be expected to pay higher taxes so public employees will be insulated from those economic realities.
True, the gov has suggested that instead of hitting the worker bees, he may go after businesses, collecting $600 million in taxes by closing “loopholes.” But then, he wants to give it back to some of them, with tax credits for those in the “life sciences.” Sounds like the kind of shell game Patrick was decrying during his campaign for the office.
It’s enough to make you think about revising that vague, gauzy slogan. How about “Together we Can … Move out of Massachusetts.”
