Author: Sarah Mofford
There is no better time to attend a private institution than when the state your institution is in has a $41 billion deficit. Sure, Oxy has its own problems with finances, but when UCLA has to cut its equivalent of the Center for Academic Excellence, and Humboldt Professors have to work fewer hours in order to delay layoffs another year, Oxy’s problems don’t seem so bad.
However, these finance problems extend beyond California’s college campuses. For those who don’t remember the train of events that led up to the instatement of the Governator, allow me to summarize. Schwarzenegger replaced former Governor Grey Davis, who was recalled in 2003 because of his mismanagement of the office and his inability to solve California’s budget crisis. And here we are again, back to budget crises and mismanagement.
The newly passed budget was described by the New York Times as a historical first for the state, stating, “At no point in modern history has the state dealt with it fiscal issues by retreating so deeply in its services.” These fiscal issues refer to some “$30 billion in cuts over two fiscal years to schools, colleges, health care, welfare, corrections, recreation and more,” reported the New York Times. Unless California changes something about its budgeting process, perhaps by repealing Prop 13 or decreasing the polarization within the system, California will become a failed state.
I know in our Oxy bubble we may all be thinking it can’t be that bad, but The Guardian, a British newspaper, reports that “Los Angeles now has a poverty rate of 20 percent. Other cities across the state, such as Fresno and Modesto, have jobless rates that rival Detroit’s.” The budget has been debated for far too long.
When it comes to lawmaking and voting, it seems that either the politicians can’t make decisions because they have been in office too long and are out of touch with the people, or they are new to their office and don’t know how the process works. Can’t we have one politician who went to public school in California, and then to a UC or a State School, who will remember that California is ranked 47th in the nation for education? Is that too much to ask?
Instead, California’s government has agreed to cut billions of dollars from education and sack 60,000 state employees. “The percentage of 19-year-olds at college in the state dropped from 43 percent to 30 percent between 1996 and 2004, one of the highest falls ever recorded for any developed world economy,” said The Guardian. The New York Times added that “classroom sizes are about to explode, and state universities are furloughing professors and cutting class offerings.” In a time when college education is becoming more and more important, the cutting of funds toward colleges and scholarships like Cal grants hurts everyone. No wonder college attendance has dropped – while colleges become more expensive, funding is less likely to occur.
If California, which is ranked the eighth largest economy in the world according to The Guardian, were a company, it would be declared bankrupt. But it’s not just the politicians in California who deserve the blame. California expanded during the first part of the 1900s and by the 1970s the rising housing prices and infrastructure growth created higher taxes.
In response, an anti-tax rebellion occurred, resulting in Proposition 13, a voter-led initiative that artificially depressed property taxes and shifted school financing burdens to the state. “[Proposition 13] also led to the onset of a culture of ballot initiatives that have hamstrung state budgeters by earmarking money for programs with one vote and taking away the ability to pay for them with others,” reported the New York Times. Those people who stand outside Target and ask for your signature for propositions? That’s the culture of ballot initiatives. Most of the props I’ve been asked to sign are about decreasing taxes even more.
I know that the tax system should be overhauled. Yet if no one pays taxes, nothing in the government would run. No education, no health care, no police, no legislature – no anything. The decline of taxes is not going to help us out of our crisis. Health care and education need to be funded by your taxes.
Thank goodness there is some hope. The investment in eco-friendly jobs and industries is able to create new jobs and new resources that can save the Golden State. It’s a bumpy road ahead, but it has potential to get better, as long as we don’t take a wrong turn.
Sarah Mofford is an undeclared sophomore. She can be reached at smofford@oxy.edu.
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