David Yepsen in the Des Moines Register:
In Iowa, Vilsack said earlier this week the state's economic emergency fund can now be topped off. That, too, is due to better than expected revenues in the fiscal year that ended June 30. It means both the cash reserve fund and the emergency fund are now full — at $535 million.I can only guess that Tom Vilsack was bullied in math class. What else explains why he would propose a 6.1% spending increase during a year in which state revenue went up 3.6%.
That's good news because those funds had been tapped to cover excessive spending approved by the governor and Legislature in past years. Vilsack credited a healthy state economy and spending restraint by legislators this last year for helping generate the additional $37 million needed to fill the emergency fund.
But that, too, doesn't tell a complete picture. The state still owes the senior living trust fund $201.5 million. That's supposed to be used to help seniors stay in their own homes, but instead those dollars were used to pay for other things. And $160 million in property-tax-credit payments isn't accounted for properly. Also, other trust funds that were cleaned out to cover spending for other things have never been repaid. And Iowa's got about $500 million of built-in spending promises that have been made for next year. Did I mention how the state's pension systems can't pay what they owe?
So what if the State owes the Senior Living Trust fund over $200 million? Vilsack can just blame Wal-Mart for employing all those 70-and-80-somethings a few hours a week so they can have gambling money, yet still qualify for Medicaid under the rules the politicians wrote.
Not to fear. Chet Culver came up with 5 or 10 ideas the other day on economic development.
Culver will get IPERS to invest in businesses like
And if that isn't bold enough, Chet Culver will open more casinos in places like Allerton and Fort Dodge.
You can also be sure a coffin nail tax hike will fill up them coffers.
Or Iowa can elect Jim Nussle. He has a lot of experience mismanaging budgets and spending money on things like tourism development for Kentucky like it's just come off a North Korean printing press.
Establishing a living trust even though it may be expensive is a very important decision. It saves your descendants having to go through courts of law and overpaying for assets they could get for free right from your own very hands.In most cases the living trusts are under tax pressure but the main advantage is that the assets are protected from the hands of creditors if they are under a trust since the creditors can have no claim over the asset.
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