Texas plans drastic cuts to education, health care, and social services

[Hannah Bell]

On Monday, the House-Senate Conference Committee in the US state of Texas reached a tentative agreement on much of the state’s two-year state budget. Though not finalized yet, it is already clear that the proposed budget will impose drastic cuts to education, health care, and other social services.

Earlier this month, the senate passed a $176 billion budget, while the version passed by the house was $12 billion less. Even if the senate version were to be approved unchanged, it would still represent an $11 billion cutback in spending over the previous budget. The senate version slashes public school spending by $4 billion, as opposed to the house-approved bill, which slashes public school spending by $7.8 billion. Such are the parameters of the official debate.

Although portrayed by the media as a major political battle, the truth is that most of the budget terms have already been agreed upon except for education, which remains a small sticking point rather than a fundamental disagreement. The dispute is largely over how much money to disburse from the state’s Rainy Day Fund to offset some of the proposed cuts to education.

This Rainy Day Fund, financed by oil and gas revenue from previous years, currently amounts to more than $9 billion. There is concern within sections of the political establishment that it would be too provocative to impose mass layoffs and school, hospital, and nursing home closures while leaving such a significant pile of cash untouched. Republican Governor Rick Perry, an unapologetic agent of the super-rich, has announced strong opposition to any bill that includes expenditures from the Rainy Day Fund, despite having previously used the fund for his own pet projects.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/may2011/texa-m21.shtml

[Hardrada]

1. Texas, the Early Learning Center for Hades

[cutlassmama]

2. he'll throw all the old people out of the nursing homes, just like Reagan

did with the mentally ill. Grandma will now be on the street corner, hooked up to an IV, with a sign "will work for food". All the while he has $9b in the "rainy day" fund.