Reply #11: Universal Single Payer Healthcare is part of the answer. [View All]

[RBInMaine]

"If not TABOR than what?" so you ask. First, Mainers do have a high AVERAGE overall tax burden, but remember that this is the AVERAGE, skewed in large part by our traditionally low overall income levels compared to cost of living in this state. However, our actual average tax burden per family in REAL DOLLARS is down around 35th in the nation. The problem is tax dollars compared to income level. The coastal LOCAL real estate marketeer-driven explosion in housing costs haven't helped! Average housing costs are WAY too high Maine compared to income levels. We are also a large state geographically compared to population with LOTS of infrastructure to take care of. We have ALWAYS been a relatively poor state with lots of elderly and low income folks, especially in rural Maine, who rely on social programs to survive. We have to pay a lot for energy here in the cold northeast, and we have lost tens of thousands of good jobs, as have many other states, due to awful trade agreements that have sent our factories to the third world (No one can blame Baldacci or Dems for that!!). You also have to look at inflation, etc. etc. What to do? MANY things, but universal single payer healthcare like Canada and MANY other advanced nations would help big time. Also: roll back the TONS of costly new education mandates; require annual zero-based local budgeting practices statewide; either find a way to cap property valuations for tax purposes or expand the circuit breaker program; take out the LD1 loopholes to hold local govts. more accountable and ensure LD1 provisions are enforced; look at a variety of tax re-structuring possibiities to reduce property taxes; take a good look both the Brookings and Maine Chamber of Commerce economic development recommendations to expand job growth; ... Quick-fix one-size-fits-all schemes like Palesky and TABOR designed by and for the greedy right-wing are WRONG and UNFAIR and FLAWED. It's a complex problem that will require a complex solution, but there are FAIR solutions that can work over time, and yes, our leaders and at all levels regardless of party do need to roll up their sleeves and get to work on solutions (although we must also remember that LD1, circuit breaker, homestead exemption, and other measures HAVE BEEN DONE, they deserve credit, and they need time to become fully accessed and implemented).