Friday, February 12, 2016

The Reality of Act 10!



By Jeff Simpson

Today was a day that will live in infamy in WI history.  Well today 5 years ago.  February 11,2011.  It was the day that Scott Walker Dropped his bomb on the good people of WI, especially public workers, with what he called ACT10.

Scott Walker had planned all along to use his victory and power to punish his political enemies.The problem with Scott Walker though, besides a fundamental lack of economic sense, is that he does not care who he brings down with him.

When he enacted ACT10, we know that after the first year, he bled $1,000,000,000 of demand out of the Wisconsin economy.

Now that we have lived under ACT10 for five years, exactly what we thought would happen, has happened.



Yes, you read that right, Governor Walker, while punishing the public employees for not supporting him, has bled $5,024,000,000 from our economy.   That explains why we have taken the biggest hit in the middle class in the country.

ACT10 is still a very divisive piece of legislation,but that is not surprising when it was enacted by this guy:


The biggest problem with ACT10 though, is that no one really understands what it is.  Even Todd Barry, from Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance gets it wrong.

Todd Berry of the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance said districts took advantage of the law, and the “‘tools’ more or less worked.”
While every district in WI has, by law, used the "tools" provided in ACT10, we have a record number of referendums on the ballot from local school districts(because its NOT working).

Let's take a quick look at what ACT10 actually does and does not do.   It is no surprise to anyone that Maciver got it wrong, but they did the math:

$5.24 billion in savings works out to $910 in savings for every man, woman and child in Wisconsin, or $2,291 for every household in Wisconsin. The DOT could build 2,912 more roundabouts. The savings could fund over 68,000 four-year degrees at UW-Madison, or install 42 separate Milwaukee-style streetcar systems throughout the entire state. Thankfully, however, Walker and the legislature have used the Act 10 savings to provide more than $2 billion in direct tax relief for Wisconsinites.
The reality is Scott Walker and ACT10 has taken $5.24 billion(or as Mr. Healy points out $2291 per family) of Demand out of our economy.  

That is the end though,  of Mr. Healy's expertise as he points out -

. The DOT could build 2,912 more roundabouts. ----  We could have built, but we didn't because the WIsGOP want to limit the amount of roundabouts in WI and our infrastructure is badly failing under the Walker Administration.  

 The savings could fund over 68,000 four-year degrees at UW-Madison -----  We could have sent 68000 Wisconsinites to UW-Madison, instead, we cut $250 million from the UW budget and because you are more likely to go to college if your parents did, and the WI middle class has taken a beating, the enrollment of Wisconsin students at UW-Madison has declined tremendously.  

42 separate Milwaukee-style streetcar systems throughout the entire state. -  We could have, but the MacIver Institute has adamantly opposed the Milwaukee Streetcar since it was first proposed.  

Since we did not invest in any of the items, what did we invest in?  What do we have to show for the massive cut in pay to public employees? 

Well we paid for some extensive legal bills for the unethical way they redistricted, we had to pay massive overtime costs for Scott Walker's security because he refused to pay for them, we also have to now pay for 100% of Scott Walker's campaign bills.   Add to that the fact that Scott Walker's pet project of WEDC, has lost millions of taxpayer dollars and that the latest budget submitted by Scott Walker was the largest spending budget in Wisconsin's history.

While Scott Walker and his Republican shills have touted a decrease in taxes, the reality is our taxes decreased an average of $3 total over two years.  We have not seen the massive tax cuts nor have we seen the advantages of having more money in our pocket to spend.

For the $3 savings, we were given, record debt, less services, lower wages, numerous business closings and layoffs and a divided state.

Not the best record for the Republicans to run on in 2016.  

Don't forget, go to our facebook page and tell us how Act10 has affected you!




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