What Has Act 10 Cost You?

From the minute Scott Walker was elected, he had a plan.  His plan was to "divide and conquer" Wisconsin.   His weapon in doing so was ACT 10.


Recently, our friends from the right, knowing they lose on the issue of ACT 10,  started a website, "I save with act 10" where you can put your county and home value in and it magically comes up with the many dollars ACT 10 has "saved you"(for me personally it said I saved $189 when in reality my taxes increased $111) . They do not tell you what their equations are, just trust them, you are now in the upper 1% thanks to Scott Walker. That website, however they come up with their numbers (it appears that an Alchemist does it using magic stones), there are many things that they do not take into account.

Some things they are missing are:

* Was ACT 10 the ONLY way to balance the budget (PS we all know the budget is not balanced)

* How much has the big government expensive bills that the republicans passed cost you, where would webe    had they focused on jobs instead of them (some examples of course are Voter ID,  Redistricting and the incredible bills they ran up and charged to the taxpayers to do so, sending the train money back, sending the federal money to expand wireless internet in rural Wisconsin back, etc...)

* The fact that the JOHN DOE investigation has trapped many of Walker's top staff and will probably close upon Scott Walker himself in the near future and that is not ok!  

* The Scott Walker lied to be elected, and lied under oath when discussing it. 

* One of the biggest things not taken into account is the fact that DEMAND is what drives the economy, Econ 101 - when people have less money they buy less things, thus CONTRACTING the economy.  

That being said not everyone saves with ACT 10.  ACT 10 has cost Wisconsin dearly this past year and a half.   My wife works for the Madison School District, and, like all public employees, we were forced to take the cuts to her pay in ACT 10(which was approximately $6000). 

Here is a quick and partial list of what we have cut in this past year(its not scientific but it is reality) 

* Our subscription to the Wisconsin State Journal $130/yr 

* Subscription to ESPN the Magazine $59/yr

*  Our membership to the YMCA $68/ month - $816/yr 

* My son's karate lessons - $100 + a month 

* We rearranged work schedules and daycare and saves us approximately $3000/ yr

*  We have cut out going out to eat to local restaurants monthly probably saving $200/month 

* Cutting down going out to eat, cuts out our need for babysitters so we probably save about $50-60 a month on babysitters. 

 Everything on that list(except for ESPN the Magazine) is money that was DIRECTLY TAKEN from our local economy.   Our daycare money was to a local daycare where I live, babysitters also, YMCA helps the community, I would estimate that of the going out to eat money we are no longer spending 85% would have went to locally owned restaurants, the karate lessons were in our community etc.... We also plan to get an extra 100,000 miles out of the car I drive now than we would have before.   

That is just the dollar cost of ACT 10 to our family.  Then there s the cost of the friends who have "defriended" me and the family members that no longer talk to us.  

In my opinion, none of this was worth the $49 that some people "saved" in property taxes.  These cuts have real world effects on local communities and local businesses.  

That is what ACT 10 has cost us......what has ACT 10 cost YOU?  

Please share your stories here, and also "like" our facebook page  https://www.facebook.com/WhatAct10HasCostMe  and share your stories there also!