http://samuel-warde.com/2015/06/kansas-governor-declares-war-kansas-courts/
"He even imported Arthur Laffer, the man who invented “trickle-down” economics, to sell it to the suckers, I mean citizens. The story line was that in eliminating taxes for 200,000 businesses and slashing the tax rates for the wealthy, businesses would flock to Kansas, creating jobs and more disposable income. Thus they would make up the difference in sales taxes. While all this was transpiring, Kansas would keep the budget balanced by cutting unnecessary expenditures in areas like social services, infrastructure, highways and education.
For the 2014 fiscal year, tax collections came in $333 million short of expectations. The Kansas legislature had cut $150 million in those “unnecessary expenditures,” but total collections were down $700 million from the previous year. The state had to raid the reserve fund to the tune of $320 million to balance the books.
In May, Moody lowered Kansas’ credit rating from Aa1 to Aa2, citing sluggish recovery and risky tax plan. In August, Standard and Poor’s followed suit by lowering Kansas’ bond rating from AA+ to AA, citing the state’s unbalanced budget caused by the 2012 tax cuts.
This year is even worse. Even wiping out that $380 million remaining in the reserve fund, Kansas is coming up $279 million short. According to the Kansas constitution, the books must be balanced and they’ve got less than three weeks to do it. The bell tolls at midnight, June 30.
Oh, and next year the shortfall is expected to be in the neighborhood of $800 million and the reserve fund cupboard is bare!"
