May 12, 2008

Hone your own budget skills!

With the May Revise only two days away, there’s still time for all you armchair budget quarterbacks to play fantasy budget here.

This is the Web site for the “California Budget Challenge,” sponsored by an outfit called Next 10. Next 10 is a nonprofit nonpartisan group out of Palo Alto. Its admirable-if-pretty-much-unobtainable goal is to make Californians better understand how their state government works.

You can go the site, answer a dozen or so multiple-choice questions, and see what the budget would be like if you were king or queen of the state for a few years. It doesn’t take long and it does give one a feel for the daunting challenges facing our elected leaders.

Me? I finished with a $4.7 billion surplus by 2012-13, mainly by raising spending only slightly and increasing everyone else’s taxes.

Probably why I’m not a candidate…

Posted by swiegand on May 12, 2008 10:50 AM