Loopholes and workarounds

Bobby Jindal threatens to veto a budget that messes with inventory tax credits.

BATON ROUGE -- Gov. Bobby Jindal said Thursday he won't support a legislative effort to temporarily suspend tax breaks to drum up quick cash to patch together next year's budget.

The Republican governor, in a sit-down with reporters to recap the second week of the legislative session, said he's told legislative leaders that he would consider the move a tax increase and he would veto a budget dependent on it.

"I made it very clear to them that we're not encouraging any kind of games or workarounds or loopholes," he said.

Seems a bit late for that kind of talk.  This is from last year.

Why didn't revenues eventually rebound after the economy began improving? Well, because of tax cuts alone, we're collecting $850 million less each year. And Louisiana's budget is heavily dependent on regressive sales taxes, which economic studies indicate don't respond quickly to economic growth.

Whatever the reasons, when revenues failed to rebound, Jindal and lawmakers continued to tap one-time money, to the point they'll now consider no solution beyond spending temporary revenue and imposing deep budget cuts.

That non-recurring revenue, by the way, has been mostly acquired by selling state assets, misappropriating federal hurricane relief funds, staging an irresponsible tax amnesty program and draining every trust fund in sight.

What was temporary is now permanent. Jindal and legislators are addicted to non-recurring revenue.

Jindal's whole term as Governor has been about loopholes and workarounds meant to cover up the severe structural damage his package of asset dumps and tax favors was doing to the state budget.  He's on the way out now so it doesn't really matter what happens next.