The spigot is off, taxpayers are tapped out

Kinda on the subject of the previous, JLF’s Joe Coletti offers up his own budget plan. Bottom line:

It’s time for government leaders to accept the need for cuts, Coletti said. “While private payrolls shrank 9.1 percent between 2007 and 2010 — those 300,000 jobs are gone — state and local government payrolls expanded by 4.2 percent,” he said. “Stimulus spending mainly allowed government to keep growing. But taxpayers are tapped out. The federal spigot to states is off. Now it is time for governments to downsize.”

Spreadsheet here. It’s worth a look; ask yourself if we really need many of the programs and departments marked ‘end general fund appropriation.’