How to Curb State Spending If Your Name Is Martin O’Malley

January 20, 2008 by Cato  
Filed under Fiscal Policy, Maryland, Maryland Politics

Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley claims to exercise fiscal restraint with Maryland tax dollars. It isn’t his fault that he had to raise taxes. The blame squarely lays on his predecessor, former Gov. Bob Ehrlich.

O’Malley is such a fiscal conservative that he’s eliminating 500 jobs in his proposed state budget. At least that’s what you hear in most of the mainstream media. Yet, buried within the bowels of the O’Malley budget is the creation of 898 new jobs. Lest my math skills fail me, that’s a net gain of 398 jobs; almost equal to the number of state jobs that O’Malley claims to be eliminating.

Is this “lean operating budget” increasing only 4.1%, or is it really growing by almost 6% as noted in the Governor’s own “Budget Highlights” book?

It doesn’t really matter. O’Malley will tell us new story since this one appears to have been exposed.

cross posted at Red Maryland

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