The State of California faces a massive $28 billion dollar budget deficit, according to Bloomberg. “We are heading toward a financial Armageddon,” Schwarzenegger said. “The problem gets worse every day,” he said. He said the deficit estimate for the $100 billion general fund has grown from $11.2 billion to $14.8 billion,” according to the Sacramento Bee.
Could legalized gambling help solve part of this problem? The State of Nevada legalized gambling during the Great Depression. At the time they had a large underground gambling economy. “Today, more than 43 percent of the state general fund is fed by gambling tax revenue and more than 34 percent of the state’s general fund is pumped into public education, according to Reuters.
Today the State of Nevada runs ads here in California that tout their lower taxes and pro-business attitude (see graphic above) as they try to convince California businesses to relocate to Nevada. Well, perhaps it is time for California to offer gaming so we can enjoy lower taxes too!
Gambling revenue is way off today, in Nevada, due to the global Bush depression, however Nevada is still averaging a billion dollars a month in gaming revenue, according to the State of Nevada. Why should California concede any of that revenue to Nevada? Can you imagine what sort of business casinos would do in Hollywood, San Francisco and maybe even Santa Ana? And near other tourist attractions, such as Disneyland, Universal Studios, and San Diego’s Sea World?
What about Indian gaming? Indian casinos in California netted over $7 billion in revenue in 2007, according to the San Diego Union Tribune. The gambling tribes do little for our state. Why concede them the revenue?
California could be looking at an annual $20 billion in gaming revenue! And think of all the construction and casino jobs that legalized gaming would create in the Golden State?
But why stop at gambling? Why not revise our Three Strikes law too? If all three strikes had to be violent crimes a lot less people would end up in prison for life.
“Under a new state law, California will spend $7.4 billion to build 40,000 new prison beds, and that is over and above the current annual operating budget of more than $10 billion. Interest payments alone on the billions of dollars of bonds that will be sold to finance the new construction will amount to $330 million a year by 2011 — all money that will not be available for higher education or other state priorities,” according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
We can recapture some of the money being blown on prisons and prison guards not only be revising our Three Strikes law, but also by enforcing Prop. 215, the medical marijuana initiative – or decriminalizing marijuana altogether.
We also could save untold millions by getting rid of the death penalty. Let’s face it. These criminals never do get put to death. Instead they file one appeal after another, tying up our courts. Just sentence them to life in prison, no parole. That may be worse than death!
We could also save millions of dollars by giong to a part-time State Legislature. And by changing the way we pay retired legislators when they are tabbed to serve on state commissions.
Just look at what former State Senator Carole Migden just lucked into. “Migden, 60, will earn more than $132,000 a year as a member of the California Integrated Waste Management Board, $16,000 a year more than she earned as a senator, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Does anyone else think that is nuts!
Honestly, do we really need a full-time state legislature? Our state legislators have proven to be a bunch of useless gas-bags, so why not cut their hours and their pay? While we are at it we ought to also take away the legislator’s car allowance and per diems. If they want to serve the public, then let them do it at their own expense!
California can get out of the budget hole we are in. But to do so we are going to have to make some tough decisions – and we are going to have to start thinking like Libertarians. Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have any answers, so why not let freedom lead the way?
I agree with so much of what you wrote even though I dont like the idea of having such widespread gambling in CA. I mean whey not legalize and tax prostitution as well? The reason we don’t is that its not consensual and neither is gambling for some people so I can’t support either except with regulation that prevents abuse.
Same with Medical Marijuana which regardless of one’s opinion of its medical efficacy marijuana is now regulated so that “patients” are monitored by physicians regularly the same as people on prescriptions are.
While this accounts for a large percentage of marijuana’s users there is still a huge amount of illegal drug activity with serious individual and societal consequences that we have yet to effectively regulate despite a decades old war, the expenditure of a large amount of tax resources, a huge federal agency and millions of dedicated public servants and law enforcement personel. Your decriminalization idea may not work well with an overall strategy to manage the problem but perhaps a change in sentencing from incarceration to treatment would yield the results you are proposing.
The whole criminalization of marijuana is pretty outdated in my opinion. I think a huge savings could be made in several areas of poilicing, copurts, probation etc etc, if it was simply decriminalized.
I have heard reports of several police departments nationwide simply refusing to enforce any form of marijuana laws simply for the fact that they think its a waste of man power.
I don’t know that the law enforcement funding is for specific drugs Paul. Its likely that the enforcement money will just be spent on other areas. The savings will come from not having to pay for the users incarceration although there may be a drop in the caseloads of our courts and probation departments these are so underfunded now that it would just allow them to catch up.
I still think that we don’t want kids using alcohol and drugs and that we don’t want to saddle youthful experimentation with convictions and records that can harm their chances upon launching. This is the thought behind the pre-conviction treatment programs that give offenders treatment and not a record. Even this deterrent will be somewhat ineffective because kids will be kids.
I also think that those who prey on kids with drugs don’t limit themselves to marijuana but also provide crack, speed and other club drugs Like the date rape drug for those adventurous enough to try them or use them on their unsuspecting victims. I want these folks policed, prosecuted, and locked away for the good of our society.
I really don’t want California to be like Nevada, sorry. We have gambling available because of Indian gaming and we do get revenue from them even though they don’t take from the general fund in that they are sovereign and pay for their own schools, police and fire.
As for three strikes and legalizing drugs, I’m all for that. Unfortunately Arnold really shouldn’t have vetoed the hemp bill, it would be a huge boon to our economy and takes very little resources to grow, it’s a damn weed. It’s sustainable and we could stop importing hemp from other countries.
How does this Dec. 11 post which I’ve never seen already have four comments from Dec. 7? I’m confused… Some good ideas though.
Vern,
I put this story up on Sunday and it went nowhere. Now that our state budget crisis is even worse, I thought it would be a good time to refresh it and bring it back.
I doubt either the red or blue guys in Sacramento will take note – but the ideas in this post WOULD solve our budget crisis…
Well, for gambling, people need to have disposable income. So, revenue from that is probably highly dependent on the economic situation.
The 3-strikes law’s only real effect is the overcrowding of prisons. So getting rid of that law would ease the financial burden of the state somewhat.
As far as de-criminalizing marijuana (that’s actually a more accurate description than legalizing), that is the only real way to go. It is an addiction, and these people need therapy, not punishment. If they could get the drugs prescribed that they need, that would also put quite a dent in the drug trade, and in the drug-related crimes. Researchers have long advocated de-criminalizing. But of course, too many politicians appeal to emotions instead of rationality. And a large part of the population buys into the emotional stuff.