The Plan Behind the Curtain
In the last newsletter I told you we organized an ambitious Comprehensive Fiscal Plan Working Group. It’s certainly been keeping me busy. You can watch our public meetings, where we’ve heard presentations on the state’s fiscal position, the pension funds, and proposals for PFD constitutional amendments. But there’s been a lot of work behind the scenes too. Before we can agree on any solutions, we need a shared understanding of the problem.
That's kept us on the phone with one another, a lot. How big do we think the budget will be? What do we expect will happen with oil prices? How about investment earnings and our permanent fund or pension investments? Inflation? Health care costs? There are a lot of moving pieces.
Those pieces matter. The assumptions behind the curtain do a lot to set the shape of the stage. If our predictions are too rosy (low inflation, high oil prices, five more years of stock market growth!) our plan will be worthless. If its ludicrously dour, Alaskans won't buy the need to raise revenues from their pockets or cut services they want.
We’re at it every day—in committee and/or on the phone. So stay tuned for more updates! As always, please let me what you think. My phone and email are at the bottom of this newsletter. There’s also going to be public testimony in Juneau or by statewide call-in on Monday August 2 from 6pm-9pm. You can come to the Capitol in person, call 586-9085 from a Juneau-based number, or call 844-586-9085 from any other number.
