McCrory « The Progressive Pulse

Raleigh an “orgy of meanness”?

June 19, 2013 at 11:35 amCategory:Uncategorized

The Asheville Citizen-Times had an opinion piece today about the actions this year by the N.C. General Assembly and Republican Gov. Pat McCrory. The author, who makes no bones about his disappointment in the two, is Martin Dyckman, a Waynesville resident and former editor at Florida’s St. Petersburg Times.

From Dyckman’s piece:

I covered politics throughout a long career in journalism without ever seeing a legislative session as overwhelmingly radical as that of the current General Assembly.

It’s an orgy of meanness, prejudice, nastiness, cruelty, shortsightedness, selfishness, spite, arrogance and conscious brutality. Three examples, among many, are the cynical forfeiture of extended unemployment insurance, expansion of Medicaid and repeal of the earned income tax credit. Now, they’re hatching a tax scheme that will increase the burdens of the poor and middle class, give a windfall to the wealthy and impose more destructive cuts on the schools and colleges.

The pretext for all that is to make North Carolina more attractive for investment. That is, to put it politely, enough fertilizer to enrich the soil of a thousand farms. Business goes where it can find a skilled workforce and good transportation; tax rates are far down the list. The real object, one suspects, is simply to make North Carolina a trophy for wealthy freeloaders and right-wing ideologues, to serve as an example to be applied wherever else the Democratic Party is disorganized or complacent. Raising money to run for the U.S. Senate has something to do with it, too.

You can read Dyckman’s entire editorial here.

No state income taxes for teachers?

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June 17, 2013 at 2:57 pmCategory:Uncategorized

by Sarah Ovaska

North Carolina’s top education leader called on state legislators Monday to give teachers a break on personal income taxes.

State Superintendent June Atkinson, a Democrat elected to the statewide post, released a statement Monday afternoon asking that teachers be exempt from state income tax, in light of their low pay and cuts being given to what corporations pay in their taxes.

June Atkinson

Neither the House nor Senate plans by Republican budget writers included teacher raises in their final $20.6 billion budget proposals but did have a $50 million plan in the House plan to give vouchers for low-income children to attend private schools and a Senate tax reform plan that would give significant tax cuts to the state’s wealthiest residents.

Salary supplements for teachers with graduate degrees were also eliminated in the current budget proposals.

Republican Gov. Pat McCrory had included a modest 1 percent raise for all state workers in his budget proposal, but the legislature will have the final word on how state money is spent.

Teachers in North Carolina are among the worst paid in the nation — the starting salary for a teacher is $30,800 and it takes a teacher five years to reach more than $31,000 a year in salary, according to information from the N.C. Department of Public Instruction. A report given to the State Board of Education in March found that North Carolina teacher pay was 46th in the nation and only Mississippi and West Virginia paid less out of 10 states in the Southeast.

Here’s the full statement from Atkinson:

Much has been said about the need for North Carolina to become more competitive with our surrounding states when it comes to corporate income taxes. Those supporting a cut in corporate income taxes say that the reduction will attract more corporations and then we will have more jobs for North Carolinians.

I propose another reduction – exempt all public school teachers from having to pay any personal state income taxes. We lag behind South Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Mississippi in what we pay our teachers. In fact, we rank 46th in teacher pay. The General Assembly proposed budgets do not include salary increases for teachers, but corporations expanding or locating in North Carolina certainly need workers who are educated – the work of teachers.

Let’s keep our competent teachers in North Carolina classrooms. Let’s position North Carolina to be a more attractive state for new teachers. Exempt them from paying personal state income taxes. That will at least give teachers more take-home money to support their families and will make North Carolina a little more competitive with our neighboring states.

Just another GOP Governor talking point: “Medicaid is broken”

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June 7, 2013 at 4:03 pmCategory:Uncategorized

by Adam Searing

Looks like a memo came down to GOP Governors (including NC Governor Pat McCrory) who don’t want to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act: Just say “Medicaid is broken” again and again and again. In NC, Medicaid has the lowest growth rate in the US and has helped do things like make NC’s infant mortality rate drop at one of the biggest rates in the nation. But don’t let those pesky facts get in the way of a good talking point!

Could McCrory’s budget adequately cope with sequestration?

April 13, 2013 at 11:07 amCategory:NC Budget and Tax Center

by Tazra Mitchell

It has been a few weeks since Governor McCrory released his budget proposal for the biennium that runs from July 2013 to June 2015. His proposal has received a lot of praise for building up the state’s various savings reserves, including the Rainy Day Fund, the Medicaid Risk Reserve, and the Repair and Renovations Fund.

What has been less widely scrutinized is whether the reserves in his proposal would be sufficient to cope with the first and potentially second rounds of damaging sequestration cuts to defense and non-defense programs. Read More…

McCrory, Wos announce plan to privatize Medicaid

April 3, 2013 at 2:44 pmCategory:Uncategorized

by Sarah Ovaska

Gov. Pat McCrory announced an ambitious plan Wednesday to privatize the state’s Medicaid system, a move that he said will mean better treatment for patients and save taxpayer money.

But medical groups are already questioning whether the proposed changes will improve the quality of health care, or a way to slice off profits from a taxpayer-funded program for companies.

The head of the N.C. Medical Society Robert Seligson issued a statement Wednesday saying the group was interesting in learning more about the privatization plan, but was prepared to be critical if it didn’t put patient care first.

Gov. Pat McCrory and N.C. Health and Human Services Sec. Aldona Wos at Tuesday’s press conference.

“[I]f the administration’s idea of reform is bringing in out-of-state corporations so they can profit by limiting North Carolina patient’ access to health care and cutting critical medical services to our state’s most vulnerable citizens, that is not change we can support,” Seligson said.

He added, “We question the wisdom of handing off this important function off to Wall Street.”

McCrory, the state’s new Republican governor, made the announcement Tuesday with his Health and Human Serves Secretary Aldona Wos and said the privatization and move to managed care will be a solution to fix a “broken Medicaid system.”

“The system does not treat the whole person,” he said.