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Mass. social programs
We now have way too many people dependent on social programs. Some of the programs are good, and some of them are bad. Too late to get rid of much of it, when people are dependent with no other viable options.
Also, politically, people dependent on the social programs, together with those people especially sympathetic to them (by, e.g., ethnic group identification), constitute a large number of voters.
"Social" Programs
"We now have way too many people dependent on social programs."
Agree.
"Too late to get rid of much of it"
Disagree...
The money will run out. When it does (Higher taxes politically impossible, everyone fire-able gone) the "services" will end. Period. It's coming, and it's not going to be derailed again. The only thing anyone can do is make provisions to support their own lives. This game has been played many times in history and it always ends up the same. Get yourself an ARC (backyard greenhouse) big enough to support yourself & your family. Make provisions for SECURE storage of necessaries for 1-3 years, trade your savings for silver/gold coins. Make sure you can heat/power your house without the grid if necessary. Oh yes, for sure get something that shoots, and enough ammo for it to be sure you can keep whats yours - yours when the money runs our for street patrols/police. That goes for fire people too. You'll need ALL of it...
Start NOW.
Time is short.
What happens to the people who can't do that on your schedule?
do they just die? How will that work? Just curious cuz I can't or don't want to imagine your scenario playing out.
This ain't no party
This ain't no disco. This ain't no foolin' around.
Wouldn't work in town
In town -- in a hypothetical scenario in which those preparations turn out to actually be necessary -- you're packed in with hundreds of thousands who do not have those preparations. You're scrod.
And in the apocalyptic scenario in which you'd need that ammo (i.e., in which police and then National Guard could not maintain order), you're better off the heck out of town, in a cluster of people who are uniformly well-prepared.
I myself am not worried about that scenario, and am staying in town, in my densely-packed tinderbox, with only a few days' of food on hand.
However, if a lot of people want to flee to the suburbs and countryside, I'd encourage you to abandon your housing *before* I renew my lease. I'm not worried about Road Warrior gangs, but I could use some relief on my rent. :)
We're not alone
The Massachusetts budget situation is representative of what's occurring in most state legislatures across the country, and we're not nearly in as bad a shape as some other places, like California.
This is Stage 2 of the Great Recession: The impact of layoffs, the Wall Street crash, and mortgage foreclosures dovetailing with falling tax revenues.
And when you combine it with the usual political dysfunction, the blend of useful and wasteful/ineffective/inefficient public programs, well, it's all pretty terrible.
How sickening.
How many more cuts are the people at large supposed to take?