Last week the Sacramento Bee asked readers to weigh in using an interactive exercise that allowed them to rank various possible means of cutting the state budget. The options were all within a framework provided by the Bee, so it was a limited set of options; for example, you couldn't opt to get rid of all funding for prisons.
However, within that limited framework, there were definite trends as far as what was more popular and what was less popular among the more than 2,100 people who participated. As usual, Californians seem fairly eager to cut anything that looks like it might affect somebody other than themselves.
Here is a link to the results.
The items that had the highest favorability included:
* Cut the Legislature's budget 25% (82% in favor)
* Use First Five money for Medi-Cal for children (78%)
* Eliminate local redevelopment agencies (78%)
* Reduce state mandates to local governments (77%)
* Cut all state funding for county fairs (76%)
An election to extend temporary taxes was at 73%, so that's actually not as bad as I might have imagined. However, I'm not sure how representative the sample was. Readers of the Sacramento Bee may be more favorable toward taxes and toward state workers than are the California population as a whole.
These items had the lowest favorability:
* Cut aid to US born children of illegal immigrants (4%)
* Lay off 30,000 state workers (4%)
* Take half the revenue of redevelopment agencies (13%)
* Increase alcohol taxes 5 cents per drink (13%)
* Lay off 10,000 state workers (15%)
If you'd like to try the exercise yourself, visit this link.
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