Good story on the rising number of states looking at more severe fiscal conditions than expected not long ago. Click on the map and see how many of the highlighted states you can remember also having serious problems with their prison populations and the costs associated with maintaining them compared to alternatives proven to also increase public safety more. NY, with its decreasing prison needs due to law enforcement, not incarceration, is on there, so it’s not a perfect match, but CA is there (and already is seeing empty commercial real estate near its capitol) and so is Ben’s nightmare, NJ, one of the specially emphasized states. With the housing crunch not predicted by most to ease until late next year at best, with energy prices that hit state and local budgets really hard likely to continue upward, with world food prices and especially grains going much higher, and with unfunded state pensions looming, I wonder what this map will look like next year.
[Of course, it could all be solved by telecommuting, but then how would our managers know we were in our seats from 8 to 5?]
[If you got the Monkees reference, you're old.]
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