11–20 of 118 posts
This is wild. A mistake of this magnitude should result in several positions becoming vacant and many politicians being ineligible for any future offices. If a government can’t budget accurately everything else they do is likely even less competent. Every number and statistic they report should be treated with suspicion. Without clear data who is to say they are doing anything helpful at all?
Given that school budgets are absolutely gutted with mass layoffs this year and next, and the miscalculation looks like 2/3 of the budget shortfall, hiding such a basic and impactful error requires a much better explanation than I see in that article. It looks like it was done to stifle debate about budget allocations, which would be necessary in the circumstances.
> Given that school budgets are absolutely gutted What now? https://edsource.org/2026/how-california-compares-to-other-s... https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statisti...
Also, you could frame this in a much more information dense way by making an active claim about something instead of just spamming a bunch of links.
Given that school budgets are absolutely gutted with mass layoffs this year and next, and the miscalculation looks like 2/3 of the budget shortfall, hiding such a basic and impactful error requires a much better explanation than I see in that article. It looks like it was done to stifle debate about budget allocations, which would be necessary in the circumstances.
https://www.spiegel.de/panorama/bildung/baden-wuerttemberg-s...
Related: In the German state of Baden-Württemberg they were miscalculating the number of active teachers for 20 years due to a software error, causing the state to employ 1440 fewer teachers than actually intended. https://www.spiegel.de/panorama/bildung/baden-wuerttemberg-s...
This is wild. A mistake of this magnitude should result in several positions becoming vacant and many politicians being ineligible for any future offices. If a government can’t budget accurately everything else they do is likely even less competent. Every number and statistic they report should be treated with suspicion. Without clear data who is to say they are doing anything helpful at all?
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People understand that everyone makes mistakes and firing anyone who does only leads to people prioritizing hiding their mistakes vs. fixing them.
It’s helpful, whenever you find yourself saying something like, “the only real explanation to me”, to think of a good faith version before assuming that the most cynical take is reality.
Given that school budgets are absolutely gutted with mass layoffs this year and next, and the miscalculation looks like 2/3 of the budget shortfall, hiding such a basic and impactful error requires a much better explanation than I see in that article. It looks like it was done to stifle debate about budget allocations, which would be necessary in the circumstances.
> Given that school budgets are absolutely gutted What now? https://edsource.org/2026/how-california-compares-to-other-s... https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statisti...
If you want a vivid illustration (from an adjacent state) about the impact of pessimistic fiscal projections: Oregon has an infamous "kicker" law that refunds income taxes collected in excess of projections (plus a 2% margin). The state faces the same budgetary challenges as California... but can't project too pessimistically lest it leave money off the table.
Oregon's kicker law is a textbook example of bad economic policy, sadly. It essentially means that in boom years the state can't accumulate any general funds for recessions, which is half of the point of a state-level political entity in the first place. Balanced budgets and pay as you go are fabulous over the medium term, but over the short term of a year or two during a disaster or recession, governmental spending…
https://calbudgetcenter.org/resources/qa-why-hitting-gann-li...