Gov. John Lynch gets a D in the latest Cato Institute Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors.
Cato notes that Lynch was more frugal at first, but this year did not restrain spending. He’s relied heavily on cigarette tax hikes, which dropped his score in Cato’s rankings. And Cato faults him for not solving the ed funding situation.
Cato doesn’t mention the size of the latest budget increase, the tax and fee hikes that went along with it (aside from the cigarette tax increase), the overly rosy revenue estimates, the governor’s resistance to reforms that would save the state money (particularly in health and human services) and the governor’s initial refusal to say no to leftist interest groups.
I think that if Cato had been more fully aware of the extent of Lynch’s fiscal irresponsibility in this last budgeting session, he’d have gotten a big, fat F.