This is not an announcement of a continuation of the once long running reality show. Instead, its just another day living in the real world where the circumstances created by governmental policy roll down to us here on the local level. Saratoga County and municipal governments throughout the County, like businesses and families, have been experiencing a sharp increase in the cost of everything in recent years.
All government spending is inflationary, particularly on the Federal and State levels. Additionally, proposals offering fiscal incentives, green energy spending, policies that are increasing energy costs or eliminating owed debt, are also inflationary. The country is accumulating a brand new $1 trillion in debt roughly every 100 days. The deficit spending occurs through printing more money. Sadly, we will also be paying the interest on the country’s debt with freshly printed money. Did you catch that? Printed money will pay the interest on printed money. The deficit spending is inflationary and every new dollar we print makes your current money less valuable. As if this death spiral wasn’t enough of a concern, if the dollar reaches a perilous point where it is no longer the currency of choice utilized in economies around the world, the shock to our economic system will be monumental. The push by some countries to get themselves off the dollar has already begun.
In the old days, like 2018 and before, our government would offer fiscal incentives to spur growth when the economy slowed. Now, its just a matter of fiscal policy by YES. Keep printing money to cover up horrible policies and maybe we can say YES to everyone. After all, it’s much more fun to say YES to everything at all times. Saying NO may make somebody mad.
We are experiencing governmental policies intended to overrun the systems that have preserved our rule of law, peace and prosperity. The healthcare system, the country’s borders, the social safety net system, policing, government debt and the financial system as well as other aspects of the elements and entities that maintain confidence and a level of standards that protect our standard of living, are under increasing stress.
On the local level we do not have the luxury to print money or pull together billions of dollars in new debt through sweet sounding NYS bonding initiatives. Like you, we must live with the fallout and consequences created by deficit spending and dubious government policies that are not intended to protect our quality of life.
The local decision-making process pertaining to spending, must have a different outlook from local officials when compared to the Federal and State governments. As costs significantly increase for all core governmental services and operations, priorities must be vetted and established.
If policies governing various aspects of our society do not change quickly, we will face startling consequences. We will be here in the Real World attempting to manage our family and municipal budgets through mounting challenges. Hopefully, policies change before we end up saying to each other in the near future- “Remember when all we had to worry about was raging inflation, a lower standard of living, along with rising crime and drug use?”
Clifton Park and Beyond 