NY Times Gives Republicans The Budget Headline

by: vmars

Fri Jun 26, 2009 at 08:32:59 AM EDT

The headline for the NY Times article about the NJ budget passing took the Republican message and shouted it to the world:

New Jersey Passes Budget Fueled by $1 Billion in Tax Increases

But buried in a parenthetical phrase in paragraph two is the news about the shrinking budget (emphasis mine) :

The bulk of the new revenue in the budget, which is $4 billion less than the current budget, will come from a one-year increase in the income tax on people making more than $400,000 a year, or roughly 61,000 residents. Taxes will go up by 12.5 cents per pack on cigarettes, and 25 percent on hard liquor and wine. People who win $10,000 or more in the lottery will see their good fortune taxed as well.

Four billion dollars is a 12 percent reduction in the state budget, which to my mind is big news.  To the liberal NY Times the only news is that rich people making $200,000 or more will have to pay a little more in taxes.

It's not until paragraph five that we find out the vast majority of people will see no tax impact or see a benefit.  Keep in mind that the median household income in New Jersey is $67,142.

By contrast, those making less than the state median income of $82,000 stand to be largely spared.

Wait, well more than half of New Jerseyans will see no increase in their taxes?  But the headline and lead is about people making $200,000?  

And also buried in article is the reason why the budget needed to have an increase in some taxes.  Here's the entirety of paragraph six:

The increase in taxes was necessitated by a $5 billion drop in revenues, due largely to Wall Street?s collapse.

Oh.  So a national, international economic collapse necessitated a major change in the budget equal to 15 percent of this entire budget.  Corzine and the Democrats were able to make up this massive shortfall which was not their fault by making drastic budget cuts.  

Put another way, 80 percent of the $5 billion in lower revenues was made up by budget cuts, and only 20 percent by increased fees, taxes and reduced rebates.  

So the New York Times, in covering how New Jersey made up a massive shortfall due to outside forces, focuses on 20 percent of the changes made, the 20 percent that Republicans are focusing on.

Liberal media my ass.