The Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation has issued a report detailing the severity of the fiscal problems facing the Commonwealth and its cities and towns. This report, attached below, shows the urgency of dealing with the real budget busters that continue to grow at rates that are not sustainable. Those budget busters are health care and pensions. The can has been kicked down the road for many years. We are now about to run out of road. Michael Widmer posted the below on the Taxpayer Foundation website.

The continuing cuts in local aid that are crippling municipal budgets make it essential that the Legislature act to rein in the escalating costs of pension and health care benefits for local employees and retirees. The Legislature’s top priority should be to give municipal officials the same powers over health plan design – outside of collective bargaining – that the Group Insurance Commission has for state employees and retirees.

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