OVERVIEW:

During week nine, we learn that a government’s budget = policies (a governing body’s choice of actions and prioritization of resources). You’ll get to practice your hand at “balancing” the California state budget and learning how your decisions affect the services the State provides for Californians and taxes for its hardworking residents.

To complete this assignment, you will go to the Next10 website at https://www.budgetchallenge.org. (Links to an external site.) Click on the Take the Challenge! button which will lead you through an interactive exercise for balancing the FY 2020-21 California state budget (note: there’s obviously been changes since it was published due to expenditures related to the pandemic, devastating wildfires and civil unrest, but it still gives a realistic overview of policy and budget choices)

ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONS:

After creating “your” budget and reviewing the information about state services throughout the exercise, prepare a minimum of a three-page double-spaced essay responding to the following prompts. Please only provide info requested in the prompts below.

• Present the final spending, revenue and surplus numbers of “your budget” which can be found under the heading “My budget at a Glance” on the final printout.
• Briefly discuss your overall philosophy that influenced your expenditure and revenue decisions. Include examples of what influenced your decisions to increase or decrease expenditures, why you choose to increase taxes/fees or reduce them and why you chose to reduce or add to state debt.
• For two (2) of the spending categories that were most interesting to you, briefly discuss which expenditure option you chose and provide a brief explanation about why you believed this option was the most prudent decision (make sure to click on the “pros and cons” button on the right side of the screen and review the additional info and brief videos so you can fully understand and describe the impact of your choices).
• For one (1) of the revenue choices that were most interesting to you, briefly discuss the option you chose and why you believed the most prudent decision based on the information provided.
• Conclude with a brief discussion of your overall takeaways (what you learned) from this exercise about what the legislators and governor must take into consideration when making spending, revenue and debt management decisions.