Puerto Rico’s fiscal mess

Puerto Rico is heavily in debt it could no longer pay vendors. Its debt is $72 billion in municipal bonds. Its governor said the issue isn’t about politics but math.

It’s a tough fiscal or financial mess as it considers how to provide public services to its over 3 million people. It’s a fiscal mess resulting from municipal bond flotation it could no longer repay.

Not sure heading to Washington with a hat in hand would do the trick. President Obama’s White House said there’s nothing up that alley. Puerto Rico must do with what it could draw from federal entitlement programs. It’s the alternative given by Mr. O.

Free Ride Not! The WH reaction is a clear warning to the NMI that it is not going to get a free ride on the dimes of hardworking U.S. mainland taxpayers. They too deserve every penny of their income especially in a highly volatile economic global condition.

It’s time to forcibly place fiscal reality on the table. We either come to terms with it or we’d be sailing into the Marianas Trench. Like volcanic eruption you know it’ll explode but unsure when.

Are we not in self-denial of the deepening fiscal mess at home? When would the big boys realistically address what measures must be undertaken to rectify the mounting mess? Have you a realistic plan or would it be “ke sera sera” until we fall off the cliff in similar fashion like Puerto Rico? Negligence and purposeful ignorance aren’t answers either! How about dealing with the truth once and for all?

No More Roads: If we look back at where this mess started we would find there used to be a long road to kick the can down the hill. But we’ve run out of roads and the beaten can is crumbled into the size of a small pebble. If you wish to kick another can try a borrowed 50-gallon drum container from CUC.

Definitely, our perceptual paradise is in trouble. I started sensing it a little more than four years ago when over 3,000 of our very own relocated to Guam, Hawaii, and across the country in search of greener pasture. They were driven away from home sensing the lack of opportunities for families to raise their kids at home with some semblance of common decency. That legacy is now embedded in their minds forever.

Revenue generation went south while private industries struggle on their own hoping something would break just to stay afloat. There may have been improvements but far from sufficient for the fiscal and other needs of the NMI. Let’s see what city hall has in store for the NMI amidst the deepening fiscal crisis at home.

Needs in full view

With a population that is very sickly (spikes in diabetes and heart ailments) and an underfunded healthcare operation the fiscal theme is the redundant “budgetary shortfall” for FY`16 by as much as $40-plus million. This doesn’t include funds for the public school system and debts owed the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. of over $30 million.

Though the NMI has successfully moved pennies, nickels, and dimes here there and everywhere. It isn’t a strong fiscal scaffold we could rely upon for mounting needs. Thus my constant nudging that policymakers converge to creatively figure out how do we promote and lure “lasting” investments. Beyond the triad of sun, sand, and surf what else is there other than tons of shortsighted rhetoric that we can’t save or exchange at the bank?

The culprit is in the beastly expansion of government prompted by the usual mañana attitude. Politicos conveniently ignore the descending fiscal monstrosity, instead shifting and reframing the issue to avoid resolution with finality. Demagoguery is their new fad plastered on their lips. You use the term “leadership” and instantly you see apraxia taking its seat. Thus, the fiscal gangrene that worsens by the day.

Sad how demagoguery has ruined opportunities to move the needle of growth forward so it is translated into improving the livelihood of our people. Each failure reverses the strength of family income three years back. And it has been this way for over 10 years now. Hasn’t the elected elite reversed our standard of living by advancing to the rear 30 years in complete reverse? Isn’t it enough that we’re known among investors of substance for our pen chance on policy instability?