The most important issue in North Dakota is the economy. Since North Dakota is a hyper-cyclical economy, the most important job of the next governor will be to get spending more in line with the economy and to account for its hyper-cyclical nature.

Yesterday, Doug Burgum announce his candidacy for Governor of North Dakota.

His big policy point was to say that North Dakota must change its trajectory as it relates to state spending vs. the state's economy.

Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem, who is also running for governor took issue with that saying "Most North Dakotans believe that North Dakota is on the right track,” Stenehjem added. “What we need to do is not change our trajectory but build on our success."

While that is generally true when it comes to regulatory issues - it is absolutely not the case when it comes to state spending issues.

The trajectory of state spending has been straight up, and for years many folks have pointed this out and made an issue of it.

The state's legislature has followed the path of unsustainable budgets for some time.

Most law makers have understood this was a problem, but they did not have the political will to push back against the last two governors (of their own party).

Whether you want to call it "bending the trajectory" as Doug Burgum has, or a "conservative correction" as Former Governor Ed Schafer and current candidate for governor State Representative Rick Becker has- the current path is not sustainable. It simply is not prudent to stay the course on state spending.

The public can handle the truth, we do not need to be told there is not a problem when all the metric point to there being a problem. We rank smack dab in the middle when it comes to having a business friendly tax policy.

http://taxfoundation.org/article/2016-state-business-tax-climate-index

Not only do we need leadership that understands the state's spending has been out of control, but we also need leadership to realize that being mediocre on business tax policy is not going to help us diversify our state's economy.

Doug Burgum has called for a zeroing out of the state income tax in the past.

And Rick Becker has sponsored legislation in the past to do just that.

First, we must get spending under control - then we must clear a path to improve North Dakota's tax climate even more than we have in the last eight years.

It will take real leadership to do that.

-Dustin Gawrylow, Managing Director

North Dakota Watchdog Network

Yes, N.D. Needs A New Trajectory

The most important issue in North Dakota is the economy. Since North Dakota is a hyper-cyclical economy, the most important job of the next governor will be to get spending more in line with the economy and to account for its hyper-cyclical nature.

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