State Budgets

How Can Hawaii Bounce Back: Jonathan Williams on The Hugh Hewitt Show

Jonathan Williams, ALEC Chief Economist and EVP of Policy, recently appeared on The Hugh Hewitt Show and discussed the tragic impact from the Hawaiian wildfires. Hewitt also asked Williams about the history of Hawaii’s economic outlook  and ways for the state to improve going forward in this post fire recovery.

This is, nearly unprecedented at the scale. I mean, with Hawaii being relatively small state. States like California, or Florida or others can weather those disasters in a much different way, just given the size and scope of their economies. This is a somewhat unprecedented level of disaster that we’re going to see, what the rebuild might look like in that timeframe of tourism really returning to the why islands there.

I think it’s going to be something that we’re going to have to see play out here and see what it means to have that state’s economy really have a rebound. You’ve lost this really jewel of tourism there at least for the moment and to Maui. The State’s got to recalibrate. I mean, this has got to be a time we are coming together to say what do we need to do differently as a state to weather the storm and put ourselves on sure footing going forward.

Listen to the full interview here. 


In Depth: State Budgets

Smart budgeting is vital to a state’s financial health. The ALEC State Budget Reform Toolkit offers more than 20 policy ideas for addressing today’s shortfalls in a forthright manner, without resorting to budget gimmicks or damaging tax increases. One way to stabilize budgets over time is to embrace…

+ State Budgets In Depth