Perry Economy Masks Gaps While Letting Candidate Boast on Jobs

Governor Rick Perry made his pitch to Republican voters this week touting the Texas economic miracle and his ability to create jobs even during the longest recession since the Great Depression.

Yet Perry, 61, may be choosing an opportune time to trade Austin for Washington. Projected Medicaid deficits as well as shortchanged schools threaten to hollow out the miracle, even as population gains pressure the government to spend more.

“He would be leaving behind a fiscal house in worse shape than he found when he first became governor,” state Representative Mike Villarreal, a Democrat from San Antonio, said in an interview. “Our revenue system looks like Swiss cheese and our tax code is littered with tax loopholes that leak billions of dollars from our state coffers.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-18/perry-s-texas-growth-economy-masks-deficits-while-candidate-boasts-of-jobs.html