Using async subagents claude was able to research ~a dozen budget line items at once across multiple years, adding lots of helpful context and graphs to someone like me who was starting with little familiarity.
It still struggles with frontend changes, but for research this probably 20-40x's my throughput.
Let me know any additional data or visualizations that would be interesting to add!
Like do these groups all have heavy metrics about how budget is growing so we actually know anything is in balance here?
I guess I've never seen proper studies around:
"We project tax revenue will grow X amount with this level of confidence therefore we know we can consistently be within Y range of debt growth forever safely"
Or are we all just hoping we all die before someone has to comes in and cuts services spending in half?
First: Are these constant dollars? Or nominal dollars? Maybe there should be a toggle?
Second: I suggest you extend the historical time horizon by a decade, as it will help to demonstrate how Prop. 98 and the insane rise of K-12 spending have totally fucked our budget.
Now it looks like Medi-Cal, services for intellectually disabled people, and "Other HHS programs" will fuck our budget even harder in the coming decade.
Finally: I suggest adding per-beneficiary metrics for all services, where possible. How has the K-12 spending per pupil changed? How will developmental services spending per disabled person change? How much has Medi-Care spending risen per enrolled person?
A giant red flag here... That's half the net budget deficit. So... might want to explain it.
codybontecou•3w ago
sberens•1h ago