The Weekly Top 3
The Weekly Top 3
The Weekly Top 3 (8.25.2025)
Welcome to The Weekly Top 3 — our look at the top 3 things on our mind here at Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets — for the week of August 25, 2025.
This week, our top 3 issues are these: 1) we discuss some recent comments by Speaker Edgmon about the economic strains being felt by Alaska’s coastal communities and explain why, in certain real respects, they are being self-inflicted by the Legislature (2:28); 2) we start a new, occasional series by explaining the “rest of the story” surrounding some recent campaign comments by Adam Crum and Tom Begich (20:02); 3) we remember Stephen Haycox and the lessons about Alaska we learned from him and will continue to learn as we and others continue to read the rich legacy that he has left with us (33:01); and finally, in some brief comments at the end, we give a shout out to Sen. Mike Cronk for some comments he made at this week’s opening meeting of the Education Task Force (47:42).
The Weekly Top 3 is a regular weekly segment on The Michael Dukes Show. The Show broadcasts on Facebook and YouTubeLive as well as via streaming audio from the Show’s website weekdays from 6–8am. We join Michael weekly in the first hour of Tuesday’s show, from 6:25–7am, for a discussion between the two of us about our three issues.
Hi, this is Brad Keithley, managing Director of Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. Welcome to the weekly top three the top three things on our mind here at Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets for the week of August 25th 2025. The weekly top three is a regular segment on the Michael Dukes Show. The show broadcasts on both Facebook Live and YouTube Live as well as via streaming audio from the show's website. Weekdays from 6 to 8 am.
Speaker 1:I join Michael weekly in the first hour of Tuesday's show from 6.10 to 7 am for a discussion between the two of us about our three issues. We post the podcast of our discussion following the show on the Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets Facebook, youtube, soundcloud, spotify and Substack pages. Also on the Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets website, as well as the projects page on national blog site mediumcom. You can find past episodes of the weekly top three also at the same locations. Keep in mind that, in addition to these podcasts during the week, you can also follow and participate in the discussion with us of these and other issues affecting Alaska's fiscal and economic condition by following us on the Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets Facebook page and through our posts on Twitter.
Speaker 1:This week, our top three issues are these First, we discuss some recent comments by Speaker Edgeman about the economic strains being felt by Alaska's coastal communities and explain why, in certain real respects, they have been self-inflicted. Second, we start a new occasional series by explaining the rest of the story surrounding some recent campaign comments by Adam Crum and Tom Begich. Third, we remember Stephen Haycox and the lessons we learned from him about Alaska, and we'll continue to learn as we and others continue to read the rich legacy that he left behind with us. And finally, in some brief closing comments, we give a shout out to Senator Mike Kronk for some comments he made at this week's opening meeting of the Education Task Force. And now let's join Michael.
Speaker 2:You've got a lot of stuff to unpack with us today, brad. Today we're going to start things off with what you're calling the big self-inflicted wound, and this has to do with a piece that is reporting on Speaker Bryce Edgman, who he's he's warning that boy, things are just so tough and it's so bad, you know, and, of course, never acknowledging the fact that it was the actions of the legislature that has contributed to where we're at right now. So give me, give me the rundown here here.
Speaker 1:So there's an article in Alaska Public Media this past week, the headline of which is House Speaker Edgman warns of deepening strains in Alaska coastal communities, and it reports on remarks that Bryce gave during a conference focused on Alaska coastal communities and his discussion of, or his talk about, how times are worsening. Economic times are worsening out in those communities, that prices are rising, airfares are rising, fish revenues are falling and it's just having this tightening vice on the coastal communities. And I sat there reading this article and I just kept going okay, okay, okay. All this stuff is is bad. They need more revenue, they need more personal revenue out in out in the coastal communities. But who's been taking that revenue away? Who's been diverting a big chunk of money that comes into the coastal communities away? Oh, it's been the legislature and Bryce. So as I read through this and started to understand the points he was making and understand the problems he was addressing, understand the problems he was addressing, it started to dawn on me that some of this, at least, is a self-inflicted wound by the legislature, by the region's own legislative delegation, to take money away. I posted this and made that comment on one of our outlets, the Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets group page, facebook group page and Willie Keppel, a listener, made the comment yeah, he's diverted $100 million out of just Lyman Hoffman's Senate district the two halves that are Bryce's state representative district and Nellie Jimmy's state district that he's diverted $100 million out of that district through PFD cuts.
Speaker 1:It wouldn't be that much. It'd be you'd have to. I mean, if you don't use the PFD cuts to fund government, you have to do something to fund government. A portion of it would come from increased oil revenues, a portion would come from better permanent fund returns and thus a bigger POMV draw. But a portion of it would have to come from Alaskans and just like it's coming now from Alaskans through PFD cuts, a portion of it would have to come in another fashion from Alaskans, which would reduce the $100 million a little bit. But it's a huge chunk of money that's being taken out of those communities by Bryce himself, bryce and Lyman themselves through using PFD cuts as opposed to other revenue measures that could be used to raise the money.
Speaker 1:The thing that really got me was the last paragraph of this article. It says the legislature has limited power for many of these challenges, which fall to federal policy and private industry. Still, edgeman says the state can play a role, from boosting school budgets to pushing for stronger seafood marketing and supporting rural transportation networks. His solution and this is a fundamental problem not only with Bryce and Lyman but the legislature itself they think the solution is tied up in spending more state money to effectively try to lower costs, substitute state money for costs that are being incurred out in the regions. But what they don't focus on is the revenue side. Very few in the legislature focus on the revenue side of anything but they don't focus on the revenue side and don't focus on what they're doing on the revenue side. And by funding this additional spending to try to moderate costs indirectly, try to moderate costs out in the region, they're whacking Alaska families in the region in the face by taking revenue out of their pockets, diverting revenue out of their pockets to fund those costs.
Speaker 1:I wish that Bryce and others would focus on the revenue side and say what's a better revenue system than the revenue system we're using now that takes money directly from middle and lower income Alaska families, the very the core of the constituency that he and Lyman and Nellie have out in those districts, out in that region? What's a better revenue system to raise the revenue we say we need, or maybe not raise the revenue at all, maybe just cut spending. But what's a better system? Whatever revenue we need, set aside the spending cuts that need to be made, but whatever revenue we need, what's a better revenue system for our region than the revenue system we're using now, which is PFD cuts? I wish they would take the time to think through that and if they did, they would realize there are much better revenue systems that would help the region and so, instead of talking about all of the problems that are there because the costs are rising, they could help to ameliorate that by helping raise revenue, by using a different revenue system to raise the revenue that would leave more in the pockets of Alaska families in the region.
Speaker 1:It's a self-defeating. The mechanism that they and others in the legislature have set up is a self-defeating mechanism that is a self-inflicted wound on that region, particularly the rural regions of Alaska. It's a self-inflicted wound on those regions by taking out the revenue source that is most important to those regions, taxing the revenue source that is most important to those regions, and it's just. I mean it's whenever you see one of these articles or you see one of Bryce's speeches or you see one of the comments. It's just the absence of understanding that that really strikes home.
Speaker 2:Well, and I think what you're looking at is this is this is the overall feel for, uh, you know, uh, this is a snapshot into the mindset of the legislators. I mean, they're talking about how these areas are struggling and the local economies are burdened, and and, etc. Etc. But the answer is obviously not making sure that the economies in those areas are doing well on their own, and not what people could be, you know, doing with their own monies or taking care of their selves, taking care of themselves. This is, like you said.
Speaker 2:It's all about the government spend. The state can play a role boosting school budgets, pushing for stronger seafood marketing, doing all this is all about. They know better than you how that money should be spent. Not a word about the hundreds of you know, tens of millions of dollars that have been taken out of the private economy in terms of the PFD cut, and maybe those people could take care of themselves in some ways by having that money. It is a snapshot into the mindset of we know better than you how to do this and you should just let us have free reign, essentially to go do those things yeah and and they think yeah and they think we know I mean we can boost, we can boost school funding.
Speaker 1:well, okay, that helps those who are tied to that. That helps maybe some those who are tied to the school economy right In the communities and that's a segment of the communities, right but it doesn't put money in the pockets of the entire community. I mean somebody who's not tied to the school economy, which would be a fairly significant segment of the economy out there not tied to the school economy. It doesn't help them at all. What you've done is you've taken money out of their pocket, out of the pockets of those families, to put money in the pockets of the fortunate few who are tied to the school economy. It's selective benefits that they're trying to create, to create these constituencies that are thankful to them or dependent on them, at the expense of the broad scale families, the middle and lower income Alaska families in those regions that are subsidizing the other segment of the economy out there by losing money or having money diverted out of their pockets to benefit those few.
Speaker 2:You see, it's a good start, Brad, because if we do that and take the money out and effect and help those people who are, you know, it's going to entice more people to become part of the government economy, and so therefore, pretty soon everybody will be dependent on the government economy, and so then they can true I mean, really, maybe that's not in their mind what the articulated goal, but I think, subconsciously, that's what they want. They want everybody to be dependent on, you know, the government largesse in one form or another, whether it's through the school industry or the public safety, or, you know, education, or you know you fill in the blank with whatever public industry is in these areas, and they want it to be this cyclic. You know money flows in and money flows out, because we're all dependent on the. You know that's ultimately, I think, what they're looking for.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's sort of also the Reagan trickle-down theory, right, if we give money to the schools and people tied to the school economy have money, then it will trickle down to the rest of the region. I mean that trickle-down theory has never really worked. It doesn't work at the federal level with income tax. It doesn't really work at the state level with Bryce and Lyman's state-funded economy out there. You know we're talking about a significant amount of money. I mean, we talk about the PFD in terms of the individual PFD, but how we really ought to talk about it is in terms of the household impact. And so that $3,000 cut that Willie talks about, or maybe the $2,500 cut after you take into account the alternative funding that you'd have to come up with out the alternative funding that you'd have to come up with, that's, you know, $7,500 to a family of three is $10,000 to a family of four cash in their pockets in those in those regional economies and that's, you know, in those regional economies that's a lot of cash, that's a lot of impact and you're putting it in. You're putting it in every household out there, it in every household out there.
Speaker 1:So it would be useful, I think, if Bryce and others would think about these issues not only in how can I spend more money to help my region. It's how can I help my region hang on to more money, hang on to more revenue in terms of changing the way in which the state is raising the revenue through the most regressive, using the most regressive tax system ever proposed. According to ICER economist Matt Berman, if you change that, if you use a more broad-based, if you use the fair share from the oil industry that we've talked about, if you get more from the POMV draw by getting better earnings with the permanent fund, if you change the revenue side and leave that money in the pockets of Alaska families out in that region, you're going to be a lot better off pockets of Alaska families out in that region, you're going to be a lot better off.
Speaker 2:Well, this is the continual, as you said, self-inflicted wound. I mean you're pointing to this one here. We've pointed to the whole crisis with a permanent fund by moving money out of the ERA, and you know it's like a continual. We're self-inflicting our own crises to then justify the actions of what we're doing down the road. And that's, I think, again a habit that we've got going on in this legislature as well.
Speaker 2:Donna wins the internet today, hashtag Brad explaining socialism, because that's exactly what we've got going on in this. You know, we have the most socialistic constitution in the state of Alaska. We all own it collectively and everything else. And of course, that was something that Hammond talked about. He was trying to do. He was trying to, you know, he was trying to get the resource monies into the hands of Alaskans. He said, you know, explained it as one of the most capitalistic things he could do, trying to get people engaged in it.
Speaker 2:And of course, the legislature seems to be doing everything in its power to reverse that, so that the money all flows to government and then they control and decide where the money goes. And that's why we're, you know, that's why we're facing some of the challenges that we have today, and it's why we have the same problems today that we had 20 years ago, if not worse, right, if not worse because now, at least the striking at the permanent fund corpus itself is within sight. They can actually see if they have a plan that's articulated and ready to go, brad. But your thoughts on that?
Speaker 1:Well, I just think it's. We don't stop and sit there and think about both the revenue the family revenue side and the cost side the family cost side. All the legislature seems to be doing is thinking about the cost side. And how can we, the legislature, substitute money to bring those costs down? How could we bring airplane tickets down, the cost of airplane tickets down? How could we bring airplane tickets down? How, the cost of airplane tickets down? How could we bring the cost of housing down? How can we bring, you know, this or that down by spending money? They're not focusing on where that money's coming from, and it's just it's, you know it's.
Speaker 1:It's you're trying to make. You're trying to make this is the analogy that pops into my head. You're trying to make a mountain over here. You're trying to make this the analogy that pops into my head. You're trying to make a mountain over here. You're trying to, you know, build up a bunch of dirt and create a mountain of of state support, but you're doing it at the expense of digging this hole on the other side. That's, that's coming out of the expense, coming out of the pockets of alaska families, middle and lower alaska families, the core of your constituency, any constituency, constituency in the state.
Speaker 1:80% of the of the entire state is middle and lower income Alaska families. So you're doing it, you're, you're building up this mountain and and you're and you're going to, you know, pay tribute to the mountain and say all the good things I did by building this mountain of of state support, but you've done it at the expense of digging this big hole in the. Don't look at the hole. Don't look at the hole. Look at the mountain In the, in the pockets of, in the pockets of Alaska families. And it's, it's just, I mean, it's a, it's, you're. Yes, the people who get to climb the mountain, the people who get to sit on the mountain, the people who are part of the mountain, yes, they benefit Great no-transcript thing.
Speaker 2:We're focusing on the one aspect of it. Um and again, this goes back to and I think that that that paragraph at the end of the article, as you point out, summates the whole thing exactly. You know, the state can play a role, says Edgman. We have limited powers for many of these challenges, although they're the cause of many of these challenges. I mean, you know, through their actions. But we can play a role by boosting school budgets and pushing for stronger seafood marketing and supporting rural transportation all having to do with government spend. Nothing about, you know, bolstering the private economy and getting that rolling on its own to help so people can help themselves. They need to look to government for every aspect instead of letting them help themselves or helping them to help themselves. You know it's the teach a man to fish and or giving a man a fish kind of ideology, and they definitely are trying to give a man a fish at every opportunity.
Speaker 1:That's yeah, yeah, and, and it's, and, and digging the hole deeper and deeper. I mean all at the same time. Yeah, we've built, we've built, we built the the mountain to to this level, but now we need to go beyond. But now we need to pour money for more dirt on top of the mountain to this level, but now we need to go beyond. Now we need to pour money pour more dirt on top of the mountain and build it even bigger. Yeah, build it even bigger, but you're doing it at the expense of digging the hole deeper.
Speaker 2:Okay, we're back. Brad Keithley Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets, the weekly top three. Brad is starting off a new segment. Stealing a little bit from the great Paul Harvey, Brad has got a little bit of his own the rest of the story. So, Brad, what is the rest of the story? Give me the deal here.
Speaker 1:Well, this is sort of a demographic test in a way, because those who remember Paul Harvey will sort of identify their self-identify, their age as they as they do this. But Paul Harvey was a great radio. For those who don't remember Paul Harvey, paul Harvey was a great radio commentator, uh, uh, back in the day who, uh, had this great delivery, uh, approach, uh, that really sort of grabbed your attention and he had a series called the rest of the story where he would, you know, describe, take a news article and and and discuss the news article and then say, but here is the rest of the story, uh, around that news article, and, and, and. It was often, well, it was every time fascinating about what the rest of the story told you. So in a, in a very poor imitation of that, I'm going to start a little series of occasional series of talking about the rest of the story behind some of the statements politicians are making. And this week it's a couple of new candidates for governor, adam Crum and Tom Begich, who are running on certain platforms that tell only part of the story, that really have only part of the story behind it. Adam Crum's is one that just. I'm not a big Crum fan, and it's just one that really irritates me. Here's an article the article about Adam Crum's announcement for his run for governor from the Frontiersman, and it says Crum recently resigned as commissioner of the Department of Revenue, a position he held after being appointed by Governor Mike Dunleavy, highlighting his accomplishments, including boosting the state's credit rating to the highest it's been in years, while optimizing investments and working on bringing new opportunities to the state.
Speaker 1:I want to focus on the first one boosting the state's credit rating to the highest it's been in years. You know why we have a high credit rating. It's because we have deep PFD cuts. All the credit rating agencies are concerned about is can you pay your bills on time? They don't care about the spending. They don't care about how bad the spending is, how skewed the spending is. They just want to make sure you can pay your bills on time. And if you can pay, if you've got a revenue base, if you've identified a revenue base that enables you to pay your bills on time, then you get a high credit rating.
Speaker 1:Alaska had a low credit rating back in the, or a lower credit rating back in the mid-20-teens and sort of the late-20-teens. This is when Devin Mitchell, who's now the head of the Permanent Fund Corporation. Devin Mitchell was essentially the state treasurer. He was responsible for the state's debt and responsible for making the presentations to Wall Street on the state's financial situation, which was the basis for the credit rating. The credit ratings were going down because the agencies were looking at the state's spend and they were looking at the then revenue base and saying this isn't sustainable. We don't know what you guys are doing out there, but we don't think you're setting yourself up well to pay your bills. And so our credit rating was going down. Devin, in the Walker administration, as part of the Walker administration, went to Wall Street and said don't worry about that, we'll just start cutting pfds and we'll start using pfd cuts dollars that otherwise ought to go to the pfds, to um, to divert those and uh and so lost spending.
Speaker 2:There we go sorry about that, brad. We lost you for a minute there. We had a massive internet spike there, so I'm sorry. Go back to the top of your comment there.
Speaker 1:As far as we had a problem with our spending and that's where Devin Mitchell was in charge- so Devin Mitchell, who was in charge of the state's debt credit rating or state's debt management at the time credit rating, went to Wall Street and said don't worry about not having enough revenues, we'll just start cutting PFDs. And for a period of time 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, the credit rating sort of rocked along because Wall Street said, okay, we hear you, but let's see if the legislature goes along with that. Let's see if they will actually cut PFDs and if they do, then okay, everything's fine. Yes, you have a revenue source and you're going to be able to pay your bills. Don't worry about it.
Speaker 1:But there was a lot of skepticism rightly so up in New York about whether the state would do a self-inflicted wound like that. Going back to the first segment for a moment whether the state would self would would do a self-inflicted wound like that uh, going back to the first segment for a moment. If, whether the state would do a self-inflicted wound of using pfd cuts to, uh to to pay bills. Once we established that we did that, we would. Once devon convinced them that that's what we were going to do, the walker administration was going to do it and once it, once the legislature got on a roll and started doing it, the state's credit rating started to climb.
Speaker 1:So Adam Crum takes credit for highlighting his accomplishments, including boosting the state's credit rating to the highest it's been in years. It's not anything Adam Crum did. It's the continuation of what Devin Mitchell started. The Walker administration started when Devin Mitchell was in charge of selling Wall Street on water bond rating on. It ought to be. It was the continuation of those PFD cuts, and so Adam's Adam Crum's you know reputation that he's claiming is built on the backs of middle and lower income Alaska families who've had to fund government through PFD cuts instead of using other approaches. That's the rest of the story for Adam Crum.
Speaker 2:Well, and before you jump into it, do you think that that is such an amorphous thing to stand behind? I mean, I don't think the average Alaskan gives two craps about whether or not the credit rating of the state is pristine or not. Right, it's just such a weird thing to brag about. I saw that in one of his other commentaries. Oh, you know, he under his tutelage, the blah, blah, blah and the credit, and I'm like what, what average Alaskan cares about the credit rating of the state? We want a fiscal plan. We want to know that there's going to be stability. We want to know that our economies are going to be bolstered. Who cares about it? To me it was such a weird thing to highlight, but again, he has so few accomplishments he's got to hang on to anything that he can put his hat on at this point.
Speaker 1:That's the deal. There's nothing else. I mean Crum hasn't helped contribute to resolving our fiscal situation. He hasn't helped implement the legislature's 2021 fiscal policy working group agenda. He hasn't helped push forward on in fact, he's gone in the reverse on oil revenues and he hasn't helped push forward on modernizing oil revenues revenues he has. He as a member of the permanent fund board. He hasn't pushed for investment policies that would boost the pomb. He hasn't done anything else. So he's grabbing onto this one thing that really comes out of the walker administration. He's grabbing onto this one thing as as his highlight, because that's really all that he's got and it's just, it's just humorous to listen to him talk about it. All right, tom Begich here. Here's. Here's the rest of the story on the Tom Begich statement.
Speaker 1:Tom Begich announced that he's running for governor in the in the APRN in the Alaska public media article on Begich's announcement. I didn't see this any place else, but APRN picks it up. So the main reason he's running, he said, is to reverse what he sees as state stagnation. He emphasized the need to boost education funding and to raise state revenues from corporate taxes, trimming oil tax credits and the like. He says $500 million in new state revenues within easy reach. That's just agreeing about those things that make sense. None of those things cost an individual Alaskan anything. So the rest of the story on that is I mean, this is like Elise Galvin when she says, oh, I've got a solution and I've got an income tax. Is like Elise Galvin when she says, oh, I've got a solution and I've got an income tax.
Speaker 1:When you look at it it's this very thin layer of raising revenues built on the backs of PFD cuts. So we've got about a billion seven. A billion eight depends upon what oil prices are at the time. We're facing about a billion seven billion eight, 8, um uh deficit over the next uh 10 years. Average deficit over the next 10 years. Baggage is 500 million. Wouldn't raise even a third of that, wouldn't solve even a third um of the of the problem.
Speaker 1:Fiscal policy working group says we've got to raise some revenues. We've got to raise some oil revenues. We've got to do spending cuts, we've got to cap spending. We've got to do a lot of things.
Speaker 1:All Begich has picked up on is the oh, we got to raise some revenues and that $500 million wouldn't even cover a third of the deficit that we're running. What's sitting underneath that? How does he do the rest of that? Continuous PFD cuts? I mean, if you're not talking about a full solution to the billion seven billion eight problem, if you're not talking about a comprehensive solution to that problem, you're only talking about a piece of the solution. The rest of it.
Speaker 1:What you're saying implicitly is the rest of it's going to be covered by the way we've been covering it through is through PFD cuts. So the rest of the story on Begich yes, he's got a fiscal plan. Yes, he's going to be covered by the way we've been covering it through is through pfd cuts. So the rest of the story on baggage yeah, yes, he's got, he's got a fiscal plan. Yes, he's going to raise some revenue, less than a third of the deficits that we're facing. Uh, yes, he's going to raise some revenues. But what the part he's not saying the rest of the story is? It's based upon, it's built on pfd cuts. It's built on continuing the most regressive tax ever proposed.
Speaker 2:Right, and it doesn't touch but even a third of the current deficit projected. And that's even before we get into last week's discussion of the IEA and EIA and the potential for, you know, $2 billion in deficits. If you include the supplemental and everything else, I mean it's going to be significant. It wouldn't even hardly be a drop in the bucket on that, but he's uh, he's going to talk about that and that's a. You know, that's a valid and interesting point. You know, what I found interesting about that article my kind of rest of the story take on this is that he's he's basically just a placeholder. He admits it in there. He's basically just a placeholder. He admits it in there. He's basically just a placeholder.
Speaker 2:Because the article mentions that Mary Peltola is the last Democrat to win a statewide race, but that she hadn't announced whether she was running for any office. And he said well, I've always told her and I'd say this to you if she were to get in the race, I wouldn't need to be in this race. She'd be in the race, but I'm in the race, and that is the difference. He's basically, I'm just a, I'm just a placeholder. I'm just a placeholder of the, which I thought was interesting as well. On top of all that, I'm just here to fill, I'm just here to warm the seat until Mary decides what she wants to do, which is, you know, some irony there as well. All right, finish up the rest of the story, brad, before we move on to number three here.
Speaker 1:Well, no, that is the rest of the story. The rest of the story is whenever anybody's going to come to you during this campaign cycle Begich and others saying I've got a solution to the fiscal problems, and it's X. In Begich's case, it's $500 million of new revenues. I've got a solution to the fiscal problem and it's X. Keep in mind the rest of the story is okay. The whole is $1.7 billion, $1.8 billion, $2 billion, depending upon the oil price of the day. The whole is that. Are they talking about a solution that encompasses, comprehensively solves the $2 billion problem, $1.7 billion problem? Are they talking about a solution that comprehensively solves that? If they aren't, there's a rest of the story. And the rest of the story is they're really talking about PFD cuts to fill the.
Speaker 2:To fill the remainder Right, because, again, but even if they took the whole PFD, we still don't have them. I mean, come on, this is this is getting down to the point of where, if you generated 500 million more and took all the pfd, you still wouldn't have enough at this point. Uh, because it's only another 600 million on the pf, you're still only at 1.1 billion. You're still short. Continuing. Now, brad keithley, alaskans for sustainable budgets, weekly top three kind of a different change of pace for our top three this week. Uh, now we, now we've got a. Uh. His final thoughts is an important life, a memoriam, uh, Brad. So give us your thoughts here on uh, on, uh, on, on what's happening here. Give us the, give us, give us some insight here.
Speaker 1:Well, steve Haycox, uh, who was who? Um was a long time university of Alaska Anchorage professor of history and someone who I've admired greatly past this last week, and I, and I want to, I want to note how significant I think Haycox is and how significant he will continue to be through the, through the books he wrote and through the articles he uh, he, he published. When I came to Alaska, I started digging into Alaska. There were four people really, uh, who had written a lot about Alaska, who I really spent a lot of time um uh, studying and reading and getting to know uh in some sense uh with with each of them. Um, steve Haycox was one noted Alaska historian. Scott Goldsmith, who we've talked about a lot on the show over the years, a former retired emeritus professor at University of Alaska, anchorage on economics, headed ICER for a while, wrote some great stuff back in the late 2000s and early 20 teens on sustainable budgets really sort of the genesis of the Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets was another one I've written, I've read a lot. Jack Roderick, who former mayor of first mayor of the Unified Anchorage Borough maybe, but a former mayor of Anchorage at least but more importantly, a longtime oil and gas lawyer, wrote a book called Crude Dreams which to me is the best oil and gas book ever written about Alaska. Described the beginning of the Alaska oil age. Jack was there and described the development over the years and I think has some terrific insights.
Speaker 1:And then Terrence Cole, who was professor of history, sort of Steve Haycox's counterpart at UAF University of Alaska, fairbanks, and also Dermot's brother twin brother, terrence Cole historian. I read a lot of his stuff but Haycox had a huge influence on how I've come to understand Alaska. He wrote four books. One was called A Warm Past Travels in Alaska History Interesting sort of view of various times in Alaska history. The second was Alaska and American colony which really outlines, I think, his view that Alaska has, has, was and remained, remains in many respects a colony of, of, of of America rather than rather than a full-fledged state, frigid embrace politics, economics and Environment in Alaska, which I thought was a great way of understanding, another way of understanding the oil industry and Battleground Alaska, fighting Federal Power in Alaska's, in America's Last Wilderness. Those were the books and a lot like Scott Goldsmith's stuff on economics books and a lot like Scott Goldsmith's stuff on economics, haycox's stuff on history I think really helped me understand the fundamentals of Alaska history and the forces and the dynamics at work in Alaska history, not only in Alaska, not uh today.
Speaker 1:And so I, really I, I, I want to note um uh, steve's passing and and talk about it in the sense of just just mention this, in the sense of not only, not only, you know, highlighting Steve uh as as as with his passing, but, but, but noting that Steve will continue to live on in terms of, in terms of the things he's written in theN over the years. He was a semi-regular contributor. He and John Havelock were semi-contributor uh, semi-regular contributors to the uh, to the ADN, and one piece he wrote in 2018 that I that I've kept sort of if, if I, if I kept these things on paper, it'd be yellow sheeted by now. It'd be turning at the edges. But, uh, one of one of the pieces he wrote back in 2018, while we were still in the early PFD wars, he wrote an op-ed piece and it says Alaska is still an economic colony.
Speaker 1:The legislature's action on the permanent fund earnings prove it. And basically the theme of the essay was look, alaska says it's self-reliant, but it's really not. It turns to the federal government for money to fund its operations, a point where the state funding is low. Rather than raise money broadly, or rather than raise money by going back and looking at the oil industry or looking at our other resource industries, we're starting to take it out of the pockets of Alaskans, the very people that we're trying to, that we're trying to claim are self-reliant. Down toward the end of the column he says this the designers of the Alaska Permanent Fund hope to wrest more of the benefit from the exploitation of Alaska's resources for the people of Alaska and at the same time somewhat mitigate the effects of our economic dependency.
Speaker 1:As the fund was made part of the Constitution, the corpus cannot be appropriated by the legislature, but the dividend program drawn annually from the earnings of the fund is how all Al has now diverted into state coffers for general appropriation, created a state dependency, created dependency created, created a dependency on the state government for their livelihood. Would it please the designers of the fund that the state legislature has now diverted into state coffers for general appropriation a large portion of what used to be the people's direct benefit? No Exclamation point. Exclamation point general appropriation a large part portion of what used to be the people's direct benefit no exclamation point. Exclamation point. Former jay, former governor jay hammond, said clearly that the funds earnings should go to the people's hands, not the legislatures. This is at a time when, when you know, the debate was on about whether we ought to just give up on the pfd and let the state have or go forward, and that was a, that was a steve.
Speaker 1:Haycox's words were a key turning point for me in saying no, we ought to continue the fight for the PFD. So the man lived a great life, but his words lived on. If you haven't read the books, read them. If you haven't read the essays, read them. He had. He just has a huge amount of insight. He's had a huge amount of insight about the state.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I mean some of his articles especially. You know that one talking specifically about you know this is what the framers intended of the Constitution and then this is what the architects of the permanent fund intended, and you could see it right there. I mean, anybody who has any doubt about what's being done and what's been done to the permanent fund says Bill Walker understands that people like Hammond would be outraged that this is what's going on, and he makes that point, I think, very well in some of his pieces and some of his articles. And it's like you said. It's kind of sad that we've lost that, that voice, especially from an academic standpoint, of being able to go back and look at history. But the lessons are still there. The lessons are still there to be learned.
Speaker 1:They are. They are. And the thing about the PFD that struck me so much, he put it in a historical context. It's look, alaskans have been a colony. They've been dependent on somebody like forever, and we've been an American colony. We've been dependent on the federal government and this was a turning point. I mean, what Hickok saw is this was a turning point in Alaska. Are we going to continue to be dependent on somebody or are we going to allow self-sufficiency, at least this step towards self-sufficiency, to exist? And his point was look, now we're turning everybody into dependent on the state. You've talked about dependency a lot and this is what I mean. Haycox was putting this in the historical context and saying look, this is a watershed event, that we are now creating another dependency on the state. Instead of allowing Alaskans to be self-reliant and giving them the resources to be self-reliant, we're turning them into another dependency on the state. And instead of allowing Alaskans to be self-reliant and giving them the resources to be self-reliant, we're turning them into another dependency on the state.
Speaker 2:Well, rest in peace. Stephen Haycox brought a lot of good information out there and again, he's going to live on and you could find his books out there, I'm sure, and his opinion pieces in the ADN. I remember reading that piece from Haycox where he was specifically talking about that. You know, the no like the big no like this is not what they would have wanted and this is not what they intended. And yet we continue to see these actions from our legislators and we just go. Guys, you're missing the whole point here. You're missing the whole point, and it's painful. Those that fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. And it's painful those that fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. And that's where we're at right now, yeah, they grab the.
Speaker 1:I mean, there's a lot of things you can say about that 2017, 2018, 2019 period, but they grabbed the easy thing. They didn't do the hard work. They didn't dig in and do the hard work that Alaska needed at that point. They could because, sort of like your stockbroker, right I mean? Or sort of like your financial advisor, the funds come through him in a way, on their way to you. They're your funds, they are set aside for you, they're held in trust for you as they come through your stockbroker, but they come through his fingers. And the permanent fund dividend comes through the fingers of the legislature. And rather than let that flow through, as the statute provided, rather than allow the additional support of self-sufficiency that the fathers envisioned, the legislature just did the easy thing and just took those funds, just diverted those funds into its own pocket.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I've made the analogy before, I think, to Randy, where I said you know it's like a money market fund, you know market managers where they just decide to take all of the dividend that you would have received as a shareholder because their expenses were up. And you'd be like, hey, wait, wait, wait, a second, you're taking all my, you're taking all of my dividend, all the money that's owed me because your expenses are up. That's a problem. I don't care if you think you're benefiting me or not. I think that's a problem. Up, that's a problem. I don't care if you think you're benefiting me or not. I think that's a problem.
Speaker 2:And I think it's a valid argument that you know we should be looking at that and going well, wait a second, wait a second, give us the money. And this goes back to my old analogy of you know, I think we should just all get. I think we should get all the money directly. Stop giving it directly to the state, right, just give it all to us directly. We'll all get a check for 20,000 bucks a piece and then when they issue that tax bill the next week for 18,500 a piece, there would be some, there would be a reckoning, right, there would be a reckoning of like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a second, I just got 20 grand and you want, you want 18, five of it to to fund whatever we. We need to look at something here. I mean, it would come to a screeching halt in this state.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the reason Haycox resonated so much with me on that piece is in a former life, as an oil and gas lawyer down in the lower 48, I had represented family trusts in connection with family trusts that were created to handle oil royalties and, and the way they were structured was, the oil royalties came into the trust. Um, uh, they were invested. Uh, some of them some of them were were flowed through. There were trust instructions on how to flow it through, but the portion that wasn't flowed through was invested. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? And the trust provided that the dollars would go out on a per-person basis, equally on a per-person basis, to all the members of the family. That was the family trust.
Speaker 1:The PFD is nothing more. Or the permanent fund is structured the same as that. It's structured in the same way as the old family trust down in the lower 48. And you would never even think in the lower 48, you would never even think of saying, oh well, a portion of this goes to the state, a portion of this goes to someone disproportionately. It's the way the trust was set up and that's what the permanent fund statute is. It's the trust rules, it's the provisions of the trust that describes how the benefits are to be distributed. It is so analogous to a lower 48 family oil and gas trust, royalty trust. I mean, to me it was just oh well, that's obvious.
Speaker 1:Somebody was really thinking through the provisions and and so Haycox comes along and says look, this is a way we were going to provide self-sufficiency, this is a way we're going to provide for, you know, to get off government, to get off reliance on the government, dependency on the government. It was Hammond's vision and others' vision that this was a step to make Alaskans independent. And here we go. You know, we're an American, we've been a US colony because of dependency on the federal government. Now we're creating another dependency on the state, on state funding, by allowing them to, you know, take these funds and deprive them of, cut them off and withhold them and divert them from the pockets of Alaska families. It was a great insight. That essay was a great insight into the historical significance of that decision. Michael, could we use this segment? I'll talk about it more next week, but could we use this segment to give a shout out to Mike Kronk?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. I saw that article and I was like, wow, that's some interesting stuff right there that he seems to. Maybe he's listening. Maybe all of our chatter about this is finally starting to get through, because he actually is talking about some of the things that we've been talking about on the show for sure.
Speaker 1:So yesterday was the first meeting of the Legislative Task Force Right and the ADN has an article on it. The headline is Alaska Lawmakers Convene an Education Funding Task Force. The ADN article is you know, 80% of it is we need more, we need more, we need more. And all the legislators are saying, oh, we need more funding for this, we need more funding for that school funding task. The task force is on funding and basically it was just we need more of it. But Kronk at the end had Kronk at the end of this article is quoted in and, I think, a great insight.
Speaker 1:Cronk, a former school teacher, pointed to one looming factor not within the task force's purview the state fiscal plan. For years, most lawmakers have agreed that the state is not bringing enough revenue to pay for all the services that Alaska's expect, including public schools. Fiscal plan working group convened in 2021, brought together a bipartisan group of lawmakers to discuss specific questions, much like the education task force seeks to do now, but most of the fiscal plan recommendations were never adopted. This is a quote from Kronk. We need to create a fiscal plan for this state so we're not doing what we're doing every single year fighting over which funds do we take from somewhere else to fund something else, said Kroc. If we're talking about funding, that should be our goal as part of this, and I think that's a huge insight.
Speaker 1:Look, the task force is focusing on one piece of the state's goals or one piece of the state's problem the education funding, k through 12 funding. But you can't do that in isolation, because you solve education and you've just created a problem someplace else. You can't do one piece of this without having the overarching plan of how you do fiscal policy, having fiscal policy resolved as a whole, or else you're just, you know, stealing from one to pay another, just digging the hole deeper in order to build a bigger mountain. It's. You can't do this in isolation. And Cronk Cronk making that point during the task force, I think is an excellent way of highlighting this issue and getting that issue on the table and keeping that issue on the table. So I hope, I hope Senator Cronk continues to do that, I hope Representative Rutledge, who's the other Republican on the task force, picks it up and repeats. That, amplifies it and I hope it starts getting through to the other members of the task force. You can't do this in isolation.
Speaker 2:Right Rough ridge there. Yeah, no, I think that it was. It was refreshing to see, especially in such a short article, they were actually able to fit that, you know, actually put that in there at the end and I was like, wow, maybe somebody is actually hearing what we've been saying this whole time. Or coming, finally, coming around to the same conclusion. You can't just keep doing what you've been doing and expect that there's going to be different results.
Speaker 2:Uh, on that for sure, um, and again, the fact that we keep looking to these folks who, um, whose soul, whose sole answer seems to be again, the edgeman thing of, well, we just need to spend more, that'll fix it. The more we spend, the better it'll get. Um, unfortunately, you know, eventually, once they've taken all of the PFD and once they've taken whatever 500 million that baggage is talking about and done all this other stuff, they're going to come to the same conclusion and and basically say, well, we've got to find more money somewhere we're going to, we're going to see those taxes some way shape or form, and we best be having a conversation about it before it gets to that point.
Speaker 1:Yeah and you can't. I mean, they're going to come up with whatever they're going to come up with. The task force is going to come up with whatever the task force is going to come up with, but it's just going to be about K through 12. And so K through 12 is going to have this status of having a task force about it and they'll say, oh, we need more funding here and more funding there. We need to change the formula here and change the formula there, crowding out something else along the way. You've got to have the overarching architecture of how you're going to do your fiscal plan and then fit K through 12 inside that, just as you fit the other pieces inside it, just as you fit infrastructure, just as you fit transportation, just as you fit the other pieces inside it. You've got to have that overall architecture before you do any part of it. So I think Kronk has done a great service by raising that issue. I hope he continues it during the subsequent meetings and I hope Representative Ruffridge echoes it as they keep on going.
Speaker 2:We'll have to see. We'll have to see if somebody, if there's maybe light in the foxhole, we'll have to see what happens here. All right, brad? Well, good stuff. Thank you for coming on board. As always, it's great to talk with you and we look forward to next and again, the upcoming election season. I just um, I'm, I'm kind of I don't even know. I'm trying to brace myself. Gertrude, that's what I'm trying to do try to brace myself for what's coming well, it'll be great.
Speaker 1:It'll be great stuff for rest of the story segments oh yeah, absolutely that.
Speaker 2:We'll be doing two or three of those segments a week. Absolutely all right. Brad, thanks so much for coming on board. We appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Michael, as always, thanks for having me. Well, that's a wrap for another week's edition of the weekly top three from Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. Thank you again for joining us. Remember that you can find past episodes on our YouTube, soundcloud, spotify and Substack pages and keep track of us during the week on Facebook and Twitter. This has been Brad Keith, managing director of Alaskans for Sustainable Budgets. We look forward to you joining us again next week on the Weekly Top Three. Thank you,
