JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri House members have approved a proposed amendment to the state Constitution that limits increases in state spending.

The measure would cap annual spending increases at 1.5 percent of the revenue collected in the previous year plus the rates of inflation and population change. Additional money would be used for debt and two state reserve funds. Eventually it would permit an income tax cut.


House members on Thursday approved the measure 105-54, which sends the proposal to the Senate.


Majority House Republicans say the spending limit is a priority. Supporters say it would make budget decisions more sustainable and soften the severity of cuts in tight years. Critics argue it would curtail lawmakers’ ability to make decisions.
Approval by the Legislature would put the measure to a statewide vote.

By DAVID ROGERS | 1/31/12 10:06 AM EST Updated: 1/31/12 10:28 AM EST
The government faces a fourth year of trillion-plus deficits in 2012, according to new projections released Tuesday—numbers which also show little relief in the future unless Washington comes to grips with needed changes in its tax and spending policies.

Like Aunt Cassandra coming down from the attic, the Congressional Budget Office steps square into the 2012 campaign season with the 147-page report which might have been subtitled “It’s not just the economy stupid, it’s also the debt.”

The $1.079 trillion deficit now projected for this fiscal year ending Sept. 30 is actually worse than what CBO had predicted in August. And to punch home its message, the non-partisan agency outlines an especially grim scenario in which Congress not only extends all the current tax cuts but pulls the plug on the $1.2 trillion in sequester set in motion by the Budget Control Act last summer.