I Can See An Empty Bank Account From My Window

Not mine, for once.

With oil prices down along with oil production, the state is facing an Alaska-size shortfall: Two-thirds of the revenue needed to cover this year’s $5.2 billion state budget cannot be collected.

Many Alaskans are not old enough to recall times this bad. This is the nation’s least-taxed state, where oil royalties and energy taxes once paid for 90 percent of state functions. Oil money was so plentiful that residents received annual dividend checks from a state savings fund that could total more than $8,000 for a family of four — arriving each autumn, as predictable as the first snowfall.