“We’re just concerned that the state can afford the magnitude of these cuts,” said Gavin Thornton, Executive Director of Hawaiʻi Appleseed Center for Law & Economic Institute. “If there is a recession, if something else catastrophic happens in our state, puts us in a really challenging position.”

To put it in context, Thornton said during the Great Recession in 2009, and 2010, Hawaiʻi lost $500 million in revenue for each of those years.

“This bill is projected to lose a billion dollars in revenue. So twice that by the time we get to 2030. Those losses from the Great Recession led to the now infamous furlough Fridays that we experienced in our public schools, and a whole host of cuts that really were damaging to our mental health system to social services. There were lots of government layoffs, that’s worrisome.”