On the final day of May, Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback, a Republican, boldly approved a radical state budget that the House and Senate passed. This followed an even more radical tax cut bill that he signed three weeks ago that will cut income taxes among individuals and businesses by $3.7 billion dollars over five years.

These two bits of legislation will greatly restrict the money the Kansas government has to work with, as Brownback and his supporters commit themselves to “shrinking the footprint of state government and pursuing policies that grow the economy,” Brownback said.

These new legislations will not go without negative consequences, but many prominent Kansas Republicans seem to believe that the benefits will outweigh the problems.

Brownback claims that the tax cuts will improve the economy.

“The best thing we can do for individuals in this state, and particularly for somebody that’s struggling, is to provide jobs and job opportunities,” Brownback said. “That’s what this does.”

The state’s revenue secretary, Nick Jordan, said that the new tax bill will create 22,000 jobs in Kansas.

But are the benefits of these changes actually more important than the problems they cause?

As a result of the tax cuts, projections by the Kansas Legislative Research Department show the state deficit to reach $2.5 billion dollars by 2018.

When the state loses that much money, state-funded services will unavoidably be cut.  And when education comprises 65 percent of the state’s expenses, its same funding will surely not remain.

Education is clearly a driving force in economic improvement. Students that are given a quality education in public schools, community colleges, and state universities, like Wichita State, earn the knowledge and work skills necessary to become capable employees and employers.

If funding for this essential economic benefit is cut, causing education quality to decrease along with resources and educators, the economy will be hurt.

When she considered the effect on education and various social services, the president of Kansas Action for Children, Shannon Cotsoradis, said, “this is not a bill that’s good for low and moderate income families in Kansas.”

Hindering the ability of individuals in the lower income levels to gain a quality education does not only hurt the Kansas economy as a whole. It also hurts the upward mobility of these individuals.

It seems clear that the benefits do not outweigh the problems. Maiming the economic force of education to improve the economy just doesn’t make sense.

Tax breaks can be a very effective step in improving the economy, but they should not be done in a way that will unavoidably hurt education.

The extremity of these legislations is not and should not be popular among many Kansans. Our state government has acted irresponsibly and far from the public’s interest in producing these major changes.

Brownback has even stated that he would have signed a more compromised tax plan if it had been introduced to him—a plan that wouldn’t cut so drastically into the state’s revenue—but the legislative branch’s failure to cooperate led this drastic plan to be put in place.

Our state’s education should not be hurt because of the irresponsibility of our government. Kansas’ leaders need to get their act together and become the system that our state and its people need.

The Courts have finished redistricting—since our legislature couldn’t even manage to do that—and major changes in the districts have been made, and incumbents have been moved from their old districts. This will cause power in the Kansas House and Senate to shift to new people.

Hopefully Kansas’s voters will elect reasonable, cooperative leaders this election.