What Part Of “Spreading The Wealth” Don’t You Understand?

Eric Rosengren, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, has a message for those of you who worked hard to buy a nice house in an upscale, low-crime community:

Pay up.

Top officials in wealthy Hub suburbs aren’t buying the Boston Fed chief’s Robin Hood-like suggestion that government take money from richer towns and give more to poorer ones.

Speaking at a Washington, D.C., conference on the housing crisis, Rosengren said…[t]he ultimate long-term solution is to increase federal and state “revenue sharing” to address high unemployment, crime, high-school dropout rates and other maladies affecting communities, Rosengren said.

But some town officials weren’t buying Rosengren’s class-based prescription for more revenue sharing.

“Already there’s revenue sharing that favors communities that are not as wealthy,” said Donna VanderClock, town manager in Weston. “Weston residents are paying more than they’re receiving now from the state.”

She cited a recent report that 50 percent of Brockton’s city budget comes from state aid, while only 4 percent of Weston’s budget comes from non-town sources.

The Boston Globe-Democrat picked up on it, too:

“If these are community problems, we may need to search for community solutions,’’ Rosengren said. “If a more holistic approach is needed, states and the federal government may need to examine the most effective and efficient ways to address the broader problems in these communities.’’

He suggested a federal revenue-sharing program that would focus on high-foreclosure communities to provide money to improve schools, code enforcement, policing, and other services.

When government economists start using medical phrases like “holistic,” it’s time to grab more than your wallet. Because some politician’s about to tell you to turn your head and cough.