This common phrase of our vocabulary derives from those past days when people depended on wells to supply their drinking water. Many of those wells were hand dug and relatively shallow. As a boy, I once helped a man dig a well. He found water at 88 feet.

It sometimes happened that extended drought caused those wells to dry up. Usually, folks could tell when that was threatening. If the bucket came up half full, you knew that trouble was nigh. If the water was stale and murky, it meant something was wrong. When the warning signs appeared, certain steps had to be taken:

• Consumption had to be curtailed. Rationing was never easy, but it was ration now or suffer more serious consequences later.
• All waste had to be eliminated.
• Some projects needing water had to be postponed.

Here in America a different kind of well is going dry. I speak of the well of government funding. All of those agencies and individuals who draw their income and operating expenses from state and federal government wells are feeling the pain. Several states are now teetering on bankruptcy, and others are fast approaching it. Even our federal government has drained the well with its vast expenditures.

The farmer's well is replenished by rain and snowfall. Government's well is replenished by taxes paid by businesses and working citizens. The well begins to run dry when recession overtakes the economy, or when the demand for tax dollars exceeds what the producers can afford to pay.

Public schools draw their economic lifeblood from the government's tax well. Granted, education of children is a more noble and productive business than many of the things that government funds, yet the funds for schools, bureaucrats, and pork projects all come out of the same tax well.

For several years the signs have been clear that the funding well was running dry. Yet every public agency was driven to ask for an increase in its operating budget for the coming year. Workers demanded raises. Then one day, across the nation, the buckets started coming up with more mud than water. Now we are faced with insufficient revenue to fully fund even the most basic things, such as schools.

The reality is that schools, along with every other agency that depends on the tax well, are going to have to make adjustments to survive this dry spell. Renovations will have to wait. Raises will be hard to come by. Extracurricular activities will have to be curtailed.

With multibillion-dollar revenue shortfalls, states must institute meaningful reductions in spending. No agencies can be exempt. Raising taxes always sounds like an easy solution, but the person who is unemployed cannot pay more taxes. Businesses that are closed cannot pay taxes. Excessive taxes on those who are employed are self-defeating.

Like the farmer whose well was drying up, everyone must learn to live with less. If we are to survive, all the extras will have to be postponed, and even the basics will have to be trimmed.

Americans love their children and appreciate their schools. They have supported them well. Like the rest of the nation, schools and teachers are going to have to tighten their belts and pray for economic recovery. Rather than railing against the taxpayers and the government, we should be grateful that we are not among those out of work and looking for employment.

John Waddey is a native of Tennessee and the father of four children. He is a public speaker, editor, and author of 37 books.