Scot Lehigh had a fine column yesterday that addressed the question we’ve been asking: If we’re going to cut the income tax rate from 5.3% to 5.0%, what services do you cut? Is there a Free Lunch for taxpayers? Well, Lehigh did a good thing and asked the Massachusetts Taxpayer Foundation, who studies these things:
”It is abundantly clear that the budget cannot accommodate the income tax rate cut on the two-year schedule proposed by the governor while simultaneously addressing even a handful of the many competing and costly priorities now being considered,” the foundation concluded.Among those priorities: Restoring reduced human service programs, implementing the state’s new health-insurance mandate, increasing local aid to help bolster squeezed municipal services and relieve pressure on property taxes, and making a major investment in the state’s public colleges and universities, which, in real dollar terms, still languish some 30 percent below their 2001 funding levels.
A one-year rollback, meanwhile, “would have very direct repercussions on local aid and higher ed,” says Michael Widmer, president of the foundation. “It is too hard to do without an impact on a whole list of other spending priorities that have broad support among the political leadership.”
It is completely natural for taxpayers to want lower taxes, just as it’s natural for shoppers to want lower prices. And frankly, the Big Dig culture of Beacon Hill — which has been a bipartisan failure, over a long period of time — gives taxpayers a strong suspicion that their money is being flushed down the toilet.
That being said, I suspect that when it’s quantified so clearly — an average of $200 per year per filer — that it may not resonate with the voters as much as, say, Jon Keller thinks. Sure, folks will vote for a tax cut in the abstract, but look at the bipartisan scoffing to Sen. Frist’s proposal to write $100 checks for gas; I actually found myself agreeing with Rush Limbaugh.
The Free Lunch Four need to come clean with what they would be willing to cut to get us down to 5%. And Deval Patrick needs to find a way to assure people that he is not a free-spender. All candidates need to assure us that every tax dollar is a sacred trust, and present concrete ways that they will keep that trust.
Discuss
19 Comments . Leave a comment below....explain opposition to income tax rollback it with bumper sticker talking point.
The conservative Mass Taxpayer Association warns of repercussions of tax roll back...(so what if right wingers argue whether they are conservative...with a name like that everyone thinks they are)
My take is Deval is opposed to the roll back because he won't be able to push his agenda of IMPROVED education. I think he needs to remind voters that a rollback will make current dismal matters worse. How many parents are paying to send their kids on school buses, or to play sports? With a rollback local schools will be charging for # 2 pencils.
The rollback will put $200 a year in my pocket...compare that to the $900 a year my town was asking for a 2 and 1/2 over-ride (surprise, it did not pass).
I've heard Deval talk about the choice between services and lower taxes. It's OK, but I think his folks need a more concise comeback...which I don't have.
Here's the bumper sticker - "Cut the Property Tax - Vote Deval Patrick!" Or you could say, "Raise the Property Tax - Vote Healey, or Reilly, or Mihos, or, maybe, Gabrieli!"
Did you hear Deval's closing remarks at the Agawam candidate forum? After listening to that, I have little doubt Deval knows how to explain his opposition effectively and use the issue to his advantage.
When I was in college I was on a committee to select a new food vendor for our student union. We interviewed several candidates, including the vendor who currently had the contract.
I took one very impotant lesson away from that experience, something that really reached me. The vendor we wound up selecting said something like "your current vendor, when faced with declinig sales, decided to decrease portion sizes and increase prices. As a result sales are down even more.
We take a different approach. We're going to spend a little more to make the food better and more people will eat it. People are willing to pay for a quality product, and we're going to offer that -- even if we have to spend a little more up front to get there.".
We selected them, and they made good on their promise. Instead of just providing more (but less) of the same, they expanded the menu, they offered different items, they shook things up. The result was that they were tremendously popular, and sales went up.
That seems to be, in a nutshell, what is happening in Massachusetts. People aren't happy with having increased prices for decreased services. But no one is shaking things up. They're just increasing prices and cutting portion sizes.
That's the kind of story that Deval Patrick must tell.
Wow, Charlie I have not read that anywhere yet. I love it. It should be the mantra of Deval or Chris in the general election. (Unfortunatley for Reilly--the taker of Big Dig campaign contributions, it won't play for him.)
As Healey runs the same Republician play about "protecting the voters from Democratic control", the outsiders (Deval or Chris) counter with "the Big Dig culture of Beacon Hill" and everybody will get it...the Republicans in the corner office are part of the problem.
I think Gabrieli is in the best place on this issue, and it's consistent with his whole approach, not just triangulation. Reilly advocates the fiscally irresponsible 1-year rollback. Deval goes against the referendum results and the anti-tax majority. Gabrieli honors the referendum, but says it should be a patient, responsible rollback.
while there may be more recent information out there, from the televised debate there wasn't much difference between Gabrieli and Patrick--they chose different words for what seem like similar positions (more similar than either of them to Reilly).
Gabrieli: critical to make the rollback, must do it responsibly, this year just breaking even in MA budget so can't do it (tax rollback) today (or this year?)
Patrick: going from 5.3 to 5 right now is fiscally irresponsible, ought to roll back the income tax wen we can afford it, in favor of cutting any tax that makes sense to roll back.
They don't seem so different--both will do the roll back when it works fiscally which is not now. Neither of them know when it might be prudent. Both disagree with Reilly. Gabrieli wants to grow the economy and then the roll back would be ok. Patrick wants to be sure that local governments are able to provide the services that they've been cutting.
People get so caught up in the 10 word punch phrase that they don't even know whet the hell it means anymore.
Cities and towns across MA. are juggling between keeping the street lights on or firing all of the janitors in the schools system. This is what meant by fiscally responsible, socially progressive. Some cities are now charging uo to 10 dollars apiece to pick up big trash items... which means that people will just dump trash all over the city and in parks.
It is NOT responsible to cut taxes whereby that average tax payer gets 60 dollars "relief" but then has to pay 800 dollars more to send ONE kid to state university.
We need Fiscal RESPONSIBILTY not slash and burn tax cuts.
New Frames for Taxes
All Deval has to do is ask people how much more out of pocket do they have to spend now on things that the state budget once paid for... then the script right itself.
The former Secretary of Administration and Finance Eric Kriss departed with a stern warning to cities and town about Municipal Budgets.Those of you who simply want to raise property taxes have no real clue about except the City of Cambridge and certain other municipalities ,who get it. I thought my post on the subject was very clear.But no bites from BMG.
............."So, if the City of Cambridge, the liberal bastion of progressive liberal thinking is able to manage its fiscal affairs ,why do certain candidates insist on raising taxes to generate municipal revenues rather than promoting sound fiscal management practices?"
Your post was right about the cost of health care. That's what's killing the local budgets. Unfortunately, it's not so easy to get those under control, when you're dealing with individual unions and smaller pools. The state has a more efficient system that apparently delivers decent health care. I'm not certain how that could be applied to cities and towns, or if it could be done without a huge stink.
In any event, it's been my impression that Kriss has not exactly been a constructive voice on this matter.
As a resident of the People's Republic myself, I think that Cambridge is almost a useless model for other communities. Several decades of rent control artificially depressed the value of real estate, and the end of rent control has provided a bonanza in increased property values. Unaffordable housing development has also added to this bonanza. I doubt that this experience can be replicated elsewhere. And almost the last person I would ever listen to for advice is Eric Kriss.
costs are part of the equation. If I told you Eric Kriss was a democrat, would you then respond with an intelligent answer to my post. He referred to the runaway entitlements for Municipal employees in his speech. Come on ....Lets have an intelligent debate... What do you think about controlling municipal costs.?
libertarian if anything; highly reactionary. His idea of fiscal restraint involves starving anyone who dares to work in government and firing those who already do.
I take him at his word when he refers to decent healthcare and benefits as "runaway" costs. This man would have us all working as 39.5 hr/wk temps with no benefits if it was his call. Thank God he's no longer the head of Admin and Finance.
Thanks for asking. The biggest issue facing municipalities today is health care costs, for employees and retirees. There are two ways to approach this issue - one way, the Kriss way, is to blame so-called greedy public employees, and hold up private sector corporations, like Wal-Mart, as models that the public sector should emulate. The other way is to realize that the increase in health care costs is not the fault of employees but our present health care system, and that we need to get those costs under control. And I'm not talking about any pie-in-the-sky single payer system, I'm talking about going back to the role that our state government played in controlling health care costs during the Dukakis administration. It can be done - look at how much money Partners is making - who is paying for that - certainly not greedy municipal employees. It won't get done if we rely on right-wingers like Eric Kriss.
Do you think that public employees who smoke should pay a higher premium or co pay than those who don't smoke.? Also , just curious ,do believe in socialized medicine similiar to the Canadian model?
Well, taking away the Union veto on any change to municipal health care plans would sure help get those costs under control...any takers?
Michael Widmer is in dager of losign all credibility, Frank - too many people are on to his mis-named groups as high tax apologists.
Also - for those of us on the Cape and South Shore and Western Mass. who are resigned to being screwed over by every local aid formula that Boston devises - do you think will magically give up our desire for a tax cut that lets us keep our own money in favor of BOSTON helping us out? We learned the difference between average and median long ago, and know that our own working class tax cut will be higher than $200 thank you.
you can then take your tax cut and finish the Sagamore Rotary reconstruction. I'm sure you'll have no trouble pooling the millions it will take to finish that job.
I think we are attacking this the wrong way. Dem candidates should not be talking about the cuts THEY will make to achieve the rollback, but the cuts that VOTERS have necessitated. This is a small but important differentiation. Voters do not take the negative implications of take tax cuts seriously. This is evidenced by the last ballot question on repealing income tax. It almost passed!
was never a problem for me. Or other people on-Cape. We liked it.
It WAS a problem for Boston legislators attempting to arrive at their Cape homes for a long weekend.
Please don't hang that one around our necks.
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