Friday, May 13, 2005

Movement on a 5% income tax with more money for education

Congratulations to Senators James Meeks, Rick Winkel, Miguel Del Valle, Kim Lightford, Kwame Raoul, Maggie Crotty and all the other advocates of decent schools for poor children in Illinois for coming to consensus on a 5% state income tax with the revenue allocated to higher education, elementary and secondary education and local property tax relief.

The new vehicle is HB 755, perhaps as close to the 750 brand as they could get.

The bill status is here and the text of the amendment is here (it's long).

There's a good article in the State Journal Register here.

Basically, this is a 2005 version of the swap. The details are still a little murky (I haven't read it all yet), but it's great news and a big sign of progress.

Who says the House is always more progressive than the Senate. . . .?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The proponents may be able to get it passed without using "67% income tax hike" to describe it, but those whose withholding tax increases 67% might be willing to finance campaigns against some of those who vote for it.

Anonymous said...

The intellectual dishonesty astounds. First, when discussing increases, only a liar would fail to also mention the decreases. Thus, decrying an income tax increase without welcoming the property tax decrease is just plain deceitful. Additionally, many folks - and that goes for you dupage and lake county crybabies - would likely see a net reduction in taxes because of the exorbitant property tax rate out there. Finally, a simpleton would say that adding 2 to 3 is a 67% increase. An intelligent person would do the math to determine that the actual increase is vastly less....so do the math people.

Bill Baar said...

What's the estimate on lost jobs from boosting the corporate rate to 8%?