Sunday, April 30, 2006

Tax Freedom Day in Illinois

The Bloomington Pantagraph appears to be the only paper reporting this. The whole editorial is a great read and points to both Republican and Democrat leadership deficiencies.

Breathe a sigh of relief Illinoisans. Today you shed the bonds of taxation. Tomorrow you finally begin working for yourself instead of the taxmen. Well, not exactly but at least theoretically.

This is the official Tax Freedom Day in Illinois, as designated annually by the nonpartisan, nonprofit Tax Foundation.

In other words, we have been working 120 days just to pay for this year's local, state and federal taxes.

For the mathematically challenged, that's darn close to one-third of the year - and approaching half of the year's "work days."

The tax figures are based on data from the Department of Commerce's Bureau of Economic Analysis and includes the typical income taxes, sales taxes and even real estate taxes.
Horrible. This is the reason we are lagging behind in job creation. This is the reason wages are stagnant in Illinois. This is the reason why businesses and people are moving out of state. This is the reason why families are stressed to the brink needing both parents earning wages. This is the reason crime isn't dropping as fast as we would like. This country was founded on the principles of economic freedom, and we are getting closer to being slaves to the government every year.

27 comments:

Skeeter 4:22 PM  

1. How should we pay for the war in Iraq?

2. What programs do you believe should be cut?

It is easy to ramble on about high taxes, but such ramblings are irrelevant unless you have a real plan to control spending.

Jeff Trigg 4:51 PM  

Bush said they'd pay for the war with oil profits, didn't he?

Illinois Arts COuncil
Illinois Tourism Bureau
State Fairs
All Corporate subsidies
All subsidies to private education
All subsidies to non-profits
All sports and entertainment subsidies
State Police cuts
Dept of Corrections cuts
Cap pensions and switch to 401k type retirements
Cut Sec of State 20% by going 5 years between license renewal instead of 4 years
Combine Comptroller and Treasurer
Eliminate Lt. Gov.
Decriminalize marijuana - good $250 million in Illinois right there not counting if we taxed it in cafes.
Cut everything that is not directly related to a specific person in need.

Off the top of my head just for Illinois. Skeeter read through the past 3 years of my blog and you'll find plenty of proposals to cut spending that wouldn't neglect anyone in critical need of help. With our current budget, Illinois could write a check for $20,000 and give it to 25% of our population.

Now how about you justify the $5,000 being spent for every man woman and child in Illinois along with the $75,000 per year and above pensions and any spending that doesn't directly help someone who needs it.

Skeeter 6:16 PM  

Interesting that you would mention the Tourism Bureau this weekend.

The Chicago Tribune this weekend ran a story indicating that Chicago is losing convention business.

Should we continue to promote that business, or should be just tell those employed in the industry that your taxes are more important than their jobs.

It looks to me like that dept. brings in more than it spends.

Jeff Trigg 7:20 PM  

The biggest problem with Chicago's convention business is some of the highest hotel taxes in the US to go along with high room charges. Believe it or not, but convention planners figure in tax when considering bids from several locations.

I've served on Convention & Visitor Bureau and Tourism boards and managed a Marriott hotel in Cook County. Customers don't like subsidizing the Chicago White Sox when they visit, which they are doing now. It would pretty much be impossible to prove the state's Tourism Bureau brings in more than they spend and naive to think many, if any, employed in the industry would lose their jobs if the state stopped funding local TV shows in Chicago or billboards in California or TV commercials in Ohio. The solution isn't taking more money so a state agency can promote Chicago conventions, the solution will be the market working forcing Chicago to offer more competitive services by reducing or at least mantaining costs.

Besides, that's a problem for Chicago/Cook County, not the people of Carbondale or Decatur. We did a really good job of promoting tourism to East Tennessee without spending state taxes, cooperating locally with hotel/motel associations and others in the industry, and voluntarily funding ad campaigns that helped all of our businesses. There's no reason why Chicago/Cook can't take care of themselves in that regards.

steve schnorf 7:32 PM  

Except that people here have to work fewer days than in more than 40 other states to get to Tax Freedom Day, so why aren't all those jobs and people relocating here, where the tax burden will be lower?

Anonymous,  8:31 PM  

Good question,Steve. I understand that when you control for income, Illinois actually has a lighter tax burdern than average.

Jeff Trigg 9:16 PM  

Actually it is the opposite. Illinois is the tenth highest taxed state, not the 40th. You can't believe Ralph Martire's twisted stats that only includes the taxes he wants to include. Taxpayers in only nine states have to work longer, which is why people and jobs are moving out of Illinois. And New York and Mass and NJ and Conn... From the article I linked you would have seen:

"However, the Tax Foundation has already declared Illinois to have the 10th heaviest tax burden in the nation (Connecticut has the highest and Alabama the lowest)..."

http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxfreedomday/

Skeeter 8:48 AM  

"Reducing costs"

Interesting.

You want to cut wages of people working in the tourism industry?

Skeeter 8:50 AM  

Answering further:
How does the State of Alabama rank when it comes to things likes schools, and roads?
Sometimes taxes are necessary to keep Illinois from turning into Alabama.

Jeff Trigg 11:04 AM  

Only the ones in the state Tourism Bureau, and those would be cut to zero. Probably cut some wages and pensions at McPier, which was run by Fawell after all so you can't claim there is no waste there. Knock the hotel tax in half, and eliminate the income tax on everyone making under $25,000, and about everyone in the that industry would see take home pay increase quite a bit without an increase in cost to the consumer. Capping pensions at $75,000 for the "administrators" at McPier would probably reduce costs considerably also and help wages grow.

Why do you insist that poor people pay the state income tax, cutting their take home pay? Why does Meeks and HB750 proponents insist on taxing poor people even more and reducing their take home pay further? I'm not cutting wages, I'm cutting waste. You are the one in favor of cutting take home pay.

Last I checked no one is starving in Alabama, they don't have a homeless problem, unemployment rate is lower, average wages are increasing faster than Illinois, and the people seem to have pride in their state and aren't moving elsewhere. As for education, seems like they passed Chicago and their 6 out of 100 going to college already. So that's a bad comparison.

Florida has 5 million more people than Illinois but their state budget is $10 billion less than Illinois. Tell me again why we need to tax poor people's income at all, let alone increase it?

Common Sense Dude 11:38 AM  

A surefire way to derail an economy is to increase and/or introduce new taxes.

One or both of two things will happen if a working family or individual's taxes are cut; they will either spend the savings or invest it. Either way, ecomonic activity is generated. Over time, the economy grows, jobs grow, incomes grow. Then there will be more taxpayers.

Would you rather have 90% of $100,000 or 10% of $1 million?

Skeeter 12:12 PM  

Nobody is starving in Alabama????

Have you ever been to Alabama?

How are the schools there?

How is medical care there?

How are the roads there?

Don't waste our time with nonsense.

Skeeter 12:30 PM  

Following up:

According to the Heritage Foundation, Alabama Schools rank 43rd in the nation.

Incidently, Alabama ranks 45th in the nation in state funding for public schools.

You get what you pay for.

Jeff Trigg 4:12 PM  

Ahhhh, Skeeter, is reality making you mad to the point where you can't accept it.

Take a look District 51 in Washington, IL, Skeeter. Lowest spending per pupil in the state of Illinois. How is it they perform almost as well as the school that spends the most per pupil in the state? I'll tell you. District 51 is getting what they pay for, even though they are paying less than anyone else in Illinois. A good education for their kids. Barrington is just paying for expensive teachers without regard for teacher performance, like most of the rest of the state.

It's not our fault you don't do your research before over-spending for something you could get at a lot better quality and at a lower cost. IF you and your party truly cared about the quality of education you'd be trying to figure out why District 51 does it better for cheaper. But you don't truly care once you learn the reason is their teachers are held accountable and are paid according to performance.

So tell me why again you insist on taking poor people's income and want to take even more of their take home pay? You want to turn the rest of Illinois schools into what your party has done with them in Chicago. That's great. Give it up skeeter, you can't justify the amount in taxes that are already being spent. All you can do is try to change the subject.

Skeeter 4:21 PM  

JT,
43rd in schools.
45th in spending.
Coincidence?

Jeff Trigg 8:48 PM  

Skeeter you are wasting our time with nonsense. Why don't you adjust that Alabama school spending for income, like Martire does with taxes? And then teach them how to avoid testing stupid kids so their scores dont show up on NCLB. Although I have no doubt their schools aren't great if they are following NCLB, have collective bargaining pay instead of performance pay, and have no educational choices. Alabama is completely irrelevant when you look at spending per pupil versus performance in Chicago and District 51.

District 51, lowest spent per pupil in the state. Great performance. Chicago, 6 out of 100 go to college.

And your solution is to tax the poor starving people of Alabama more because Chicago schools spend more and perform worse.

Without looking, Chicago government schools and Alabama government schools probably aren't very far apart in number of students. Make Chicago it's own state for comparison sake, and they'd be like 10th in spending per pupil and 50th in performance. But that would prove spending and performance is a coincidence, just like District 51 does. Why is it again that you like to tax poor, starving people skeeter?

Skeeter 7:31 AM  

Why are you afraid of the issues?

It is easy to rant about poor people.

It is much more difficult to deal with real numbers.

Alabama (your choice of a great low tax state):

43rd in schools.

Maybe that is your strategy. If you can just dumb-down the voters, people will support people like you.

Stop running from the issues. Face the reality. Accept your own example. You made the original reference to Alabama. Now live with it. Or maybe you should live there.

steve schnorf 10:59 AM  

I fear you have misread 750, for poor people's taxes would not increase under it.

Jeff Trigg 12:38 PM  

Skeeter you are the one running from issues, but nice try with typical liberal double speak. You must have gone to Chicago public schools. The article pointed to Alabama, I didn't. I pointed to Florida actually to compare state budgets. You have avoided the issues completely and now it is obvious you are resorting to telling me to leave the state.

If money matters so much why are Chicago public schools worse than in Alabama, and why is District 51 doing so well even though they spend less per pupil than any other school in Illinois?

As for dumbing down kids, nice try at an insult, but that insult should be directed at the Democrats who are actually doing what you accuse me of in Chicago, with Republicans help of course. Why do you continue to support people that dumb down kids so they continue voting for Democrats? 6 out of 100 go to college and it's my fault, not the people running the schools. You have lost even more credibility.

You contend that Alabama schools are awful because they don't tax people enough. Why do you insist on taxing poor people and think that will improve anything?

As you have demonstrated the ONLY issue you care about is taking more of poor people's money to put into an education system that gives us Chicago results. One minute you say people are starving in Alabama, and the next minute you expect them to hand over more of their money. Skeeter when was the last time you wrote a check to the Alabama public schools or to the starving people in Alabama? How about city of Chicago schools? Thought so, you want to do it with my money.

Jeff Trigg 12:49 PM  

Steve, an income tax increase will hit poor people indeed as HB750 does not increase the standard deduction anywhere that I could see.

Someone making $16,000 per year now has a $2,000 deduction, so they pay $420 in state income tax. Under HB750, they would pay $700 in state income tax.

And before you say, "but they'll get property tax relief", I highly doubt many poor people own their own homes and it would be a bad assumption to think landlords will reduce rent. If anything, landlords will increase the rent if HB750 passes, because their income tax may increase by $1,000 but their property tax might only be reduced by $300, assuming there is any property tax relief. Poor renters would pay more in income tax and face higher rent when landlords try to break even between income tax and property tax.

Skeeter 1:18 PM  

Interesting strategy.

If you keep rambling on about how taxes hurt the little guy, maybe even you will believe it.

Sort of like your tourism analogy.
You claim that the problem is that costs are too high, but then refuse to admit that your plan for lower costs would mean lower wages.

According to you, if we could just cut government pensions, all of our problems would be solved. That is a fine working thesis.

Keep talking though. It is less expensive than therapy.

Jeff Trigg 2:55 PM  

And what is your plan skeeter. Insult people and try to put words in their mouths until they forget about the problems and avoid answering any questions whatsoever.

SKEETER, have you ever written a check to the CHicago public schools or the Alabama schools or your starving people in Alabama? Why does District 51 perform so well yet spends less per pupil than any other school in the state? Why do only 6 out of 100 go to college from Chicago public schools if your politicians solutions are soo good? Why are Chicago's schools worse than Alabama's if money is the only solution? Why do you insist on taxing poor people and think that will solve anything? How do justify the state government spending enough money to write a $20,000 check to 25% of the population? And that doesn't count county, township, and local taxes which would end somewhere near $8,000 being spent for every man woman and child.

You are just like a Rush Limbaugh follower, all you can do is parrot what others tell you to say and avoid any reality or real issues or real solutions. Skeeter you like stealing from the poor and giving to the rich, admit it. You could care less how awful Democrats are governing or educating, you would defend them regardless if they are handing millions to horse racing while your Chicago schools supposedly only need more money to do better. It is exactly the type of sycophants like you that only care about winning and don't care about results that has made Illinois 48th in population losses and Cook County only behind LA in population losses. It's truly pathetic not to be able to realize taxes hurt poor people. And you are calling me crazy? Give it up skeeter, you've provided absolutely nothing of substance with your comments.

Common Sense Dude 7:15 PM  

Find me one poor person that would say, "Yes, I prefer to pay more and higher taxes so that I have even less money to put food on the table and heat my home."

No one, at least in their right mind, wants to pay more taxes; especially to a government with beloated spending practices. There is no correlation to how much a municipality takes in tax revenues to who how well it's school system operates or how well it's students perform. It more probable that the higher the taxes, the more corrupt it will be.

steve schnorf 11:09 PM  

Jeff, check EITC numbers in the draft bill.

Anonymous,  12:15 AM  

Jeff,

Thank you for being one of the few people making sense on this blog and rising above the conservative and liberal parrots who make most of the posts here.

You distinguish yourself well from the two largest groups of hypocrites who post here: those who support Blago but hate Bush and those who support Bush but hate Blago. Newsflash: they're the same thing, namely massive failures at basic governance. While Bush's failures are magnified due to his holding higher office, he and Blago are two sides of the same coin of failure.

Besides, the best way to improve the performance of kids in school is to give them incentives. School performance would be much better today if we used all new school spending on setting up cash incentives for students who get good grades and have good attendance instead of universal preschool or smaller classrooms. Kids respond to incentives just like adults and not using this fact to improve school performance is simply misguided.

Jeff Trigg 9:55 PM  

Stevem thanks for the suggestion, but I don't believe there is a copy of the draft bill available to me with EITC numbers. I looked at the bill online, again, and just didn't find anything relevant on EITC in it, and I'm assuming that is the 5% Illinois EITC. But if they didn't raise the IEITC, HB750 is still going to hit poor people from my estimation. $16,000 would qulaify for about $2,000 in federal EITC, (assuming they take it and aren't one of the 30% that figure it wrong) which only translates to $100 in Illinois EITC. $100 doesn't make up the difference in the 67% state income tax increase. And even if it did, it would then still be taking $100 out of their pockets. Maybe I'll just ask S.R. Fritchey to explain to me exactly how it is poor people won't be negatively affected by HB750. I still say it will hit them from several angles, income tax, higher rent, or even reduced EITC.

steve schnorf 2:14 AM  

Jeff, I spent a lot of time looking at drafts of this legislation, and talking with Reverend Senator Meeks, Ralph Martire, Rick Winkel, and lots of other people about it. I don't believe the legislation is perfect, and I've made it clear I don't agree with some of it. For example, I have always opposed refundable earned income tax credits, because I believe personally that refunding people income taxes that they didn't pay, as opposed to relieving them of taxes they otherwise would have had to pay, is too close to welfare to suit me.

On the other hand, I have been opposed to an increase in the personal exemption becauses it relieves people of their tax burden who don't need to be relieved, such as me.

But, when I got to the absolute bottom line, this was the best piece of legislation or plan out there for me or someone else with my concerns to support. Why, you ask? Because it was the ONly legislation out there.

Over and over again for the past three years I said to my Republican friends in the GA who asked me why I was supporting Martire and Meeks, I would love to support your plan, because I'm sure it would be better than this one, but the problem is, you don't HAVE a plan.

So, the proposal Ralph drafted would intend, primarily through the use of refundable eitc, to reduce the tax burden for people in the bottom 20% of income brackets, and to hold those in the bottom 60% harmless.

His calculations may be imperfect, and the legislation may be inadequately drafted, and there may be many other far better solutions to the current state funding inadequacy, But I don't see them or hear about them.

I truly don't intend to sound mean spirited, but there's no other way I've thought of to present it; what's your plan, and why isn't your legislator introducing it? Or, look people in the eye and say, "There isn't a school funding problem and there isn't a property tax problem in Illinois."

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