Taxation
This letter to the Projo, which links to righttax.org, makes a point worth hearing: In Rhode Island public schools are funded by a combination of state-supplied money and funding generated by cities and towns via property taxes. Unfortunately, in Rhode Island we rely too heavily on the property tax to fund our schools. The second…
Kudos to State Rep’s Carol Mumford (R, Scituate/Cranston) and Peter Kilmartin (D, Pawtucket) for today’s op-ed in the ProJo in which they propose raising the Rhode Island inheritance tax threshold from $675,000 to $1 million. Protection of assets acquired over a lifetime, coupled with a desire to leave the next generation a small inheritance, now…
The Heritage Foundation has done an analysis of the new House Budget crafted by the Democratic majority in Washington and concluded that it means higher taxes across the board. Their reasoning: The House leadership has proposed to increase spending over the next five years. Given the leadership’s avowed commitment to paying for spending increases, tax…
For those who missed Providence Mayor David Cicilline’s annual budget address last night, here’s the abbreviated version: We need to raise taxes on the rest of Rhode Island to provide more money for Providence. The Mayor essentially touted a plan to reduce property taxes while raising income taxes that has long been popular in progressive…
It’s worth noting, as an addendum to Andrew’s post, that the two metrics aren’t merely correlative. A substantial portion of the tax revenue goes toward those sorts of programs that attract poor people to the state (see, e.g., here, here, and here). In other words, the option is more likely to be “all of the…
The Providence Phoenix’s Brian C. Jones puts the idea that high taxes are driving people away from Rhode Island into the category of just-a-theory… There has been a growing conviction that high taxes drive people away from Rhode Island and deplete the lifeblood of the private economy. Whether the world really works that way is…
Warwick Sen. Michael McCaffrey has introduced (S 0159) legislation to lower the state sales tax from 7% to 6%. As McCaffrey points out, the 7% rate was originally put into place to help the state bailout from the credit union crisis in the 1990’s. Now that it has served its purpose–all of the money has…
To no one’s surprise, the various “advocates” who have taken up permanent residence at the State House pleaded with lawmakers to accept their solution to the budget shortfall: either raise taxes or stop any scheduled tax cuts: Freeze the so-called “tax-cut-for-the- rich” in its tracks before state government loses tens of millions of dollars. Halt…
Look, we all have bad days as bloggers. Some are worse than others. Matt Jerzyk of RI Future clearly steps over the line today…Today at 500pm there will be a big union rally sponsored by Council 94 AFSCME at Central Falls High School to oppose the privatization of school bus drivers expected to take place…
Every once in a while–usually somewhere within a long screed extolling the virtues of a more socialistic America–the rhetorical point has been brought up that politically Democratic states pay more taxes than politically Republican states (who, by extension, benefit by getting more tax dallars). Well, the Tax Foundation has done some deep digging and has…