July 3, 2014

Tucson Weekly: Shifty Proposal

media mention

 

In other words, cutting the income tax helps those at the top way more than it helps the other 85 percent of taxpayers, who barely pay any income tax at all.
But people at the lower end of the income ladder do pay plenty in sales tax, gas taxes, sin taxes and a variety of other taxes and fees that keep state and local governments running. And those taxes are considered regressive; as the 2013 Who Pays report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy explains, “because spending as a share of income falls as income rises, sales taxes inevitably take a larger share of income from low- and middle-class families than they take from the rich.”
The Who Pays report concludes that rely more heavily on sales taxes than income taxes derive a greater percentage of revenue from poor and middle-class than states that rely more heavily on income taxes. Conversely, states that rely heavily on income taxes and have low sales taxes tend to be the least regressive in the country.
Of the top 10 most regressive states, five of them are among the states that Ducey and Bennett tout as models because they have no income tax.

In other words, cutting the income tax helps those at the top way more than it helps the other 85 percent of taxpayers, who barely pay any income tax at all.

But people at the lower end of the income ladder do pay plenty in sales tax, gas taxes, sin taxes and a variety of other taxes and fees that keep state and local governments running. And those taxes are considered regressive; as the 2013 Who Pays report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy explains, “because spending as a share of income falls as income rises, sales taxes inevitably take a larger share of income from low- and middle-class families than they take from the rich.”

The Who Pays report concludes that rely more heavily on sales taxes than income taxes derive a greater percentage of revenue from poor and middle-class than states that rely more heavily on income taxes. Conversely, states that rely heavily on income taxes and have low sales taxes tend to be the least regressive in the country.

Of the top 10 most regressive states, five of them are among the states that Ducey and Bennett tout as models because they have no income tax.

 

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