Wichita Eagle: Food Sales Tax Adds Up
media mentionBrownback and the Legislature raised the sales tax rate to help fill a large revenue shortfall created by the 2012 state income tax cuts, which included eliminating income taxes on about 330,000 owners of limited liability companies and Subchapter S corporations. Though a number of lawmakers argued this past session that the business exemption was unfair, Brownback threatened to veto any change to the law.
As a result, the tax burden shifted even more to lower-income Kansans. In fact, the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy calculated that the bottom 40 percent of Kansans are paying more in taxes now than they did before the 2012 tax cuts.