Food Tax
The House bill to remove the food tax was amended (to make up municipal and county governments' revenues, through a .13 increase on non-food items) and passed the House 57-17. It now moves to the Senate.
The House floor debate can be heard here. After it had been stated that the bill would cause a "shift" in taxes and that not enough money would be left to fund other wants and needs, I made the points that the bill did cause a shift -- moving money from government coffers to people's pockets -- and that, if there isn't enough money now to cut taxes, there will never be enough money.
We'll see how the Senate feels about the issue.
The House floor debate can be heard here. After it had been stated that the bill would cause a "shift" in taxes and that not enough money would be left to fund other wants and needs, I made the points that the bill did cause a shift -- moving money from government coffers to people's pockets -- and that, if there isn't enough money now to cut taxes, there will never be enough money.
We'll see how the Senate feels about the issue.
posted by steve u. at 1/26/2006
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3 Comments:
Steve,
What do you think about the recent public lecture held in Utah by BYU Professor Steven E. Jones?
.
OK,I am going to correct the facts here. The floor amendment that passed on this bill did not increase the local option amounts by .13%. The original bill as introduced and approved in committee had those increases. The 1% local option was amended to 1.1% and the county local option was increased from .25% to .28%.
This was put into the original bill to hold counties, cities, and towns harmless for the reduction in their local option sales tax revenue.
The floor amendment was to modify the distribution method to actually accomplish the holding of these entities harmless. As I listened to the floor debate it was clear that many of the reps didn't understand that fact. Though to their defense it did seem strange to include the increase in the rate to hold harmless without actually providing a method. Obviously, cities that would be hurt the most from removing the sales tax on food might not be helped much by an increase in the tax on nonfood items. Take for instance a community that has 50% of its sales tax revenue from the tax on food. Removing the tax from food and slightly increasing the tax on everything else is not really going to help that community.
As for the actual amendment, are you aware that the provisions are nearly identical to SB 35? In fact there are some technical deficencies in SB 35 that are corrected by the language in HB 109. Do you have any comments on the prospects for SB 35 now that HB 109 has passed the house and is in the senate?
I also found the debate on this bill fasinating. Seemingly true republican fiscal conservatives arguing against this bill because then they will not have enough money to spend on some seemingly worthwhile projects.
I have to agree with what I read somewhere else. If I bought something at the store and the store owner agreed to accept a certain amount of money for that item but when I finished paying for it the store owner found that I had overpayed by about 10-15%, I would expect him to refund that amount back to me not keep it to make repairs or expand his business.
Did anyone ever explain why the cities and counties should be held harmless? What's so special about those revenue suckers??
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