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We need to support Progressive Taxation. A progressive tax structure that would provide enough money for the State to provide services for education, to help the disadvantaged, and for sufficient and proper public services to know we are secure in our commonwealth.
ReplyDeleteOur current tax structure is under attack, and has left us without resources in good times, and desparate in bad. The lowest wage earners pay approximately 11% to 12% in taxes, while the highest wage earnewrs pay 4 to 5%, in reverse of their ability to pay.
Platform Plank Proposal: - Newton #1
ReplyDeleteTopic: Taxation
Submitted by: Tim Snyder, Democrat, Newton
The state legislature should enact a program of progressive, state-wide land value taxation and use the funds to provide a per-capita floor of funding for local education.
In addition to the local property taxes on land and buildings which varies widely from town to town, the state should impose a modest (perhaps 1%) tax on the land portion of the property. This tax could be made progressive by exempting the first x dollars (e.g. $50,000). Every town already maintains assessments of each parcel of property broken down by land and building(s). The billing could be part of the local property tax. Each city or town would keep a portion of those revenues equal to a per capita rate times the number of school age children living there. Any excess collections would be sent to the state to distribute to cities or towns where the collections did not cover the per capita coverage.
This tax would not be subject to the geographic avoidance. Unlike the sales tax, where people can shop in NH or a tax on manufacturing plants where a company can move to a low tax haven elsewhere, the land cannot be moved. The value of the land is created by community expenditures on infrastructure, public safety and public services so taxing it would represent a modest return on public investment. Collecting 1% (with a large deductible) would be fairer than other forms of taxation where the value (income or capital gains) are privately produced.
This approach would relieve some of the pressure on property taxes and would encourage growth and development. It would also provide a stable floor of funding for public education that wouldn't be subject to the annual budget fluctuations at the state or local level.
Land value taxation has been implemented in many cities and towns in the US, Australia, and elsewhere around the world over the last hundred years. It has evolved from the ideas of American social philosopher Henry George (see www.henrygeorge.org).
EXAMPLE:
On a residential property where the lot is worth $100,000 and the house is worth $400,000 the tax would be assessed on the land portion less $50,000. One percent of fifty thousand would be $500. That would be equivalent to .1% of the total value of the property.