| I don't often agree with Strieff, but lets be honest, what the Senate Budget and Taxation committee has proposed is even less progressive than the Governor's plan. They started by eliminating combined reporting, which is something that should have overwhelming progressive and Democratic support. But it gets worse. Top-earning Marylanders and big businesses got a break yesterday when a Senate panel amended Gov. Martin O'Malley's revenue package by reducing top income tax rates and eliminating a measure designed to ensure that multi-state corporations pay taxes.
The Budget and Taxation Committee also voted to eliminate some of the breaks the governor had included for lower-income households and against O'Malley's proposal to reduce the state property tax by 3 cents per $100 over the next three years.
The panel moved to extend the state sales tax to include computer services, landscaping and arcade games, but not to other services recommended by O'Malley. And the governor's plan to tie the gas tax to increases in the cost of construction materials also failed in the committee. Well good for those top-earning Marylanders and big businesses. It appears their millions of dollars in campaign contributions and lobbyists have paid off. I also can't say I am happy with the preformance of several Montgomery County legislators, who seem to have lost a few of their liberal credentials. Another significant change to the governor's plan came in his proposal to make the state income tax more progressive. O'Malley called for a new bracket of 6 percent for individuals making more than $150,000 a year and couples making more than $200,000. A 6.5 percent bracket would kick in for all income above $500,000 a year.
But the plan approved by the Senate committee would reduce those top brackets to 5 percent and 5.5 percent. That change could help win the support of Montgomery County legislators.
"The sense is that our county may be disproportionately impacted by that, and unlike other parts of the state, we sit across the river from Virginia and down the road from D.C.," said Del. Brian Feldman, the Democrat who chairs the Montgomery County delegation. I wonder if the Delegate considered that Mongomery already DISPROPORTIONATELY BENEFITS from government programs in Maryland? I suppose the wealth in Montgomery is just happenstance, and has little to do with well maintained infrastructure, quality public schools, etc. Furthermore, I highly doubt that Montgomery citizens would choose the DC or Fairfax school systems over their own. |
Either way, it seems that those with the money and time to visit Annapolis and grease palms are winning this session. Even the Governor's nominal income tax cuts for us dirty poor people, to offset the sales tax, gas tax, etc that we will be paying, were eliminated. I wonder if these cuts came to assure that those howling mad near-millionaires in Mongomery wouldn't have to suffer any sort of choice between eating all organic this week, or only half. Legislators are nearly falling over one another to accomodate the rich. When the Governor introduced his plan, I expected legislators to work to make it more progressive. They have done the exact opposite, and now we have an even more regressive tax package. |
