by Catherine Barrett | Jun 18, 2021 | Opinion
By Catherine Barrett |
David Cook is a Republican politician elected to serve in the Arizona House of Representatives from the 8th Legislative District. Representative Cook was elected to the State House in 2016 and represents central and eastern Pinal County and southern Gila County. He currently is in opposition to tax reform.
When alerted that a postcard campaign was taking place on Wednesday the 16th to encourage him to listen to the stories of hardworking Arizonans that need tax relief he did provide the following social media tweets (@RepDavidCook), “ …Yes – “we” the people- not any one person, one party, one county- “We the people” of Arizona. Those of us that are truly conservatives – saving the taxpayers – Billions (or trying to) and paying off those debts – not kicking them down the road – for future generations.” A public school teacher then asked, for him to support the flat income tax rate. Now, more than ever we need tax relief. He replied, “How much are your HOA fees a year?” The response, “Respectfully, we don’t have HOA fees, we have Biden penalties.” Silence
Arizonans need to call Representative David Cook (LD8) 602-926-5162 and voice your stories about how hardworking citizens need tax relief. Tax relief is any government program or policy initiative that is designed to reduce the amount of taxes paid by individuals or businesses. This is the time to return money to taxpayers, not leave it in the hands of the government.
Catherine Barrett, an Arizona Master Teacher, has been called “the bravest teacher advocate in the state” by educators and lawmakers. She holds Masters degree in Education and had been teaching for 19 years.
by azfreenews1 | Jun 16, 2021 | Opinion
By the Free Enterprise Club |
Republicans in the Arizona legislature are on the cusp of passing significant tax relief for hardworking families and small business. With historic levels of surplus cash sitting in the state coffers (over $4 billion for FY 2022 alone), returning this money to taxpayers makes sense. In fact, it would have already happened if not for two lone holdouts within the Republican caucus, claiming the $1.9B tax cut is just “too big.”
Are they right? Should the size of the tax package be reduced to avoid a funding cliff in the future?
For an answer to this criticism, it makes sense to examine current revenue projections being provided by the Joint Legislative Budget Committee (JLBC). For years JLBC has been relied upon as an independent source for revenue and budget projections by the state legislature. JLBC has never been accused of partisanship or of “cooking the books” to produce rosy budget scenarios. If anything, they have historically been too conservative in their figures, often because they don’t use dynamic modeling for their growth projections.
With this in mind, JLBC is projecting that by FY2024, baseline revenue for the state will be over $14.5 billion, a figure that has been growing with each month. For perspective, legislators were budgeting just shy of $11.1 billion in ongoing revenue prior to the pandemic—meaning that Arizona is expected to see a 31% increase in state revenue in four years.
Where is all this new revenue coming from? While a portion of this surplus is expected from economic growth, that is not the only source. Much of this new revenue is from a series of tax increases that continued to be ignored by opponents of the budget.
Remember the “monumental” new gaming compact Ducey signed in April—the one allowing for sports and fantasy sports betting? That is projected to rake in $300 million of new revenue annually by FY2024.
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by Goldwater Institute | Jun 13, 2021 | Opinion
By the Goldwater Institute |
With states still feeling the economic damage done by the COVID-19 pandemic, President Joe Biden signed the “American Rescue Plan Act” to give states billions of federal dollars to help them recover. But there’s a catch: The Act effectively prohibits states that take the money from cutting taxes through 2024. That’s unconstitutional—and the Goldwater Institute is joining one legal challenge to it.
Congress can sometimes put conditions on grants to states, but it can’t take advantage of an emergency to coerce states into giving up control of such an important issue of state policy, and it can’t impose a condition on a grant that has nothing to do with the grant’s purpose. That’s why many state attorneys general have filed federal lawsuits challenging this “Tax Mandate”—and it’s why the Goldwater Institute has filed a brief supporting the state of Ohio’s challenge.
THE TAX MANDATE
A provision in the Act says that states cannot use federal grant money to “directly or indirectly offset” a loss of revenue resulting from a tax cut enacted between March 2021 and the end of 2024. If they do, the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury will take the federal money back, up to the amount of revenue the state lost. That appears to mean that states that cut taxes between now and 2024 will have to pay back some or all their grant money.
The Tax Mandate’s defenders say this is just to make sure states actually use federal money for COVID relief. But the Tax Mandate doesn’t actually do that. The Act lists four broad categories of things a state can spend federal grant money on. After states spend the money, they have to report how they spent it to the Treasury Secretary. If the Secretary determines that a state spent money on something that doesn’t fall into one of those categories, she can take that money back.
So if a state receives a grant of, say, $5 billion, it has to show that it spent $5 billion on things the Act allows. If some things it reports weren’t appropriate uses of the money, the Secretary can recoup that portion of the grant. That alone ensures that states spend their federal grants for the purposes Congress intended.
The Tax Mandate, on the other hand, does not help ensure that states spend their grant money properly. Instead, it focuses on whether a state indirectly used federal funds to offset revenue lost as a result of tax cuts. That might make sense if the Act were otherwise designed to deny federal money to states that could afford to pay for their own COVID relief (if they put other policy priorities aside). But the Act doesn’t do that.
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by AZ Free News | Feb 18, 2021 | Economy, News
PHOENIX – On Wednesday, the House Ways and Means Committee approved legislation that revises Arizona tax structure for taxpayers and protects small business from over taxation by the federal government, without impacting the state general fund. The vote on HB 2838, sponsored by Rep. Joseph Chaplik, was divided along party lines.
In November 2020, the Internal Revenue Service issued guidance (Notice 2020-75) that pass-through entity businesses may claim deductions above the $10,000 State and Local Tax (SALT) cap. In response, at least seven states have imposed a new tax structure at the pass-through entity level permitting this deduction as intended by the federal government. Under HB 2838, Arizona would join those other states, providing small businesses significant potential tax savings.
“Small businesses are the backbone of the Arizona economy, and I will do everything in my power to protect them,” said Chaplik. “As Arizona businesses recover from an unprecedented economic downturn, I remain committed to providing them every opportunity to thrive in this challenging environment. HB 2838 frees up critical capital for business owners and doesn’t cost the state a dime in tax revenue.
“Republicans voted to help all businesses with tax relief without negatively impacting our state revenues. Democrats voted ‘no’ and are not willing to help their businesses in their districts,” claimed Chaplik.
All 31 members of the House Republican Caucus have signed their support for HB 2838. It will next be considered by the whole House.
