California is sitting on a surplus, but don’t expect a refund
By Judy Lin | Jan. 10, 2018 | ECONOMY, POLITICS
It should be said that California’s resistance began before there was a resistance.
When Gov. Jerry Brown unveiled his last budget Wednesday, it bookended eight years of a progressive march to reduce greenhouse gases, expand health care, grant more rights to undocumented immigrants and raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. Along the way, blue state voters have assented by passing temporary taxes on the rich—not once, but twice. The top marginal income tax rate is now 13.3 percent, the highest state income tax rate in the country.
In short, policies that are now labeled acts of resistance to President Donald Trump were alive and ascendant in California long before he won the White House. But the contrasts have become much more stark. Instead of cutting taxes, the Democratic governor and his party’s legislative leaders have passed a gas tax to help pay for aging infrastructure. Instead of trying to shift government out of the healthcare marketplace, California is looking for a way to fund single-payer health care, including coverage for undocumented immigrants. Instead of criminalizing pot, the state is looking forward to collecting taxes on marijuana sales.
In the months between now and the June deadline for a final budget, the governor and the Legislature will hammer out details. The focus this year: what to do with an expected surplus of $6.1 billion. Republicans say return it to California’s 40 million residents as a nice tax refund. The governor’s priority is to fill up the state’s rainy day fund. Democratic legislators mostly want to spend it.
“We have a very different approach,” said Assemblyman Phil Ting, the San Francisco Democrat who chairs the Assembly Budget Committee. “Our focus, the people who we think need tax relief, are the working Californians who are making less than $25,000. That’s where we want to spend our money, making sure they have money to pay rent, to pay for food.”
Rather than giving out “huge corporate tax breaks and a huge tax break for the wealthiest in this country,” Ting has a long list of how he would like to spend that extra money, including:
entire article:
https://calmatters.org/articles/california-sitting-surplus-dont-expect-refund/
By Judy Lin | Jan. 10, 2018 | ECONOMY, POLITICS
It should be said that California’s resistance began before there was a resistance.
When Gov. Jerry Brown unveiled his last budget Wednesday, it bookended eight years of a progressive march to reduce greenhouse gases, expand health care, grant more rights to undocumented immigrants and raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. Along the way, blue state voters have assented by passing temporary taxes on the rich—not once, but twice. The top marginal income tax rate is now 13.3 percent, the highest state income tax rate in the country.
In short, policies that are now labeled acts of resistance to President Donald Trump were alive and ascendant in California long before he won the White House. But the contrasts have become much more stark. Instead of cutting taxes, the Democratic governor and his party’s legislative leaders have passed a gas tax to help pay for aging infrastructure. Instead of trying to shift government out of the healthcare marketplace, California is looking for a way to fund single-payer health care, including coverage for undocumented immigrants. Instead of criminalizing pot, the state is looking forward to collecting taxes on marijuana sales.
In the months between now and the June deadline for a final budget, the governor and the Legislature will hammer out details. The focus this year: what to do with an expected surplus of $6.1 billion. Republicans say return it to California’s 40 million residents as a nice tax refund. The governor’s priority is to fill up the state’s rainy day fund. Democratic legislators mostly want to spend it.
“We have a very different approach,” said Assemblyman Phil Ting, the San Francisco Democrat who chairs the Assembly Budget Committee. “Our focus, the people who we think need tax relief, are the working Californians who are making less than $25,000. That’s where we want to spend our money, making sure they have money to pay rent, to pay for food.”
Rather than giving out “huge corporate tax breaks and a huge tax break for the wealthiest in this country,” Ting has a long list of how he would like to spend that extra money, including:
- Increase the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit, which puts money into the hands of the working poor
- Expand Medi-Cal health care for poorer Californians to cover all remaining uninsured residents, mostly undocumented immigrants
- Expand early education for 4-year-olds through preschool and transitional kindergarten programs
- Increase college aid
- Expand mental and social services to reduce the number of criminals who go on to re-offend
entire article:
https://calmatters.org/articles/california-sitting-surplus-dont-expect-refund/
