Last week, Gov. Scott Walker said he is interested in the possibility of eliminating Wisconsin’s state income tax and raising the sales tax to make up for the lost revenue. As noted by the Wisconsin Budget Project, eliminating the state income tax and raising the sales tax would result in a tax increase for all but the wealthiest taxpayers.
To replace the revenue lost by the income tax, the state sales tax rate would need to be raised to 13.5%, giving Wisconsin the highest state sales tax rate in the nation.
The tax shift endorsed by Governor Walker would mean the bottom 80% of taxpayers would be paying more in taxes – some of them, a lot more. For example, a taxpayer in the lowest 20% by income would pay nearly $750 more in taxes, on average. Taxpayers in the top 1% — a group with an average income of $1.1 million – would receive a tax cut averaging nearly $44,000.
Here’s a graph outlining how eliminating the state income tax and raising the sales tax would lower taxes on the top 20% of income earners in Wisconsin, while raising taxes on everyone else.
Nothing surprising with this. Over the past three decades the Federal and State tax burdens have been increasingly shifted away from the wealthy and businesses and onto lower and middle income citizens, via one sleight of hand after another – always disguised as “tax cuts” of some sort. This is just more of the same. Walker and all the rest of his ilk can be expected to continue promoting the larger agenda of the financial interests and the leisure class.
What’s even more interesting is how uncritically this was picked up by the state media. I would think it could easily get passed by this legislature so the lack of analysis into the effects of increased prices on regular Wisconsin families is troubling enough. That an obvious bit of election pandering would escape critical comment is astonishing.
Jane, it’s not surprising that the “real” media in Wisconsin hasn’t really picked up on the story, because the “real” media in Wisconsin is by and large a joke.
Not astonishing at all. Over the past three and a half decades the mainstream media have shifted so far to the right that any notion of fairness and balance is purely a myth. The truth is, thei pretty much spin the news to suit their owners and advertisers – most of whom belong to or at least aspire to the affluent classes. A joke indeed.
When the media in this state reports with increasing frequency on news that first appeared in blogs (as is happening with increasing frequency in WI), the media is clearly doing something wrong.