 |
Post Office Box 1147
▪
Marblehead, Massachusetts 01945
▪ (781) 639-9709
“Every Tax is a Pay Cut ... A Tax Cut is a Pay Raise”
47 years as “The Voice of Massachusetts Taxpayers”
— and
their Institutional Memory — |
|
CLT UPDATE
Monday, April 5, 2021
"Millionaires" Grad
Tax Would Hit Middle-Class Retirees
Jump directly
to CLT's Commentary on the News
|
Most Relevant News Excerpts
(Full news reports follow Commentary)
|
|
A new
study from the Pioneer Institute says the so-called
“millionaires tax” that’s regularly discussed on Beacon Hill
wouldn’t just dip into the pockets of the wealthiest few,
but would also nail middle-class people cashing out for
retirement.
“Despite its purported goal of taxing only the uber-rich,
the graduated income tax would fail to protect people of
more modest means from overtaxation on one-time
windfalls,” wrote study authors Greg Sullivan & Andrew
Mikula. “It has the ability to push those with
significant capital gains and valuable asset sales into
higher tax brackets, punishing owners of retirement nest
eggs and desirable real estate. In practice, these
‘one-time millionaires,’ who cash in on a lifetime of
work and sacrifice in anticipation of retirement,
out-number those who consistently have seven-figure
salaries or stock market windfalls.” ...
The graduated income tax proposal — dubbed the
millionaires tax” or the “fair share amendment” — would
slap an additional 4% income tax on annual income over
$1 million.
The Boston Herald
Thursday, April 1, 2021
Study says Massachusetts ‘millionaires
tax’ wouldn’t just hit the mega-rich
By Sean Philip Cotter
In recent decades, Massachusetts policymakers have
worked hard to shed the “Taxachusetts” label that
plagued the Commonwealth into the 1990s. Once at 6.25
percent, the state income tax had fallen to 5 percent by
2020, while corporate tax rates have been flat.
Massachusetts tax policy has prioritized stability and
predictability so far in the 21st century. But since
2015, a graduated income tax proposal has sought to
undermine those priorities under the guise of a “fair”
tax only on the super-wealthy.
Despite its purported goal of taxing only the uber-rich,
the graduated income tax would fail to protect people of
more modest means from overtaxation on one-time
windfalls. It has the ability to push those with
significant capital gains and valuable asset sales into
higher tax brackets, punishing owners of retirement nest
eggs and desirable real estate. In practice, these
“one-time millionaires,” who cash in on a lifetime of
work and sacrifice in anticipation of retirement,
outnumber those who consistently have seven-figure
salaries or stock market windfalls.
Further, because of the tax treatment of pass-through
business income, many of these “onetime millionaires”
could be small business owners still reeling from the
economic effects of COVID-19. Now, in the midst of the
pandemic and its potentially devastating aftermath, is
not the time to burden small business owners, the core
of the state’s economy....
To understand who exactly would be affected by the
so-called “Fair Share” tax proposed by the legislature
at the behest of the MTA and the SEIU [Massachusetts
Teachers Association and the Service Employees
International Union], it is critical to ascertain how
often so-called “millionaires” earn $1 million or more
in a year. Fortunately, the Tax Foundation’s data on the
persistence of millionaires allows us to do just that.
According to the Tax Foundation’s “Income Mobility and
the Persistence of Millionaires, 1999 to 2007,” fully
half of U.S. taxpayers who reported gross annual income
of $1 million or more at least once over a nine-year
period did so only once. Nearly two-thirds did so two or
fewer times, and almost three-quarters did so three or
fewer times. Fewer than 20 percent did so in a majority
of the nine years and fewer than 6 percent earned $1
million or more every year.
This data exposes a potential vulnerability of the
proposed graduated income tax, showing it to be more of
a “retirement tax,” as many people rely on recouping the
value from home equity or a stake in a business to pay
for their retirement. In fact, Massachusetts displays
the very same concentration of “one-time millionaires.”
In the Commonwealth, 46 percent of households with
incomes over $1 million did so only once in 10 years and
fully 60 percent did so twice or less in the 10-year
period ended in 2017 (see Figure 2).
This data alone does not prove that many “millionaires”
are retirees, or whether those who are using the income
to pay for retirement try to avoid taxes on that income.
However, other IRS data shows that after similar
graduated income tax levies passed in other states,
out-migration exploded among people of retirement age.
The so-called “Fair Share” tax would apply to — and
dampen the retirement plans of — a significant number of
people who worked a lifetime and who are not consistent
millionaires....
Pioneer Institute
The Graduated Income Tax Trap: A
retirement tax on small business owners
April 1, 2021
The welfare-industrial complex has a very simple theory
about why they’re finally going to pass the graduated
income tax in Massachusetts next year: They believe that
after 60 years, they have at last succeeded in dumbing
down the state electorate to the point that a majority
will actually vote against their own best interests — to
impoverish themselves.
Sadly, the hacks are probably correct.
This time around, the soak-the-middle-class scheme has
been rebranded as a “millionaires tax,” because
supposedly only taxpayers who will have their state
income taxes jacked up from 5% to 9% a year are those
making over a million dollars a year.
And the extra billions, which will only come from people
making a lot more money than you, will go to really
worthy projects, like “infrastructure” and education —
“for the children,” don’t you know.
Wink wink, nudge nudge....
That ignorance is what the hackerama is banking on. They
think at least 50%-plus one of the state’s voters are in
fact that feeble-minded. And the evidence backs them up.
The non-working classes have been diligently attempting
to impose this graduated-income tax on the commonwealth
since 1962. Consider the declining results for the
productive classes.
In 1962, the same year that a Massachusetts native, JFK,
pushed through a federal tax cut by pointing out that “a
rising tide lifts all boats,” his home-state
constituents rejected the proposed state tax increase,
83-17.
In 1968 the hacks tried again — 70% voted thumbs down.
In 1972, even as Massachusetts was the only state to
vote for acid, amnesty and abortion, 67% said no new
taxes.
In 1976, the payroll patriots tried again. No — 73%.
In 1994 — the taxpaying majority (64.6%) once more voted
no.
In 2018, the hackerama tried to put the Trojan horse
back on the ballot via some back-door maneuver. But the
Supreme Judicial Court, hardly a bulwark against lunacy
of any sort, told Beacon Hill to forget about it.
For those of you keeping score at home, that makes the
hackerama 0-6. But like an antibiotic-resistant STD, the
graduated-income tax is baaaaaaack again, one
legislative vote away from being back on the ballot in
2022.
The Pioneer Institute put out a new study last week,
stressing the obvious: “’Millionaires’ tax’ wouldn’t
just hit the mega-rich.’”
But is anyone paying attention anymore? That’s the
problem....
Of course, should the hacks finally win on their seventh
try, we will be told that the new, higher tax rate is
“settled law,” and should never, ever be tampered with
again by anything so unseemly as a repeal effort.
And even if the electorate did eventually vote to
repeal, the legislature would probably ignore it.
Remember Mike Dukakis’ “temporary” income tax increase
of 1989? By 2000, the voters repealed the “temporary”
law in a landslide, 60-40, but the rate didn’t go back
down to 5% until 30 years after its “temporary”
enactment....
If you’ve always dreamed of being a millionaire, just
vote for the “millionaires tax,” because by 2024 at the
latest, you will indeed be a millionaire — at least for
Massachusetts tax purposes. Once the graduated income
tax is on the books, they can pick off everybody who
works for a living, one income quintile at a time.
There’s an old saying: “Don’t tax you, don’t tax me. Tax
that guy behind the tree.”
In Maskachusetts in 2023, that guy behind the tree will
run away. Then the tree itself will be chopped down.
Then anyone who can’t run away will be chopped down, and
fed into an economic wood chipper.
That is the one promise the hacks will keep —
guaranteed.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, April 3, 2021
Massachusetts electorate’s ignorance
might just get ‘millionaires tax’ passed
By Howie Carr
Department of Revenue is expected to announce March tax
collections [on Monday]. DOR expects that it will
collect $2.413 billion in taxes in March, which would be
a drop of $246 million from March 2020, but actual
collections have been shattering the agency's benchmarks
in recent months....
Now eight months through fiscal year 2021, Massachusetts
state government has collected $19.527 billion in taxes
from people and businesses, which is $1.123 billion or
6.1 percent more than it did during the same eight
pre-pandemic months of fiscal year 2020....
DOR considers March a "mid-size month" for tax
collections, usually ranking sixth out of the 12 months.
Through March 15, DOR had already collected $1.689
billion, which is up $107 million or 6.7 percent
compared to the same half month period in March 2020.
State House News Service
Friday, April 2, 2021
Advances - Week of April 4, 2021
One of the great puzzles of the past year is that the
world was devastated by a plague and Massachusetts tax
revenues were...pretty much OK. Month after month, the
state is collecting far more money than expected,
dissolving initial fears of a multi-billion dollar
deficit and leading to a new realization that state
finances are relatively healthy.
This remarkable turn-of-events raises two fundamental
questions. First, how have state tax revenues held up so
well amid the lockdowns, joblessness, and main street
woes? Second, should experts and policy wonks have
foreseen this surprising outcome? ...
Between April and June, the state did experience a
sizable drop in tax revenue.
But an unexpected thing happened when spring turned to
summer and the state's new fiscal year (FY 2021) began.
Monthly reports from the Department of Revenue started
showing relatively healthy-looking tax collections. And
far from a temporary blip, that overperformance has
continued right up to the present.
As of the end of February, Massachusetts is on pace to
collect $31.5 billion, vastly more tax revenue than
expected — indeed, more than we were collecting before
the pandemic struck.
Why did tax revenues remain strong? ...
Between stimulus checks, PPP loans, bailouts for
hard-hit sectors, public health spending, and a host of
other cash infusions, federal aid has helped sustain
people's incomes and encourage spending. And in that
way, it also bolstered the state tax system.
Consider the state income tax. For tax purposes,
unemployment benefits generally count as income, just
like a paycheck. So when the federal government
introduced expanded unemployment insurance — with many
laid-off workers receiving more money in benefits than
they ever received from their jobs — that raised state
income tax receipts. (More recently, the state has
decided to refund some of these taxes paid on
unemployment benefits — not least because other revenue
streams are returning.)
Or, think about what people do when they get money from
the federal government, be it through unemployment
benefits, direct stimulus checks, or a paycheck
backstopped by PPP loans. They turn around and spend
some of that money at local grocery stores and online
marketplaces, which generates sales tax for
Massachusetts....
Why couldn't we foresee it? ...
Trouble is, the early pessimism wasn't just wrong but
enduringly so. It was a stake we had put in the ground,
and even when monthly updates showed surprisingly strong
tax revenues, we still felt tied to that stake.
Perhaps the best example is the notion — heard echoing
through the virtual corridors of the State House last
fall — that the real challenge was going to be next year
(FY22). We had predicted a catastrophe; and if tax
collections didn't actually look catastrophic, that only
proved the real emergency was still out there somewhere,
waiting to derail us....
Pretty soon, last year's deficit fears will seem like
ancient history. But when economic uncertainty returns,
as we all know it will, I hope we remember some of the
lessons of this pandemic year: keep an eye on the feds;
slow the process down; don't expect the next recession
to look like the last one.
But I also hope that forecasters — myself included — are
quicker to incorporate new information and more ready to
regularly share their shifting sense of what's going on.
CommonWealth Magazine
Sunday, April 4, 2021
Why tax forecasts during COVID
have been so wrong
The heating oil industry is fired up about a proposal to
take away energy-efficiency rebates from its customers
as part of a state-led effort to wean homeowners off
fossil fuels.
At issue are priorities endorsed March 24 by the Energy
Efficiency Advisory Council that include phasing out
Mass Save rebates for new oil-fired systems for heat and
hot water, as well as no-interest loans for homeowners
to install them, as soon as January. Rebates for natural
gas-fired and propane installations would be ratcheted
back significantly.
“It’s simply not fair,” said Michael Ferrante, president
of the Massachusetts Energy Marketers Association. “I
wouldn’t say it’s going to cripple the industry. But
it’s going to hurt us. And it’s going to hurt heating
oil customers.”
The proposal from the council, which is chaired by the
state energy resources commissioner, follows
recommendations issued by the Baker administration in
December for Massachusetts to reach “net-zero” carbon
emissions by 2050. The changes also line up with
aggressive goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that
were included in a sweeping climate law passed by the
Legislature and signed by Governor Charlie Baker last
week. One provision allows municipalities to adopt
net-zero building codes for new construction, which
could effectively block fossil-fuel hookups in future
projects.
Significant changes in how buildings are heated will be
needed if Massachusetts is to reach its 2050 emissions
goal. State officials and environmentalists hope to
encourage the use of electric heat pumps in homes and
discourage fossil fuels. The ramifications could be huge
for the 700,000-plus homeowners in the state who use
heating oil — as well as for the companies that serve
them.
Massachusetts electricity rates, meanwhile, are among
the highest in the United States, nearly double the
national average....
Ending oil rebates is one of many proposed changes to
the Mass Save program, which is regulated by the state
and funded by surcharges on electricity and natural gas
bills. They will now be used by the state’s major
electric and natural gas utilities as they formulate a
plan for the next three years, with an eye toward
incorporating climate benefits.
The Boston Globe
Thursday, April 1, 2021
‘It’s going to hurt us’: Heating oil
industry fights effort to eliminate state’s rebates
Mass Save’s popular incentives, including no-interest
loans, could end in January
[Connecticut] Gov. Ned Lamont was warmly greeted by
Mayor Erin Stewart, the Republican who recently
announced she would not challenge Lamont for governor in
2021. On Tuesday, they had common cause — if only to a
point.
Stewart agreed to appear outside a gleaming new
apartment building constructed on a city lot that she
says was unmarketable until the construction across the
street of CTfastrak, the busway much maligned in GOP
circles.
The Republican mayor and Democratic governor each are
boosters of transit-oriented development, a popular and
politically safe approach to creating cities that are
less reliant on gasoline-powered vehicles, the largest
single source of greenhouse gases in Connecticut.
But Lamont has gone a giant step further by signing onto
a regional Transportation and Climate Initiative as a
way to reduce greenhouse gases and raise money for
transit — a concept bitterly opposed by many leaders of
Stewart’s GOP.
In promoting TCI, as the initiative is known, the Lamont
administration is working to succeed where it failed
horribly two years ago in seeking support for highway
tolls as a means to modernize Connecticut’s creaky
infrastructure....
Stewart kept her distance from TCI, which is opposed by
the leaders of the House and Senate Republican
minorities in the General Assembly....
TCI is a cap-and-invest program and will bring revenue
into the state – an estimated $89 million in 2023,
increasing to as much as $117 million in 2032.
Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, the three
states responsible for 73% of transportation emissions
in New England, have signed a memorandum of
understanding committing to the initiative.
Legislation is necessary to go forward, and the
legislature’s Environment Committee is expected to vote
on the plan Wednesday. It is opposed by the trucking
industry and fuel marketers as an added cost to
businesses and consumers....
In public-hearing testimony this month, House Minority
Leader Vincent J. Candelora, R-North Branford, opposed
the initiative as an added cost, but he also said it
appeared that once created, TCI’s costs would have no
legislative oversight.
“Considering that the average American is struggling to
stay afloat due to the economic effects of the COVID-19
pandemic, now is not the proper time to be pursuing this
policy,” Candelora told the committee.
Senate Minority Leader Kevin Kelly of Stratford and his
deputy, Sen. Paul Formica of East Lyme, submitted joint
testimony casting themselves as committed to clean air,
if unwilling to endorse higher costs on gasoline brought
by Senate Bill 884, the TCI measure.
“We share that goal of cleaner air,” they said.
“However, we must protect middle class families’ wallets
in the process, and Senate Bill 884 does not protect
middle class families’ wallets.”
On Tuesday, Kelly said Republicans could achieve the
same goals without any added costs.
“The reality for Connecticut middle-class families is
that purchasing gasoline and food is still a necessity
and increasing taxes on both is extremely regressive,”
Kelly said. “It’s also misleading to suggest that the
TCI gas tax will lead to cleaner air in Connecticut as
states to our west are not moving forward with their own
clean air reforms.”
The Connecticut Mirror
Tuesday, March 30, 2021
Opposed by GOP, Lamont campaigns for
climate initiative
Desperate Democrats led by Attorney General Maura Healey
are flailing away at a weakened Gov. Charlie Baker in
hopes of taking back the Corner Office in 2022 for the
first time in eight years. Whether it’s working is
questionable.
Healey, flush with campaign cash and popularity within
the party, is directing a multipronged, not-so-stealth
gubernatorial campaign — ripping Baker on everything
from coronavirus vaccine delivery to opioids even though
the governor is undecided on running for a third term.
Baker is not even a cinch to win his own party’s
primary. Conservatives — including the Republican
party’s own chairman — have publicly challenged him on
moving too far liberal for their liking.
Baker’s popularity has taken a hit, according to the
most recent polling, as critics have pounced on the
state’s rocky early rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine and
failing to prioritize some vulnerable populations.
But Democrats take him for granted at their own peril.
He’s still more popular than Democratic statewide
elected officials and would have the bully pulpit of the
governor’s office throughout the 2022 campaign.
If Baker decides not to run for a third term, his
lieutenant governor, Karyn Polito, would be the early
favorite though she would likely face a stiff challenge
from the conservative wing of the party. Former state
lawmaker and failed U.S. Senate candidate Geoff Diehl is
considering a gubernatorial campaign.
On the Democratic side, Healey is clearly the party’s
first choice to eject Republicans from the governor’s
office, though other Democrats led by Somerville Mayor
Joseph Curtatone, Harvard professor Danielle Allen and
former state Sen. Ben Downing are also plotting
campaigns.
The attorney general has been crisscrossing the state —
using her publicly funded office by the way — in a
campaign-like tour of heavily Democratic areas like
Brockton and Worcester.
The Boston Herald
Monday, March 29, 2021
Desperate Democrats led by Maura
Healey flailing away at weakened Charlie Baker
No one misses Donald Trump more than Maura Healey.
Because with Trump gone, she has no one to sue.
Attorney General Healey, 50, a progressive Democrat,
sued Donald Trump close to 50 times during his four
years as president, and a made a big deal out of it each
time.
Now she is complaining about three lawsuits Republican
attorneys general have filed against President Joe
Biden, including challenging Biden’s failed immigration
policy as well as his shutting down the Keystone XL
pipeline that threw thousands out of work.
Healey, who spent the past four years trashing Trump and
his agenda, said, “Donald Trump may be out of the White
House, but Republican attorneys general across the
country are still doing his bidding and conspiring to
block President Biden’s agenda at every turn.” ...
While there is no public estimate of how much taxpayer
money Healey spent on her lawsuits against Trump — most
of which went nowhere — Healey gained a lot of publicity
for “standing up” to Trump.
Surely it would be wickedly unfashionable in the woke
world of progressives if Healey filed suit against Biden
even though he is ultimately responsible — just as Trump
was — for the sad plight, even death, of immigrant
children led to the border and abandoned by Mexican
traffickers.
But odds of the Democrat attorney general filing suit
against the Democrat president range from nil to none.
But with Trump gone as her main political target, Healey
has redirected her attention toward Gov. Baker, using
Baker’s distribution of the COVID-19 as a thin veil to
go after him. Charlie Baker has become her Donald
Trump....
The Boston Herald
Thursday, April 1, 2021
With Trump gone, Maura Healey turns ire
on Baker
By Peter Lucas
A deeply Democratic district stayed Democratic on
Tuesday — but it’s a lot less left wing than it was.
The successor to former House Speaker Robert DeLeo
(D-Winthrop) in the Massachusetts House of
Representatives will be former Winthrop town council
president Jeff Turco. The Democrat had no problem
winning the Tuesday, March 30 special general election
triggered by DeLeo’s December 2020 resignation to take a
job teaching about legislation and public policy at
Northeastern University. The seat has been vacant since
then.
The self-described “moderate” Turco trounced his two
opponents, Paul Caruccio, a Republican, of Winthrop, and
Winthrop resident Richard Fucillo, an unenrolled
candidate. Turco got 57.3 percent of the vote (1,861
votes) while Caruccio got 14.3 percent (466 votes) and
Fucillo got 14.6 percent (473 votes), according to
multiple reports....
Turco was the subject of controversy during the primary
for some of his conservative leanings.
Turco has said in the past that he voted for former
President Donald Trump in 2016. He gave money to U.S.
Senator Susan Collins (R-Maine) in 2020. He has
expressed opposition to abortion. He also has criticized
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) and
former President Barack Obama.
In response to his primary win four weeks ago, Planned
Parenthood Advocacy Fund of Massachusetts said it will
help run someone against Turco in 2022.
“Jeff Turco is dangerous and has no place on Beacon
Hill,” the fund tweeted. “And if he wins, we’ll be there
in 2022 to primary him and elect a candidate who will
champion the sexual and reproductive rights of their
community.”
The New Boston Post
Tuesday, March 30, 2021
Conservative Democrat Jeff Turco Easily
Wins State Rep Seat in Winthrop and Revere
A year ago, when it became clear the coronavirus was a
major threat to public health, Gov. Charlie Baker
declared a state of emergency and took charge by using
the executive authority of his position. He ordered
businesses shut down, schools closed and dictated mask
mandates, limits on the size of gatherings and dozens of
other restrictions on daily life and business.
The power Baker wielded – and still uses – came by way
of the 1950 Civil Defense Act, allowing him to issue
executive orders without legislative approval during a
state of emergency. And it was, without a doubt, an
emergency....
State Sen. Diana DiZoglio, D-Methuen, is one lawmaker
behind bills filed to limit the governor’s reach. She
said recently she believes the Legislature needs to
exercise oversight or review of executive orders in a
reasonable period of time.
“This is not a dictatorship,” DiZoglio told State House
News Service. “The governor has taken a top-down,
authoritative approach to the COVID-19 response and as a
result many residents have not been heard. It’s too much
for any one person and one administration to handle when
dealing with emergencies of this scale and length.”
DiZoglio is proposing a 60-day limit on the governor’s
emergency orders, requiring him to go before the House
and Senate for extensions. The Civil Defense Act doesn’t
require any such review or impose a time limit.
On the House side, Rep. Nick Boldyga, R-Southwick, filed
a bill similar to what DiZoglio proposes that would
impose a 30-day sunset on emergency orders and mandates.
Boldyga’s bill would give state courts jurisdiction to
hear cases challenging state and local emergency
orders....
The question of limiting a governor’s power during a
state of emergency isn’t unique to Massachusetts. Dozens
of state legislatures have filed more than 200 bills and
resolutions to scale back, restrict or provide more
oversight over their governors’ power during the
pandemic.
Here in the Bay State, it’s past time for the
Legislature to act in this pandemic and that means
curtailing the governor’s emergency power before they’re
needed again.
A Salem News editorial
Wednesday, March 31, 2021
Time to rein in the governor's power |
Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
The big news this week for taxpayers
— and voters —
arrived on Thursday in a
new study
released by the Pioneer Institute on the effects of a graduated income
tax in Massachusetts, the proposed constitutional amendment called "The
Fair Share Amendment" or "Millionaires Tax. The Boston Herald
reported on Thursday ("Study says
Massachusetts ‘millionaires tax’ wouldn’t just hit the mega-rich"):
A new
study from the Pioneer Institute says the so-called
“millionaires tax” that’s regularly discussed on Beacon Hill
wouldn’t just dip into the pockets of the wealthiest few,
but would also nail middle-class people cashing out for
retirement.
“Despite its purported goal of taxing
only the uber-rich, the graduated income tax would fail to
protect people of more modest means from overtaxation on
one-time windfalls,” wrote study authors Greg Sullivan &
Andrew Mikula. “It has the ability to push those with
significant capital gains and valuable asset sales into
higher tax brackets, punishing owners of retirement nest
eggs and desirable real estate. In practice, these ‘one-time
millionaires,’ who cash in on a lifetime of work and
sacrifice in anticipation of retirement, out-number those
who consistently have seven-figure salaries or stock market
windfalls.” ...
The graduated income tax proposal —
dubbed the millionaires tax” or the “fair share amendment” —
would slap an additional 4% income tax on annual income over
$1 million.
Excerpts from Pioneer Institute study, "The
Graduated Income Tax Trap: A retirement tax on small business
owners," revealed:
In recent decades, Massachusetts
policymakers have worked hard to shed the “Taxachusetts”
label that plagued the Commonwealth into the 1990s. Once at
6.25 percent, the state income tax had fallen to 5 percent
by 2020, while corporate tax rates have been flat.
Massachusetts tax policy has prioritized stability and
predictability so far in the 21st century. But since 2015, a
graduated income tax proposal has sought to undermine those
priorities under the guise of a “fair” tax only on the
super-wealthy.
Despite its purported goal of taxing
only the uber-rich, the graduated income tax would fail to
protect people of more modest means from overtaxation on
one-time windfalls. It has the ability to push those with
significant capital gains and valuable asset sales into
higher tax brackets, punishing owners of retirement nest
eggs and desirable real estate. In practice, these “one-time
millionaires,” who cash in on a lifetime of work and
sacrifice in anticipation of retirement, outnumber those who
consistently have seven-figure salaries or stock market
windfalls.
Further, because of the tax treatment
of pass-through business income, many of these “onetime
millionaires” could be small business owners still reeling
from the economic effects of COVID-19. Now, in the midst of
the pandemic and its potentially devastating aftermath, is
not the time to burden small business owners, the core of
the state’s economy....
To understand who exactly would be
affected by the so-called “Fair Share” tax proposed by the
legislature at the behest of the MTA and the SEIU
[Massachusetts Teachers Association and the Service
Employees International Union], it is critical to ascertain
how often so-called “millionaires” earn $1 million or more
in a year. Fortunately, the Tax Foundation’s data on the
persistence of millionaires allows us to do just that.
According to the Tax Foundation’s “Income Mobility and the
Persistence of Millionaires, 1999 to 2007,” fully half of
U.S. taxpayers who reported gross annual income of $1
million or more at least once over a nine-year period did so
only once. Nearly two-thirds did so two or fewer times, and
almost three-quarters did so three or fewer times. Fewer
than 20 percent did so in a majority of the nine years and
fewer than 6 percent earned $1 million or more every year.
This data exposes a potential
vulnerability of the proposed graduated income tax, showing
it to be more of a “retirement tax,” as many people rely on
recouping the value from home equity or a stake in a
business to pay for their retirement. In fact, Massachusetts
displays the very same concentration of “one-time
millionaires.” In the Commonwealth, 46 percent of households
with incomes over $1 million did so only once in 10 years
and fully 60 percent did so twice or less in the 10-year
period ended in 2017 (see Figure 2).
This data alone
does not prove that many “millionaires” are retirees, or
whether those who are using the income to pay for retirement
try to avoid taxes on that income. However, other IRS data
shows that after similar graduated income tax levies passed
in other states, out-migration exploded among people of
retirement age. The so-called “Fair Share” tax would apply
to — and dampen the retirement plans of — a significant
number of people who worked a lifetime and who are not
consistent millionaires....
This is a new insight, one I don't
recall having been considered before. The greatest number
of victims of this "millionaires" money grab will one-time road
kill, retirees and small-business owners checking out into
retirement, selling off their lifetime-accumulated assets.
The Takers' — the usual suspects,
the teachers' union and "Woke" leftist unions
— call this "fairness."
Of course this is and has always
been just another Trojan Horse intended to slip inside the
constitutional gate to eliminate the flat-tax, in which everyone
pays the same tax rate on all income; replace it with the
long-lusted for graduated income tax with different rates on
different income brackets.
Boston Herald columnist and WRKO
radio talk host Howie Carr has a different concern
— one which should concern all of
us today. In his column on Saturday ("Massachusetts
electorate’s ignorance might just get ‘millionaires tax’
passed") he wrote:
The welfare-industrial complex has a
very simple theory about why they’re finally going to pass
the graduated income tax in Massachusetts next year: They
believe that after 60 years, they have at last succeeded in
dumbing down the state electorate to the point that a
majority will actually vote against their own best interests
— to impoverish themselves.
Sadly, the hacks are probably correct.
This time around, the
soak-the-middle-class scheme has been rebranded as a
“millionaires tax,” because supposedly only taxpayers who
will have their state income taxes jacked up from 5% to 9% a
year are those making over a million dollars a year.
And the extra billions, which will only
come from people making a lot more money than you, will go
to really worthy projects, like “infrastructure” and
education — “for the children,” don’t you know.
Wink wink, nudge nudge....
That ignorance is what the hackerama is
banking on. They think at least 50%-plus one of the state’s
voters are in fact that feeble-minded. And the evidence
backs them up.
The non-working classes have been
diligently attempting to impose this graduated-income tax on
the commonwealth since 1962. Consider the declining results
for the productive classes.
In 1962, the same year that a
Massachusetts native, JFK, pushed through a federal tax cut
by pointing out that “a rising tide lifts all boats,” his
home-state constituents rejected the proposed state tax
increase, 83-17.
In 1968 the hacks tried again — 70%
voted thumbs down.
In 1972, even as Massachusetts was the
only state to vote for acid, amnesty and abortion, 67% said
no new taxes.
In 1976, the payroll patriots tried
again. No — 73%.
In 1994 — the taxpaying majority
(64.6%) once more voted no.
In 2018, the hackerama tried to put the
Trojan horse back on the ballot via some back-door maneuver.
But the Supreme Judicial Court, hardly a bulwark against
lunacy of any sort, told Beacon Hill to forget about it.
For those of you keeping score at home,
that makes the hackerama 0-6. But like an
antibiotic-resistant STD, the graduated-income tax is
baaaaaaack again, one legislative vote away from being back
on the ballot in 2022.
The Pioneer Institute put out a new
study last week, stressing the obvious: “’Millionaires’ tax’
wouldn’t just hit the mega-rich.’”
But is anyone paying attention anymore?
That’s the problem....
Of course, should the hacks finally win
on their seventh try, we will be told that the new, higher
tax rate is “settled law,” and should never, ever be
tampered with again by anything so unseemly as a repeal
effort.
And even if the electorate did
eventually vote to repeal, the legislature would probably
ignore it. Remember Mike Dukakis’ “temporary” income tax
increase of 1989? By 2000, the voters repealed the
“temporary” law in a landslide, 60-40, but the rate didn’t
go back down to 5% until 30 years after its “temporary”
enactment....
If you’ve always dreamed of being a
millionaire, just vote for the “millionaires tax,” because
by 2024 at the latest, you will indeed be a millionaire — at
least for Massachusetts tax purposes. Once the graduated
income tax is on the books, they can pick off everybody who
works for a living, one income quintile at a time.
There’s an old saying: “Don’t tax you,
don’t tax me. Tax that guy behind the tree.”
In Maskachusetts in 2023, that guy
behind the tree will run away. Then the tree itself will be
chopped down. Then anyone who can’t run away will be chopped
down, and fed into an economic wood chipper.
That is the one promise the hacks will
keep — guaranteed.
Howie made one mistake in that
column when he wrote: "Of course, should the hacks
finally win on their seventh try, we will be told that the new,
higher tax rate is 'settled law,' and should never, ever be
tampered with again by anything so unseemly as a repeal effort."
In my Boston Herald Comment on his
column I noted:
The
graduated income tax proposal (being sold as a "millionaires
tax") is a constitutional amendment, and
constitutional amendments are not subject to repeal.
If it is
adopted and is embedded into the state constitution, it
would require the years-long and arduous process of another
constitutional amendment to make it go away.
Constitutional amendments require significant support in the
Legislature —
and an actual vote, twice over two
legislative sessions (four years)
— which
will never happen to abolish a graduated income tax.
The Legislature only supports constitutional amendments
which benefit themselves (such as the one they effortlessly
placed on the ballot providing them with automatic pay
raises, sold to low-information voters as 'preventing
legislators from ever voting themselves another pay grab').
Remember
the proposed constitutional amendment for term limits
proposed by the people after months of hard work collecting
the necessary signatures? That citizens petition saw
more dodges and weaves in the Legislature than a goat-roping
before it was blocked from making it onto the ballot:
http://cltg.org/cltg/Death_of_Term_Limits.htm
If the
state's constitutional flat tax (everyone pays the same rate
on taxable income) is ever replaced with a graduated income
tax amendment — IT WILL BE FOREVER AND WILL
INEVITABLY IMPACT ALL TAXPAYERS.
Citizens for Limited Taxation was founded in 1975 by Edward F.
King specifically to oppose the fourth assault on the state
constitution to impose a graduated income tax, which we defeated
on the 1976 ballot. The Takers came back for their
fifth attempt on the 1994 ballot where CLT again defeated its
efforts. Now they're back for their sixth assault
(seventh if the high court's 2018
rejection of it is counted).
Barbara Anderson
holding a lawn sign for CLT's successful 1994 grad tax
opposition ballot campaign
In its "Advances
- Week of April 4, 2021" the State House News Service reported
on Friday:
Department of Revenue is expected to
announce March tax collections [on Monday]. DOR expects that
it will collect $2.413 billion in taxes in March, which
would be a drop of $246 million from March 2020, but actual
collections have been shattering the agency's benchmarks in
recent months....
Now eight months through fiscal year
2021, Massachusetts state government has collected $19.527
billion in taxes from people and businesses, which is $1.123
billion or 6.1 percent more than it did during the same
eight pre-pandemic months of fiscal year 2020....
DOR considers March a "mid-size month"
for tax collections, usually ranking sixth out of the 12
months. Through March 15, DOR had already collected $1.689
billion, which is up $107 million or 6.7 percent compared to
the same half month period in March 2020.
I'm not the only one scratching my
head wondering how this can be possible despite the state's
pandemic response of shutting and locking down the economy for a
year. One of the economic soothsayer-groups which read the
tea leaves, gazes into crystal balls, and produces economic
forecasts for the year ahead upon which the state budget is set
thinks they have it figured out. Evan Horowitz, executive
director of the Center for State Policy Analysis at Tisch
College at Tufts University, wrote in CommonWealth Magazine on
Sunday ("Why tax
forecasts during COVID have been so wrong"):
One of the great puzzles of the
past year is that the world was devastated by a plague
and Massachusetts tax revenues were...pretty much OK.
Month after month, the state is collecting far more
money than expected, dissolving initial fears of a
multi-billion dollar deficit and leading to a new
realization that state finances are relatively healthy.
This remarkable turn-of-events
raises two fundamental questions. First, how have state
tax revenues held up so well amid the lockdowns,
joblessness, and main street woes? Second, should
experts and policy wonks have foreseen this surprising
outcome? ...
Between April and June, the state
did experience a sizable drop in tax revenue.
But an unexpected thing happened
when spring turned to summer and the state's new fiscal
year (FY 2021) began. Monthly reports from the
Department of Revenue started showing relatively
healthy-looking tax collections. And far from a
temporary blip, that overperformance has continued right
up to the present.
As of the end of February,
Massachusetts is on pace to collect $31.5 billion,
vastly more tax revenue than expected — indeed, more
than we were collecting before the pandemic struck.
Why did tax revenues remain strong?
...
Between stimulus checks, PPP loans,
bailouts for hard-hit sectors, public health spending,
and a host of other cash infusions, federal aid has
helped sustain people's incomes and encourage spending.
And in that way, it also bolstered the state tax system.
Consider the state income tax. For
tax purposes, unemployment benefits generally count as
income, just like a paycheck. So when the federal
government introduced expanded unemployment insurance —
with many laid-off workers receiving more money in
benefits than they ever received from their jobs — that
raised state income tax receipts. (More recently, the
state has decided to refund some of these taxes paid on
unemployment benefits — not least because other revenue
streams are returning.)
Or, think about what people do when
they get money from the federal government, be it
through unemployment benefits, direct stimulus checks,
or a paycheck backstopped by PPP loans. They turn around
and spend some of that money at local grocery stores and
online marketplaces, which generates sales tax for
Massachusetts....
Why couldn't we foresee it? ...
Trouble is, the early pessimism
wasn't just wrong but enduringly so. It was a stake we
had put in the ground, and even when monthly updates
showed surprisingly strong tax revenues, we still felt
tied to that stake.
Perhaps the best example is the
notion — heard echoing through the virtual corridors of
the State House last fall — that the real challenge was
going to be next year (FY22). We had predicted a
catastrophe; and if tax collections didn't actually look
catastrophic, that only proved the real emergency was
still out there somewhere, waiting to derail us....
Pretty soon, last year's deficit
fears will seem like ancient history. But when economic
uncertainty returns, as we all know it will, I hope we
remember some of the lessons of this pandemic year: keep
an eye on the feds; slow the process down; don't expect
the next recession to look like the last one.
But I also hope that forecasters —
myself included — are quicker to incorporate new
information and more ready to regularly share their
shifting sense of what's going on.
Oops, all the economic experts were
wrong, even more so than usual. I'm still not convinced
Horowitz has covered all the bases —
that unemployment checks make up for the shutdown of the state
economy or that "free" money from the state and Washington more
than makes up for the massive loss of economic activity.
If that's the case then much of that government bail-out
largesse is bailing out government, laundered through its
unemployed victims.
On the climate mitigation costs
front, we learned on Thursday of another cost of the progressive
jihad. The Boston Globe reported ("‘It’s
going to hurt us’: Heating oil industry fights effort to
eliminate state’s rebates"):
The heating oil industry is fired up
about a proposal to take away energy-efficiency rebates from
its customers as part of a state-led effort to wean
homeowners off fossil fuels.
At issue are priorities endorsed March
24 by the Energy Efficiency Advisory Council that include
phasing out Mass Save rebates for new oil-fired systems for
heat and hot water, as well as no-interest loans for
homeowners to install them, as soon as January. Rebates for
natural gas-fired and propane installations would be
ratcheted back significantly.
“It’s simply not fair,” said Michael
Ferrante, president of the Massachusetts Energy Marketers
Association. “I wouldn’t say it’s going to cripple the
industry. But it’s going to hurt us. And it’s going to hurt
heating oil customers.”
The proposal from the council, which is
chaired by the state energy resources commissioner, follows
recommendations issued by the Baker administration in
December for Massachusetts to reach “net-zero” carbon
emissions by 2050. The changes also line up with aggressive
goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that were included
in a sweeping climate law passed by the Legislature and
signed by Governor Charlie Baker last week. One provision
allows municipalities to adopt net-zero building codes for
new construction, which could effectively block fossil-fuel
hookups in future projects.
Significant changes in how buildings
are heated will be needed if Massachusetts is to reach its
2050 emissions goal. State officials and environmentalists
hope to encourage the use of electric heat pumps in homes
and discourage fossil fuels. The ramifications could be huge
for the 700,000-plus homeowners in the state who use heating
oil — as well as for the companies that serve them.
Massachusetts electricity rates,
meanwhile, are among the highest in the United States,
nearly double the national average....
Ending oil rebates is one of many
proposed changes to the Mass Save program, which is
regulated by the state and funded by surcharges on
electricity and natural gas bills. They will now be used by
the state’s major electric and natural gas utilities as they
formulate a plan for the next three years, with an eye
toward incorporating climate benefits.
Government's
punishment of undesired behavior such as how you heat and cool
you home has begun, first by removing previous incentives to
"break your will" before "turning
the screws" to crush any resistance that remains.
So far Baker's
Transportation and Climate Initiative (TCI) "boondoggle" is
spinning wheels and treading water. Of the dozen northeast
states initially considering joining his coalition only two
others have signed on — Rhode
Island and Connecticut (and the city of Washington, D.C.)
— and only Massachusetts doesn't require a
vote by its state legislature. You may recall that the
Baker administration once asserted that success of TCI depended
on reaching a "critical mass" of participating states.
There are now only three governors of the dozen invited states
that have agreed. Whether or not the other two governors
are given approval to participate by their respective
legislatures remains questionable.
The Connecticut Mirror reported last
Tuesday ("Opposed by GOP, Lamont campaigns for climate
initiative"):
. . . But [Connecticut Gov. Ned] Lamont
has gone a giant step further by signing onto a regional
Transportation and Climate Initiative as a way to reduce
greenhouse gases and raise money for transit — a concept
bitterly opposed by many leaders of Stewart’s GOP.
In promoting TCI, as the initiative is
known, the Lamont administration is working to succeed where
it failed horribly two years ago in seeking support for
highway tolls as a means to modernize Connecticut’s creaky
infrastructure....
Stewart kept her distance from TCI,
which is opposed by the leaders of the House and Senate
Republican minorities in the General Assembly....
TCI is a cap-and-invest program and
will bring revenue into the state – an estimated $89 million
in 2023, increasing to as much as $117 million in 2032.
Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, the three
states responsible for 73% of transportation emissions in
New England, have signed a memorandum of understanding
committing to the initiative.
Legislation is necessary to go forward,
and the legislature’s Environment Committee is expected to
vote on the plan Wednesday. It is opposed by the trucking
industry and fuel marketers as an added cost to businesses
and consumers....
In public-hearing testimony this month,
House Minority Leader Vincent J. Candelora, R-North
Branford, opposed the initiative as an added cost, but he
also said it appeared that once created, TCI’s costs would
have no legislative oversight.
“Considering that the average American
is struggling to stay afloat due to the economic effects of
the COVID-19 pandemic, now is not the proper time to be
pursuing this policy,” Candelora told the committee.
Senate Minority Leader Kevin Kelly of
Stratford and his deputy, Sen. Paul Formica of East Lyme,
submitted joint testimony casting themselves as committed to
clean air, if unwilling to endorse higher costs on gasoline
brought by Senate Bill 884, the TCI measure.
“We share that goal of cleaner air,”
they said. “However, we must protect middle class families’
wallets in the process, and Senate Bill 884 does not protect
middle class families’ wallets.”
On Tuesday, Kelly said Republicans
could achieve the same goals without any added costs.
“The reality for Connecticut
middle-class families is that purchasing gasoline and food
is still a necessity and increasing taxes on both is
extremely regressive,” Kelly said. “It’s also misleading to
suggest that the TCI gas tax will lead to cleaner air in
Connecticut as states to our west are not moving forward
with their own clean air reforms.”
In the end, Gov. Baker and
Massachusetts may stand alone in support of his Transportation
and Climate Initiative — and that
is the goal of our multi-state anti-TCI coalition. Without
"critical mass" it falls flat on its face. We have another
monthly Zoom conference among our partners later today, after
which I should know more.
On the political front it's looking
more like the Democrats' candidate to run against the Baker/Polito
administration — whether that will be Charlie or Karyn —
will likely be the ambitious
Attorney General Maura Healey. The Boston Herald
reported last Monday ("Desperate Democrats led by Maura Healey
flailing away at weakened Charlie Baker"):
Desperate Democrats led by Attorney
General Maura Healey are flailing away at a weakened
Gov. Charlie Baker in hopes of taking back the Corner
Office in 2022 for the first time in eight years.
Whether it’s working is questionable.
Healey, flush with campaign cash
and popularity within the party, is directing a
multipronged, not-so-stealth gubernatorial campaign —
ripping Baker on everything from coronavirus vaccine
delivery to opioids even though the governor is
undecided on running for a third term.
Baker is not even a cinch to win
his own party’s primary. Conservatives — including the
Republican party’s own chairman — have publicly
challenged him on moving too far liberal for their
liking....
If Baker decides not to run for a
third term, his lieutenant governor, Karyn Polito, would
be the early favorite though she would likely face a
stiff challenge from the conservative wing of the party.
Former state lawmaker and failed U.S. Senate candidate
Geoff Diehl is considering a gubernatorial campaign.
On the Democratic side, Healey is
clearly the party’s first choice to eject Republicans
from the governor’s office, though other Democrats led
by Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone, Harvard professor
Danielle Allen and former state Sen. Ben Downing are
also plotting campaigns.
The attorney general has been
crisscrossing the state — using her publicly funded
office by the way — in a campaign-like tour of heavily
Democratic areas like Brockton and Worcester.
Boston Herald veteran political
columnist Peter Lucas observed on Thursday ("With
Trump gone, Maura Healey turns ire on Baker"):
No one misses Donald Trump more
than Maura Healey.
Because with Trump gone, she has no
one to sue.
Attorney General Healey, 50, a
progressive Democrat, sued Donald Trump close to 50
times during his four years as president, and a made a
big deal out of it each time.
Now she is complaining about three
lawsuits Republican attorneys general have filed against
President Joe Biden, including challenging Biden’s
failed immigration policy as well as his shutting down
the Keystone XL pipeline that threw thousands out of
work.
Healey, who spent the past four
years trashing Trump and his agenda, said, “Donald Trump
may be out of the White House, but Republican attorneys
general across the country are still doing his bidding
and conspiring to block President Biden’s agenda at
every turn.” ...
While there is no public estimate
of how much taxpayer money Healey spent on her lawsuits
against Trump — most of which went nowhere — Healey
gained a lot of publicity for “standing up” to Trump.
Surely it would be wickedly
unfashionable in the woke world of progressives if
Healey filed suit against Biden even though he is
ultimately responsible — just as Trump was — for the sad
plight, even death, of immigrant children led to the
border and abandoned by Mexican traffickers.
But odds of the Democrat attorney
general filing suit against the Democrat president range
from nil to none.
But with Trump gone as her main
political target, Healey has redirected her attention
toward Gov. Baker, using Baker’s distribution of the
COVID-19 as a thin veil to go after him. Charlie Baker
has become her Donald Trump....
On a politically positive note
(admittedly more difficult to find as the days pass),
former-House Speaker Bob DeLeo's seat was filled in a special
election last week and the winner was a conservative Democrat.
I didn't know any of those still existed, thought the species
was extinct.
The New Boston Post reported on Tuesday ("Conservative
Democrat Jeff Turco Easily Wins State Rep Seat in Winthrop and
Revere"):
A deeply Democratic district stayed
Democratic on Tuesday — but it’s a lot less left wing than
it was.
The successor to former House Speaker
Robert DeLeo (D-Winthrop) in the Massachusetts House of
Representatives will be former Winthrop town council
president Jeff Turco. The Democrat had no problem winning
the Tuesday, March 30 special general election triggered by
DeLeo’s December 2020 resignation to take a job teaching
about legislation and public policy at Northeastern
University. The seat has been vacant since then.
The self-described “moderate” Turco
trounced his two opponents, Paul Caruccio, a Republican, of
Winthrop, and Winthrop resident Richard Fucillo, an
unenrolled candidate. Turco got 57.3 percent of the vote
(1,861 votes) while Caruccio got 14.3 percent (466 votes)
and Fucillo got 14.6 percent (473 votes), according to
multiple reports....
Turco was the subject of controversy
during the primary for some of his conservative leanings.
Turco has said in the past that he
voted for former President Donald Trump in 2016. He gave
money to U.S. Senator Susan Collins (R-Maine) in 2020. He
has expressed opposition to abortion. He also has criticized
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) and former
President Barack Obama.
In response to his primary win four
weeks ago, Planned Parenthood Advocacy Fund of Massachusetts
said it will help run someone against Turco in 2022.
“Jeff Turco is dangerous and has no
place on Beacon Hill,” the fund tweeted. “And if he wins,
we’ll be there in 2022 to primary him and elect a candidate
who will champion the sexual and reproductive rights of
their community.”
Before you get
too excited recognize that newly-minted state Rep. Turco
was one of four candidates in the crowded primary and won
with just 36.2 percent of the vote. That pretty much made
him the heir-apparent in a Democrat stronghold district.
It would have been man-bites-dog news if anyone but the
last Democrat standing had taken the seat. Still, better a
moderate/conservative Democrat than another "Progressive."
Add The Salem News to the growing call to restrict the unbridled
power of potentially tyrannical governors of the future.
From its editorial on Wednesday ("Time to rein in the governor's
power"):
A year ago, when it became clear the
coronavirus was a major threat to public health, Gov.
Charlie Baker declared a state of emergency and took charge
by using the executive authority of his position. He ordered
businesses shut down, schools closed and dictated mask
mandates, limits on the size of gatherings and dozens of
other restrictions on daily life and business.
The power Baker wielded – and still
uses – came by way of the 1950 Civil Defense Act, allowing
him to issue executive orders without legislative approval
during a state of emergency. And it was, without a doubt, an
emergency....
State Sen. Diana DiZoglio, D-Methuen,
is one lawmaker behind bills filed to limit the governor’s
reach. She said recently she believes the Legislature needs
to exercise oversight or review of executive orders in a
reasonable period of time.
“This is not a dictatorship,” DiZoglio
told State House News Service. “The governor has taken a
top-down, authoritative approach to the COVID-19 response
and as a result many residents have not been heard. It’s too
much for any one person and one administration to handle
when dealing with emergencies of this scale and length.”
DiZoglio is proposing a 60-day limit on
the governor’s emergency orders, requiring him to go before
the House and Senate for extensions. The Civil Defense Act
doesn’t require any such review or impose a time limit.
On the House side, Rep. Nick Boldyga,
R-Southwick, filed a bill similar to what DiZoglio proposes
that would impose a 30-day sunset on emergency orders and
mandates. Boldyga’s bill would give state courts
jurisdiction to hear cases challenging state and local
emergency orders....
The question of limiting a governor’s
power during a state of emergency isn’t unique to
Massachusetts. Dozens of state legislatures have filed more
than 200 bills and resolutions to scale back, restrict or
provide more oversight over their governors’ power during
the pandemic.
Here in the Bay State, it’s past time
for the Legislature to act in this pandemic and that means
curtailing the governor’s emergency power before they’re
needed again.
"Those who fail to learn from
history are doomed to repeat it." It's too late to rectify
the heavy-handed, liberty-crushing magisterial response to the
Wuhan Chinese pandemic, but there's hope perhaps that it won't
and can't be allowed to happen again.
|
 |
 |
|
Chip Ford
Executive Director |
|
|
|
Full News Reports Follow
(excerpted above) |
|
The Boston Herald
Thursday, April 1, 2021
Study says Massachusetts ‘millionaires tax’ wouldn’t just
hit the mega-rich
By Sean Philip Cotter
A new study from the Pioneer Institute says the so-called
“millionaires tax” that’s regularly discussed on Beacon Hill
wouldn’t just dip into the pockets of the wealthiest few,
but would also nail middle-class people cashing out for
retirement.
“Despite its purported goal of taxing only the uber-rich,
the graduated income tax would fail to protect people of
more modest means from overtaxation on one-time windfalls,”
wrote study authors Greg Sullivan & Andrew Mikula. “It has
the ability to push those with significant capital gains and
valuable asset sales into higher tax brackets, punishing
owners of retirement nest eggs and desirable real estate. In
practice, these ‘one-time millionaires,’ who cash in on a
lifetime of work and sacrifice in anticipation of
retirement, out-number those who consistently have
seven-figure salaries or stock market windfalls.”
The graduated income tax proposal — dubbed the millionaires
tax” or the “fair share amendment” — would slap an
additional 4% income tax on annual income over $1 million.
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in 2018 threw out a
move to get the measure on the ballot for a referendum, but
the proponents have kept at it, and the Legislature is
expected to vote in the coming months on whether to put it
on the ballot in 2022.
Advocates for the measure say this would require the
wealthiest few to pay their “fair share,” and that this move
could then provide funding for various state programs.
Pioneer, which tends fiscally conservative and favors
smaller government, said in the report that there could be
unintended consequences. For one, it could come down heavily
on people looking to sell property or a business and retire.
“This surtax would devastate the retirement plans of many
Massachusetts residents,” said Pioneer Institute Executive
Director Jim Stergios. “Proponents of the tax haven’t
thought about the incentive it creates to change one’s
domicile to low- or no-tax states as Massachusetts residents
approach retirement, nor the deterrent it would create to
investment.”
The report also posited that it could hinder economic
recovery efforts by discouraging investment, and it could
chase seniors out of the state.
Pioneer Institute
The Graduated Income Tax Trap: A retirement tax on small
business owners
April 1, 2021
by Andrew Mikula and Greg Sullivan
[Excerpts]
This report finds that, if passed, a constitutional amendment to
impose a graduated income tax would raid the retirement plans of
Massachusetts residents by pushing their owners into higher tax
brackets on the sales of homes and businesses. The study aims to
help the public fully understand the impact of the proposed new
tax.
Introduction
In recent decades, Massachusetts policymakers have worked hard
to shed the “Taxachusetts” label that plagued the Commonwealth
into the 1990s. Once at 6.25 percent, the state income tax had
fallen to 5 percent by 2020, while corporate tax rates have been
flat. Massachusetts tax policy has prioritized stability and
predictability so far in the 21st century. But since 2015, a
graduated income tax proposal has sought to undermine those
priorities under the guise of a “fair” tax only on the
super-wealthy.
Despite its purported goal of taxing only the uber-rich, the
graduated income tax would fail to protect people of more modest
means from overtaxation on one-time windfalls. It has the
ability to push those with significant capital gains and
valuable asset sales into higher tax brackets, punishing owners
of retirement nest eggs and desirable real estate. In practice,
these “one-time millionaires,” who cash in on a lifetime of work
and sacrifice in anticipation of retirement, outnumber those who
consistently have seven-figure salaries or stock market
windfalls.
Further, because of the tax treatment of pass-through business
income, many of these “onetime millionaires” could be small
business owners still reeling from the economic effects of
COVID-19. Now, in the midst of the pandemic and its potentially
devastating aftermath, is not the time to burden small business
owners, the core of the state’s economy.
What is the Graduated Income Tax?
For the past several years, Massachusetts has been considering a
state constitutional amendment that would levy a four percent
surtax on annual personal income over $1 million. The first
attempt to do so, filed by initiative petition, failed a
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court challenge in 2018 before
re-emerging as a legislative petition and receiving initial
approval at a constitutional convention in 2019. A vote on final
approval by the legislature is expected in the spring of 2021.
If passed, it will appear on the statewide ballot in the fall of
2022.
Proponents of the amendment, led by the Massachusetts Teachers
Association and the Service Employees International Union,
together with advocacy and religious groups, call it the “Fair
Share Amendment,” a nod to their frequent assertions that the
measure would require only the very wealthy to pay what
proponents believe is their “fair share” of taxes.
Opponents argue that it would endanger the long-term economic
well-being of Massachusetts by prompting high-income residents
and businesses to relocate to states that have lower income tax
rates and discouraging high-income individuals and businesses
from coming
to Massachusetts in the first place. They believe that COVID-19
may exacerbate these relocation effects, as the pandemic has
made telecommuting much more prevalent, at least in the short
term....
The impact on homeowners
The proposed surtax does not include a safeguard to prevent
capital gains from the sale of a home, after exclusion of
$250,000 for single filers or $500,000 for joint filers, on the
sale of a principal residence or long-held small business
property from pushing a taxpayer into the 9 percent tax bracket.
This is contrary to how taxes are treated at the federal level,
where capital gains cannot force a taxpayer into a higher
bracket. The graduated income tax will thus ensnare many
families few would consider to be “millionaires” who have large
amounts of capital gains in a single year due to the sale of a
long-owned home or small business.
By including capital gains in the computation of annual income
that exceeds the $1 million threshold, the graduated income tax
effectively taxes the extraordinary escalation of Massachusetts
housing prices that has occurred in recent decades. One example
of such growth occurred in the city of Cambridge, where the
median price of a single-family home has more than quadrupled in
24 years, from $327,000 in January 1996 to $1.47 million in
January 2020, while the Consumer Price Index rose by 67 percent.
Seniors and small business owners who have owned their homes or
business property for many years and are relying on decades of
appreciation upon retirement will find themselves among those
subject to the 4 percent surcharge, even if their ordinary
income otherwise falls well below the million-dollar threshold.
The Retirement Tax
To understand who exactly would be affected by the so-called
“Fair Share” tax proposed by the legislature at the behest of
the MTA and the SEIU, it is critical to ascertain how often
so-called “millionaires” earn $1 million or more in a year.
Fortunately, the Tax Foundation’s data on the persistence of
millionaires allows us to do just that. According to the Tax
Foundation’s “Income Mobility and the Persistence of
Millionaires, 1999 to 2007,” fully half of U.S. taxpayers who
reported gross annual income of $1 million or more at least once
over a nine-year period did so only once. Nearly two-thirds did
so two or fewer times, and almost three-quarters did so three or
fewer times. Fewer than 20 percent did so in a majority of the
nine years and fewer than 6 percent earned $1 million or more
every year.
This data exposes a potential vulnerability of the proposed
graduated income tax, showing it to be more of a “retirement
tax,” as many people rely on recouping the value from home
equity or a stake in a business to pay for their retirement. In
fact, Massachusetts displays the very same concentration of
“one-time millionaires.” In the Commonwealth, 46 percent of
households with incomes over $1 million did so only once in 10
years and fully 60 percent did so twice or less in the 10-year
period ended in 2017 (see Figure 2).
This
data alone does not prove that many “millionaires” are retirees,
or whether those who are using the income to pay for retirement
try to avoid taxes on that income. However, other IRS data shows
that after similar graduated income tax levies passed in other
states, out-migration exploded among people of retirement age.
The so-called “Fair Share” tax would apply to — and dampen the
retirement plans of — a significant number of people who worked
a lifetime and who are not consistent millionaires....
Conclusion
The bottom line is that individuals with consistent annual
incomes of $1 million or more are not the only ones who will be
subject to this “Fair Share” tax. Instead, included in
Massachusetts’ new top income tax bracket will be many middle
class citizens who wisely invested in a business or real estate
at the right time and merely want to remain comfortable in their
old age by cashing in on those investments. Thus, the so-called
“millionaires tax” is really a retirement tax for many who will
be subject to it in a given year, and only in part a tax on the
super-wealthy. Before the Massachusetts legislature moves this
constitutional amendment forward, the following facts must be
considered:
1. The graduated income tax proposal will take a
significant bite out of the retirement nest eggs of many
small business owners and longtime homeowners.
2. The surtax could hinder economic recovery
efforts from COVID-19 by discouraging capital investment
and making it harder for business owners to hire back
workers.
3. A sizable plurality of Massachusetts
million-dollar earners only have a seven-figure annual
income once in a 10-year period, an indication that most
people affected by the surtax will not be the uber-wealthy
technology magnates and hedge fund managers usually
associated with the term “millionaire.”
4. When California levied a similar tax hike on
high income earners in 2012, it experienced a 14-fold
increase in annual net taxable income losses due to
seniors leaving the state, amounting to nearly $1.3
billion in 2013 alone. In 2018, this number had still
failed to return to pre-tax hike levels.
Without subjecting the graduated income tax proposal to further
scrutiny, the Massachusetts legislature risks significantly
damaging the economy, spurring cycles of capital disinvestment
and lower productivity that reach all corners of the states, and
destabilizing the budgets of both the state government and
countless senior citizens.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, April 3, 2021
Massachusetts electorate’s ignorance might just get
‘millionaires tax’ passed
By Howie Carr
The welfare-industrial complex has a very simple theory about
why they’re finally going to pass the graduated income tax in
Massachusetts next year: They believe that after 60 years, they
have at last succeeded in dumbing down the state electorate to
the point that a majority will actually vote against their own
best interests — to impoverish themselves.
Sadly, the hacks are probably correct.
This time around, the soak-the-middle-class scheme has been
rebranded as a “millionaires tax,” because supposedly only
taxpayers who will have their state income taxes jacked up from
5% to 9% a year are those making over a million dollars a year.
And the extra billions, which will only come from people making
a lot more money than you, will go to really worthy projects,
like “infrastructure” and education — “for the children,” don’t
you know.
Wink wink, nudge nudge.
If you actually believe any of this, you probably still think
that Elizabeth Warren is a Cherokee princess, that Dr. Anthony
Fauci knows what he’s talking about, that Hunter Biden’s laptop
was hacked by the Russians, and that the FBI and the Mass. State
Police are on the level …
That ignorance is what the hackerama is banking on. They think
at least 50%-plus one of the state’s voters are in fact that
feeble-minded. And the evidence backs them up.
The non-working classes have been diligently attempting to
impose this graduated-income tax on the commonwealth since 1962.
Consider the declining results for the productive classes.
In 1962, the same year that a Massachusetts native, JFK, pushed
through a federal tax cut by pointing out that “a rising tide
lifts all boats,” his home-state constituents rejected the
proposed state tax increase, 83-17.
In 1968 the hacks tried again — 70% voted thumbs down.
In 1972, even as Massachusetts was the only state to vote for
acid, amnesty and abortion, 67% said no new taxes.
In 1976, the payroll patriots tried again. No — 73%.
In 1994 — the taxpaying majority (64.6%) once more voted no.
In 2018, the hackerama tried to put the Trojan horse back on the
ballot via some back-door maneuver. But the Supreme Judicial
Court, hardly a bulwark against lunacy of any sort, told Beacon
Hill to forget about it.
For those of you keeping score at home, that makes the hackerama
0-6. But like an antibiotic-resistant STD, the graduated-income
tax is baaaaaaack again, one legislative vote away from being
back on the ballot in 2022.
The Pioneer Institute put out a new study last week, stressing
the obvious: “’Millionaires’ tax’ wouldn’t just hit the
mega-rich.’ ”
But is anyone paying attention anymore? That’s the problem.
Of course, should the hacks finally win on their seventh try, we
will be told that the new, higher tax rate is “settled law,” and
should never, ever be tampered with again by anything so
unseemly as a repeal effort.
And even if the electorate did eventually vote to repeal, the
legislature would probably ignore it. Remember Mike Dukakis’
“temporary” income tax increase of 1989? By 2000, the voters
repealed the “temporary” law in a landslide, 60-40, but the rate
didn’t go back down to 5% until 30 years after its “temporary”
enactment.
Then there were the tolls on the turnpike. They were going to
come down as soon as the bonds that were sold to build it were
paid off — in 1988. Pinky promise — no more tolls on I-90 as of
Jan. 1, 1989.
How’s that one working out for you, MetroWest?
Once the income tax rate is increased from 5% to 9% for all
those evil millionaires, guess what happens next.
The supply of Massachusetts millionaires, never robust to begin
with, will fail instantly. A lot of them will get their taxable
income under seven figures, but most will just decamp to Free
America — Florida, New Hampshire, etc. As a matter of fact, a
lot of them already have.
The Cult of the Mask is just a precursor of the police state
Charlie Parker et al. have in mind for all of us. Maskachusetts
Uber Alles!
This exodus of millionaires, or at least tax avoidance on
steroids, has happened in every single jurisdiction where this
heist has been attempted. Tax revenues in fact decline, and the
pols say, not even that sheepishly, gee, I guess we
miscalculated, so now we’re going to have to impose the
“millionaires tax” on … guess who?
If you’ve always dreamed of being a millionaire, just vote for
the “millionaires tax,” because by 2024 at the latest, you will
indeed be a millionaire — at least for Massachusetts tax
purposes. Once the graduated income tax is on the books, they
can pick off everybody who works for a living, one income
quintile at a time.
There’s an old saying: “Don’t tax you, don’t tax me. Tax that
guy behind the tree.”
In Maskachusetts in 2023, that guy behind the tree will run
away. Then the tree itself will be chopped down. Then anyone who
can’t run away will be chopped down, and fed into an economic
wood chipper.
That is the one promise the hacks will keep — guaranteed.
State House News Service
Friday, April 2, 2021
Advances - Week of April 4, 2021
Monday, April 5, 2021
MARCH REVENUES: Department of Revenue is expected to
announce March tax collections. DOR expects that it will collect
$2.413 billion in taxes in March, which would be a drop of $246
million from March 2020, but actual collections have been
shattering the agency's benchmarks in recent months.
DOR recently moved the state tax filing deadline for individuals
to May 17 to comport with the federal deadline, which could
necessitate adjustments to the agency's monthly estimates and
benchmarks -- or perhaps another adjustment to the underlying
revenue assumption for the fiscal year that ends June 30.
Now eight months through fiscal year 2021, Massachusetts state
government has collected $19.527 billion in taxes from people
and businesses, which is $1.123 billion or 6.1 percent more than
it did during the same eight pre-pandemic months of fiscal year
2020.
The last month Massachusetts saw a year-over-year decline in tax
collections was September. That caught the attention this week
of Moody's Investor Services, which noted that while the
pandemic "has resulted in persistently high unemployment" for
Massachusetts, "revenues have performed well, coming in 6.1%
year-over-year through February 2021, after recording delayed
income tax receipts."
DOR considers March a "mid-size month" for tax collections,
usually ranking sixth out of the 12 months. Through March 15,
DOR had already collected $1.689 billion, which is up $107
million or 6.7 percent compared to the same half month period in
March 2020. The agency said collections tend to be weighted
towards the end of the month, so the mid-month figures are not
used to project full-month revenue.
CommonWealth Magazine
Sunday, April 4, 2021
Why tax forecasts during COVID have been so wrong
By Evan Horowitz
One of the great puzzles of the past year is that the world was
devastated by a plague and Massachusetts tax revenues
were...pretty much OK. Month after month, the state is
collecting far more money than expected, dissolving initial
fears of a multi-billion dollar deficit and leading to a new
realization that state finances are relatively healthy.
This remarkable turn-of-events raises two fundamental questions.
First, how have state tax revenues held up so well amid the
lockdowns, joblessness, and main street woes? Second, should
experts and policy wonks have foreseen this surprising outcome?
If you're looking for quick answers, the tl;dr [sic-typo]
version goes like this: thanks to its mix of revenue sources,
the Massachusetts tax system was able to capture the benefits of
outsize federal spending and shifting economic activity; and
while that was hard to see in advance, we could have done a much
better job revising forecasts and updating expectations along
the way.
What actually happened?
A year ago, when COVID-19 was first spreading across
Massachusetts and we were learning new phrases like "contact
tracing" and "flatten the curve," the Massachusetts Legislature
asked various economists and policy groups (including my own) to
assess the potential consequences for tax revenues and the state
economy more generally.
Nearly everyone at the roundtable expressed dire concern and
warned of mammoth uncertainty. Unemployment was going to spike
(it did), GDP would collapse (it did), and state tax revenues
were likely to crater, just as they had at the nadir of the
Great Recession, when Massachusetts had a $3 billion shortfall —
followed by another $1.5 billion deficit the following year.
At first, the warnings held true. Between April and June, the
state did experience a sizable drop in tax revenue.
But an unexpected thing happened when spring turned to summer
and the state's new fiscal year (FY 2021) began. Monthly reports
from the Department of Revenue started showing relatively
healthy-looking tax collections. And far from a temporary blip,
that overperformance has continued right up to the present.
As of the end of February, Massachusetts is on pace to collect
$31.5 billion, vastly more tax revenue than expected — indeed,
more than we were collecting before the pandemic struck.
Why did tax revenues remain strong?
There are two main reasons Massachusetts tax revenues have
bested expectation: 1) massive economic aid from the federal
government; 2) a flexible tax system which allowed us to capture
shifting economic activity.
Between stimulus checks, PPP loans, bailouts for hard-hit
sectors, public health spending, and a host of other cash
infusions, federal aid has helped sustain people's incomes and
encourage spending. And in that way, it also bolstered the state
tax system.
Consider the state income tax. For tax purposes, unemployment
benefits generally count as income, just like a paycheck. So
when the federal government introduced expanded unemployment
insurance — with many laid-off workers receiving more money in
benefits than they ever received from their jobs — that raised
state income tax receipts. (More recently, the state has decided
to refund some of these taxes paid on unemployment benefits —
not least because other revenue streams are returning.)
Or, think about what people do when they get money from the
federal government, be it through unemployment benefits, direct
stimulus checks, or a paycheck backstopped by PPP loans. They
turn around and spend some of that money at local grocery stores
and online marketplaces, which generates sales tax for
Massachusetts.
It’s worth noting, though, that we did get lucky here. Had the
pandemic hit just a few years ago, sales tax collection might
have been hamstrung by the fact that Massachusetts lacked the
clear authority to collect taxes from online retailers located
in other parts of the country.
However, a landmark Supreme Court ruling in 2018 expanded
states’ ability to collect sales taxes from online retailers.
And that has proved essential in a pandemic year when so many
local storefronts have been shuttered and so much economic
activity is happening online.
Why couldn't we foresee it?
Maybe it’s cold comfort but we were hardly alone in expecting
devastating tax shortfalls. States around the country, and
national policy groups, all predicted the same thing.
Trouble is, the early pessimism wasn't just wrong but enduringly
so. It was a stake we had put in the ground, and even when
monthly updates showed surprisingly strong tax revenues, we
still felt tied to that stake.
Perhaps the best example is the notion — heard echoing through
the virtual corridors of the State House last fall — that the
real challenge was going to be next year (FY22). We had
predicted a catastrophe; and if tax collections didn't actually
look catastrophic, that only proved the real emergency was still
out there somewhere, waiting to derail us.
There's also a deeper issue, which is that pessimism is always
better than optimism when it comes to budget-making.
If you predict $30 billion in tax revenue and collect $31
billion, that feels like a windfall — free money to spend on new
priorities. But it's a real problem if you expect $30 billion
and collect $29 billion. In that case, not only do legislators
have to renege on spending promises but they also cede some
control, since Massachusetts law gives the governor greater
authority over what gets cut.
As a consequence, lawmakers prefer to build budgets with
conservative revenue estimates, and then to collect more tax
dollars than planned.
There are essentially two ways to handle this: outside groups —
like mine — could hedge our projections, giving valuable cover
to lawmakers; or we could stick to straight economic modeling
and let the politicians make downward adjustments as they
construct the budget.
Each approach has benefits, but right now we've got a kind of
in-between situation where some groups seem to hedge and others
(including mine) don't. The result is a mix of projections that
aren't really apples-to-apples.
How can we do better next time?
In "normal" times, the whole process for estimating tax revenues
seems to work pretty well: outside groups make projections,
lawmakers split the small differences, and budget-writing
begins.
Recessions, pandemics, and economic turning points will always
be more fraught, but two lessons of the last year really stand
out:
Broad-based tax systems are more robust. It's helpful that we
collect taxes on income, unemployment benefits, capital gains,
in-person sales, online sales, and beyond — because it means we
don't lose out when economic activity shifts.
Looking ahead, there are ways the state could further expand its
tax base — and make our system more disruption-proof. For
instance, taxes on services and digital goods are currently very
limited, and a package that raised taxes in these areas — while
lowering them in others — could buttress the system as a whole.
Flexibility is extremely valuable. When economists and outside
groups were (wrongly) predicting a collapse in tax revenues,
they also (rightly) supported a rethinking of the budget-writing
process to reflect the high levels of uncertainty.
Breaking from the normal, full-year planning process, and
relying instead on short-term spending proposals, gave
budget-writers time to realize their early mistake and avoid the
kind of drastic cuts that seemed inevitable last spring.
Pretty soon, last year's deficit fears will seem like ancient
history. But when economic uncertainty returns, as we all know
it will, I hope we remember some of the lessons of this pandemic
year: keep an eye on the feds; slow the process down; don't
expect the next recession to look like the last one.
But I also hope that forecasters — myself included — are quicker
to incorporate new information and more ready to regularly share
their shifting sense of what's going on.
— Evan Horowitz is the executive
director of the Center for State Policy Analysis at Tisch
College at Tufts University.
The Boston Globe
Thursday, April 1, 2021
‘It’s going to hurt us’: Heating oil industry fights effort to
eliminate state’s rebates
Mass Save’s popular incentives, including no-interest loans,
could end in January
By Jon Chesto
The heating oil industry is fired up about a proposal to take
away energy-efficiency rebates from its customers as part of a
state-led effort to wean homeowners off fossil fuels.
At issue are priorities endorsed March 24 by the Energy
Efficiency Advisory Council that include phasing out Mass Save
rebates for new oil-fired systems for heat and hot water, as
well as no-interest loans for homeowners to install them, as
soon as January. Rebates for natural gas-fired and propane
installations would be ratcheted back significantly.
“It’s simply not fair,” said Michael Ferrante, president of the
Massachusetts Energy Marketers Association. “I wouldn’t say it’s
going to cripple the industry. But it’s going to hurt us. And
it’s going to hurt heating oil customers.”
The proposal from the council, which is chaired by the state
energy resources commissioner, follows recommendations issued by
the Baker administration in December for Massachusetts to reach
“net-zero” carbon emissions by 2050. The changes also line up
with aggressive goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that
were included in a sweeping climate law passed by the
Legislature and signed by Governor Charlie Baker last week. One
provision allows municipalities to adopt net-zero building codes
for new construction, which could effectively block fossil-fuel
hookups in future projects.
Significant changes in how buildings are heated will be needed
if Massachusetts is to reach its 2050 emissions goal. State
officials and environmentalists hope to encourage the use of
electric heat pumps in homes and discourage fossil fuels. The
ramifications could be huge for the 700,000-plus homeowners in
the state who use heating oil — as well as for the companies
that serve them.
Massachusetts electricity rates, meanwhile, are among the
highest in the United States, nearly double the national
average.
It’s against this backdrop that the Massachusetts Energy
Marketers Association, which represents about 400 heating oil
dealers, finds itself about to lose Mass Save rebates, which
range from $400 to $800 per installation, as well as access to
the popular no-interest HEAT loans, to subsidize oil system
installations. (The council recommends studying the impacts on
low-income households before changing the incentives for those
customers.)
Heating oil companies argue that their customers pay into Mass
Save via electric bill surcharges and should be able to get
rebates to upgrade their heating systems. Ferrante said he
worries the utilities that work with state officials on the
program have no incentive to support his industry. He said his
association intends to challenge the changes in court if they
are finalized.
“We’re under the microscope to be wiped off the map,” Ferrante
said.
He noted that many heating oil suppliers have taken steps to
address environmental impacts, by shifting to biofuel blends
that have much lower carbon emissions. For example, nearly 80
dealers participate in a state-run program to encourage the use
of biofuel, primarily discarded cooking oil, that can be blended
with standard heating oil; they receive incentives funded by the
penalties electric utilities pay for falling short of renewable
energy goals.
Among the participants: Cubby Oil & Energy. President Charlie
Uglietto said nearly all of the Wilmington company’s roughly
6,000 customers burn a 50/50 blend of petroleum and used cooking
oil. He said it costs homeowners about $50 more a year than
unblended heating oil. A few customers use fuel made solely from
discarded cooking oil.
From Uglietto’s perspective, biodiesel is a more cost-effective
way of addressing emissions than heat-pump installations, which
state officials want prioritized in the new Mass Save plan.
“Neither the state nor Mass Save nor a lot of people recognize
the value of liquid renewable fuels,” Uglietto said. “Why are we
making people buy $25,000 heat pump installations when we can
just change the fuel that goes into people’s oil burners and
achieve greenhouse reductions today for pennies on the dollar? I
just don’t get it.”
Caitlin Peale Sloan, who heads Massachusetts policy efforts for
the Conservation Law Foundation, said there isn’t enough
discarded cooking oil from restaurants to go around for the
heating oil industry to solely rely on it as a solution.
Ending oil rebates is one of many proposed changes to the Mass
Save program, which is regulated by the state and funded by
surcharges on electricity and natural gas bills. They will now
be used by the state’s major electric and natural gas utilities
as they formulate a plan for the next three years, with an eye
toward incorporating climate benefits.
“We are really scrutinizing all our fossil fuel incentives and
will be careful about which fossil fuel incentives that will be
retained in the next plan. This is not just about heating oil,”
said Patrick Woodcock, the state energy resources commissioner.
“We think that heat pumps should be integrated across the state
. . . It’s a technological breakthrough that Massachusetts will
seize. It’s just a matter of time. We do think that time is
now.”
Amy Boyd, a member of the efficiency council, said it and the
utilities will hash out a final version by the end of October.
She noted that heating oil customers could still use Mass Save
funds for other efficiency measures, such as insulating their
homes.
“Using ratepayer money to buy things that will keep fossil fuels
around longer is wasting ratepayer money,” said Boyd, policy
director at the Acadia Center, a climate-focused think tank.
“I’m really glad that the EEAC is taking a stance on the need
for electrification.”
But Emerson Clauss, co-owner of Allegiance Construction &
Development in Northbridge, said the shift to electric heat
still relies heavily on natural gas, the most prevalent fuel
source for New England’s power plants. Clauss said he’s also
troubled by the climate law’s net-zero language for new
construction, because it could box out heating oil, propane, and
natural gas as heating sources.
“More than half of our electricity comes from natural gas,” said
Clauss, president-elect of the Home Builders and Remodelers
Association of Massachusetts. “It sounds like we’re doing a
great thing, moving in the right direction. But aren’t we just
moving where the smoke is burned off?”
The Connecticut Mirror
Tuesday, March 30, 2021
Opposed by GOP, Lamont campaigns for climate initiative
By Mark Pazniokas, Capitol Bureau Chief
NEW BRITAIN — Gov. Ned Lamont was warmly greeted by Mayor Erin
Stewart, the Republican who recently announced she would not
challenge Lamont for governor in 2021. On Tuesday, they had
common cause — if only to a point.
Stewart agreed to appear outside a gleaming new apartment
building constructed on a city lot that she says was
unmarketable until the construction across the street of
CTfastrak, the busway much maligned in GOP circles.
The Republican mayor and Democratic governor each are boosters
of transit-oriented development, a popular and politically safe
approach to creating cities that are less reliant on
gasoline-powered vehicles, the largest single source of
greenhouse gases in Connecticut.
But Lamont has gone a giant step further by signing onto a
regional Transportation and Climate Initiative as a way to
reduce greenhouse gases and raise money for transit — a concept
bitterly opposed by many leaders of Stewart’s GOP.
In promoting TCI, as the initiative is known, the Lamont
administration is working to succeed where it failed horribly
two years ago in seeking support for highway tolls as a means to
modernize Connecticut’s creaky infrastructure.
And that brought him and Stewart to Columbus Commons, a new
80-unit apartment complex constructed on the site of the old
police station, the first phase of a mixed-use development on
Columbus Boulevard, across from the terminal of CTfastrak.
“It is the first ground up development that we saw in this city
in decades — brand new, brand new housing, all because of the
access to mass transit because of CTfastrak,” Stewart said.
Lamont, who announced his administration planned to use $3
million in pandemic relief to offer free weekend passage on
CTfastrak and other transit buses over the summer, said he was
trying to make transit-oriented development less abstract — and
something worth funding.
“Transit-oriented development is a concept,” Lamont said. “Let’s
show people exactly what it is. But everybody supports it.
Everybody supports infrastructure, everybody supports rail,
everybody supports what we want to do. They don’t necessarily
want to pay for it.”
Stewart kept her distance from TCI, which is opposed by the
leaders of the House and Senate Republican minorities in the
General Assembly.
“I’m here to talk about the benefits of transit-oriented
development has had in the community. And that’s what I spoke
about today. But I’m not a member of the legislature. That’s up
to these guys to get it passed.”
Those guys included Lamont, two top environmental and
transportation advisers, and Sen. Will Haskell, D-Westport.
Haskell is a supporter of TCI and the co-chair of the
Transportation Committee.
“But really I’m here today to speak to you as the youngest
member of the General Assembly,” Haskell said.
Even if the 33-year-old Stewart was not ready to sign on, the
Lamont administration is trying to sell TCI to the General
Assembly as crucial to the next generation, though there has
been no youth groundswell comparable to the social justice
movement arising from the the death of George Floyd and the rise
of Black Lives Matter.
Haskell, 24, who unseated a long-serving Republican incumbent in
2018, was a featured speaker at a recent youth climate summit
organized by Katie Dykes, the commissioner of energy and
environmental protection.
“I can tell you that they are earnestly looking to Hartford and
wondering whether the state legislature is going to stand up for
their future, whether lawmakers are going to stand up for clean
air and clean water for their generation to enjoy and for their
children’s generation to enjoy,” Haskell said.
TCI is a cap-and-invest program and will bring revenue into the
state – an estimated $89 million in 2023, increasing to as much
as $117 million in 2032. Connecticut, Rhode Island and
Massachusetts, the three states responsible for 73% of
transportation emissions in New England, have signed a
memorandum of understanding committing to the initiative.
Legislation is necessary to go forward, and the legislature’s
Environment Committee is expected to vote on the plan Wednesday.
It is opposed by the trucking industry and fuel marketers as an
added cost to businesses and consumers.
It has broad support among environmentalists, though the Sierra
Club and others are pressing lawmakers to gear the plan to
environmental justice, ways to ameliorate the impact of
pollution on poorer urban communities.
“It’s a pretty simple idea,” Haskell said. “It says that if you
are going to pump pollutants into the air, then you also have to
pay for the asthma that those pollutants create. It says that if
you’re going to pump pollutants into the air, then you also have
to pay to pave the way for green infrastructure. You’ve got to
pay for electric vehicle charging stations, you’ve got to pay to
bring our transportation infrastructure, our public
transportation infrastructure into the 21st century.”
Dykes and Lamont said Tuesday that TCI could help the state
leverage the federal transportation infrastructure funds that
the Biden administration is promising.
“We’re going to be able to do projects like this to attract
investment in transit-oriented development that helps limit the
amount of time that people have to spend in their cars on
commutes and getting around to the services that they want,”
Dykes said. “And these types of projects, what we’re doing with
the transportation climate initiative program, is going to
position Connecticut to be at the front of the line for federal
dollars that are going to become available from the Biden
administration.”
Lamont said the federal share of those projects is expected to
be 80% or 90%, but a state match still will be required.
“We got to put up our share out of a recurring revenue stream.
And that could be Transportation Climate Initiative,” he said.
In public-hearing testimony this month, House Minority Leader
Vincent J. Candelora, R-North Branford, opposed the initiative
as an added cost, but he also said it appeared that once
created, TCI’s costs would have no legislative oversight.
“Considering that the average American is struggling to stay
afloat due to the economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, now
is not the proper time to be pursuing this policy,” Candelora
told the committee.
Senate Minority Leader Kevin Kelly of Stratford and his deputy,
Sen. Paul Formica of East Lyme, submitted joint testimony
casting themselves as committed to clean air, if unwilling to
endorse higher costs on gasoline brought by Senate Bill 884, the
TCI measure.
“We share that goal of cleaner air,” they said. “However, we
must protect middle class families’ wallets in the process, and
Senate Bill 884 does not protect middle class families’
wallets.”
On Tuesday, Kelly said Republicans could achieve the same goals
without any added costs.
“The reality for Connecticut middle-class families is that
purchasing gasoline and food is still a necessity and increasing
taxes on both is extremely regressive,” Kelly said. “It’s also
misleading to suggest that the TCI gas tax will lead to cleaner
air in Connecticut as states to our west are not moving forward
with their own clean air reforms.”
The Boston Herald
Monday, March 29, 2021
Desperate Democrats led by Maura Healey flailing away at
weakened Charlie Baker
By Joe Battenfeld
Desperate Democrats led by Attorney General Maura Healey are
flailing away at a weakened Gov. Charlie Baker in hopes of
taking back the Corner Office in 2022 for the first time in
eight years. Whether it’s working is questionable.
Healey, flush with campaign cash and popularity within the
party, is directing a multipronged, not-so-stealth gubernatorial
campaign — ripping Baker on everything from coronavirus vaccine
delivery to opioids even though the governor is undecided on
running for a third term.
Baker is not even a cinch to win his own party’s primary.
Conservatives — including the Republican party’s own chairman —
have publicly challenged him on moving too far liberal for their
liking.
Baker’s popularity has taken a hit, according to the most recent
polling, as critics have pounced on the state’s rocky early
rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine and failing to prioritize some
vulnerable populations.
But Democrats take him for granted at their own peril. He’s
still more popular than Democratic statewide elected officials
and would have the bully pulpit of the governor’s office
throughout the 2022 campaign.
If Baker decides not to run for a third term, his lieutenant
governor, Karyn Polito, would be the early favorite though she
would likely face a stiff challenge from the conservative wing
of the party. Former state lawmaker and failed U.S. Senate
candidate Geoff Diehl is considering a gubernatorial campaign.
On the Democratic side, Healey is clearly the party’s first
choice to eject Republicans from the governor’s office, though
other Democrats led by Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone,
Harvard professor Danielle Allen and former state Sen. Ben
Downing are also plotting campaigns.
The attorney general has been crisscrossing the state — using
her publicly funded office by the way — in a campaign-like tour
of heavily Democratic areas like Brockton and Worcester.
In the last week she has attacked Baker for giving state
contracts to consulting giant McKinsey & Co, just months after
the company was forced to pay a $573 million settlement to
states for its role in marketing the pain medication Oxycontin.
“After what they did to families here, why would we reward them
more state contracts?” Healey asked on Twitter.
The Baker administration just recently handed McKinsey a $1.6
million study on the “future of work” following the coronavirus
pandemic. Baker officials have also given McKinsey millions more
in contracts with the state Department of Health and Human
Services related to COVID-19.
Healey also made a slew of appearances in Worcester, to visit
striking nurses, and in Brockton to visit local businesses hard
hit by COVID-19.
Her trip to Brockton came just a day after a visit there by
Baker.
Healey’s Brockton swing included a stop at a food pantry, which
by any stretch of the imagination has nothing to do with the
attorney general’s office.
Baker for his part has sought to dispel speculation that he’s
tiring of the job of governor, telling WBUR radio in a recent
interview that “we have a ton of work to do once we get past
this pandemic … there’s plenty to do here.”
The Boston Herald
Thursday, April 1, 2021
With Trump gone, Maura Healey turns ire on Baker
By Peter Lucas
No one misses Donald Trump more than Maura Healey.
Because with Trump gone, she has no one to sue.
Attorney General Healey, 50, a progressive Democrat, sued Donald
Trump close to 50 times during his four years as president, and
a made a big deal out of it each time.
Now she is complaining about three lawsuits Republican attorneys
general have filed against President Joe Biden, including
challenging Biden’s failed immigration policy as well as his
shutting down the Keystone XL pipeline that threw thousands out
of work.
Healey, who spent the past four years trashing Trump and his
agenda, said, “Donald Trump may be out of the White House, but
Republican attorneys general across the country are still doing
his bidding and conspiring to block President Biden’s agenda at
every turn.”
Not only did her GOP colleagues fail to overturn the results of
the election, “they’re hellbent on preventing a duly elected
president from undoing the illegal policies of the past four
years,” she said.
Healey, who has politicized the state’s law office, said, “For
four years, Republican AGs were complicit in Donald Trump’s
lies, hatred and attacks on our rule of law. Now they’re
launching baseless, politically motivated attacks against
President Biden.”
One of those “attacks” is challenging Biden’s chaotic
immigration policy that has created a humanitarian crisis at the
southern border.
Healey, as recently as last Sunday, accused the Republicans of
seeking to block Biden’s “rollback of Trump’s cruel immigration
policies.” The GOP suit is like the suit filed by Healey against
Trump. But now the shoe is on the other foot.
If Trump’s immigration policies along the Mexican order were
“cruel,” there is no word — except criminal — to describe what
is happening to thousands of parentless children illegally
crossing the border under Joe Biden.
Healey made her remarks in a fundraising appeal to supporters as
reports mount that she is planning to fun for governor in 2022
when incumbent Republican Gov. Charlie Baker, 64, may or may not
seek a third consecutive four-year term.
While there is no public estimate of how much taxpayer money
Healey spent on her lawsuits against Trump — most of which went
nowhere — Healey gained a lot of publicity for “standing up” to
Trump.
Surely it would be wickedly unfashionable in the woke world of
progressives if Healey filed suit against Biden even though he
is ultimately responsible — just as Trump was — for the sad
plight, even death, of immigrant children led to the border and
abandoned by Mexican traffickers.
But odds of the Democrat attorney general filing suit against
the Democrat president range from nil to none.
But with Trump gone as her main political target, Healey has
redirected her attention toward Gov. Baker, using Baker’s
distribution of the COVID-19 as a thin veil to go after him.
Charlie Baker has become her Donald Trump.
The attorney general’s office, for the record, has no role to
play in the distribution of the vaccine. However, this has not
stopped Healey from traveling throughout the state in a campaign
mode acting as though she does.
She is obviously testing the political waters and using the
pandemic and the vaccine to do so as she questions the “equity”
of the vaccine’s distribution.
Also, part of her campaign for racial justice and equity, the
new catchwords of the left, is her charge that under Baker’s
Massachusetts, “one of four children in the state” go hungry
every night.
It is not known what Baker’s plans are for 2022, and Healey has
not officially announced that she is running for the Democratic
nomination for governor.
The only Democrat to officially announce his candidacy for
governor is Ben Dowling, 39, of East Boston, a progressive
Democrat who served five terms in the state Senate from
Pittsfield before relocating to work for an environmental
start-up.
Interestingly, though, Healey was able to quickly elbow Downing
aside by taking over Downing’s issue of making COVID-19
vaccinations mandatory for state police, correction officers and
other first responders, something that Baker has balked at.
Downing made his proposal a week ago last Friday. Three days
later Healey echoed Downing’s remarks in a WGBH radio interview.
She said it was “irresponsible” for cops and other state workers
not to be vaccinated.
Ben Downing may not be a household name, but at least someone is
listening to him.
The New Boston Post
Tuesday, March 30, 2021
Conservative Democrat Jeff Turco Easily Wins State Rep Seat in
Winthrop and Revere
By Tom Joyce
A deeply Democratic district stayed Democratic on Tuesday — but
it’s a lot less left wing than it was.
The successor to former House Speaker Robert DeLeo (D-Winthrop)
in the Massachusetts House of Representatives will be former
Winthrop town council president Jeff Turco. The Democrat had no
problem winning the Tuesday, March 30 special general election
triggered by DeLeo’s December 2020 resignation to take a job
teaching about legislation and public policy at Northeastern
University. The seat has been vacant since then.
The self-described “moderate” Turco trounced his two opponents,
Paul Caruccio, a Republican, of Winthrop, and Winthrop resident
Richard Fucillo, an unenrolled candidate. Turco got 57.3 percent
of the vote (1,861 votes) while Caruccio got 14.3 percent (466
votes) and Fucillo got 14.6 percent (473 votes), according to
multiple reports.
The general election was much less competitive than the March 2
Democratic primary, which Turco won by 6.1 percent with a
plurality of the vote.
Turco was one of four candidates in the primary; he won it with
36.2 percent of the vote.
The runner-up in the March 2 race was Revere resident Juan
Jaramillo, who served as budget director for state Senator
Joseph Boncore (D-Winthrop) and is the political coordinator for
32BJ SEIU (Service Employees International Union). Jaramillo got
30.1 percent of the vote. The third-place finisher was Winthrop
resident Alicia DelVento, who served as a communications
director and policy adviser to state Representative Danielle
Gregoire (D-Marlborough) and as a legislative aide to then-state
Representative Jeffrey Sanchez (D-Jamaica Plain). She got 26
percent. And Winthrop resident Valentino Capobianco, who served
as the chief of staff for state Senator Paul Feeney (D-Foxborough)
before running for state representative, came in fourth. He got
7.7 percent of the vote.
Capobianco was the only one of those three candidates who
publicly supported Turco in the special election. He told
NewBostonPost in an email message on Sunday, “Jeff is an
honorable man and ran an honorable campaign. I’ll be voting for
him Tuesday as the Democratic nominee.”
Turco was the subject of controversy during the primary for some
of his conservative leanings.
Turco has said in the past that he voted for former President
Donald Trump in 2016. He gave money to U.S. Senator Susan
Collins (R-Maine) in 2020. He has expressed opposition to
abortion. He also has criticized U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren
(D-Massachusetts) and former President Barack Obama.
In response to his primary win four weeks ago, Planned
Parenthood Advocacy Fund of Massachusetts said it will help run
someone against Turco in 2022.
“Jeff Turco is dangerous and has no place on Beacon Hill,” the
fund tweeted. “And if he wins, we’ll be there in 2022 to primary
him and elect a candidate who will champion the sexual and
reproductive rights of their community.”
The Nineteenth Suffolk District in the Massachusetts House of
Representatives includes all of the town of Winthrop and parts
of the eastern and central portions of the city of Revere (Ward
1, precincts 1 and 2; Ward 2; Ward 3, precincts 2 and 3; and
Ward 5, precinct 3).
The Salem News
Wednesday, March 31, 2021
A Salem News editorial
Time to rein in the governor's power
A year ago, when it became clear the coronavirus was a major
threat to public health, Gov. Charlie Baker declared a state of
emergency and took charge by using the executive authority of
his position. He ordered businesses shut down, schools closed
and dictated mask mandates, limits on the size of gatherings and
dozens of other restrictions on daily life and business.
The power Baker wielded – and still uses – came by way of the
1950 Civil Defense Act, allowing him to issue executive orders
without legislative approval during a state of emergency. And it
was, without a doubt, an emergency.
The virus spread rapidly, the number of infections grew and many
hospital ICUs in the state filled to capacity. Baker designated
what constituted an essential worker. He ordered people to stay
home, if at all possible. He dictated what businesses could
open. And he kept much of the state in virtual lockdown for a
while to stop the spread of the virus.
Baker held almost daily press briefings in the first few months
of the pandemic, using that bully pulpit to inform nervous
residents, to highlight details about the opening of facilities
to handle the overflow of COVID-19 patients and to hammer home
the need for wearing masks and to practice social distancing.
For months last spring, summer and fall, lawmakers seemed
content to let Baker’s office handle the state’s response.
Now, with a year of experience behind us and widespread
vaccinations underway, some lawmakers are looking to scale back
Baker’s executive authority through legislation to limit a
governor’s power during a prolonged state of emergency. Clearly
no one expected this pandemic to grip the state for as long as
it has, and few could have predicted a governor would use this
authority for as long as Baker has. In any case, it’s past time
to curb the power given to the governor.
State Sen. Diana DiZoglio, D-Methuen, is one lawmaker behind
bills filed to limit the governor’s reach. She said recently she
believes the Legislature needs to exercise oversight or review
of executive orders in a reasonable period of time.
“This is not a dictatorship,” DiZoglio told State House News
Service. “The governor has taken a top-down, authoritative
approach to the COVID-19 response and as a result many residents
have not been heard. It’s too much for any one person and one
administration to handle when dealing with emergencies of this
scale and length.”
DiZoglio is proposing a 60-day limit on the governor’s emergency
orders, requiring him to go before the House and Senate for
extensions. The Civil Defense Act doesn’t require any such
review or impose a time limit.
On the House side, Rep. Nick Boldyga, R-Southwick, filed a bill
similar to what DiZoglio proposes that would impose a 30-day
sunset on emergency orders and mandates. Boldyga’s bill would
give state courts jurisdiction to hear cases challenging state
and local emergency orders.
His bill wouldn’t strip Baker of his powers, Boldyga told the
News Service. “But we have had no input on these executive
orders … and it’s time to restore those checks and balances in
government.”
DiZoglio echoed the concern that the legislative branch wasn’t
empowered to rein in the power of the governor.
“Our jobs should not be to simply write letters to the governor
hoping that he’ll take action,” she said.
The question of limiting a governor’s power during a state of
emergency isn’t unique to Massachusetts. Dozens of state
legislatures have filed more than 200 bills and resolutions to
scale back, restrict or provide more oversight over their
governors’ power during the pandemic.
Here in the Bay State, it’s past time for the Legislature to act
in this pandemic and that means curtailing the governor’s
emergency power before they’re needed again. |
NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this
material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior
interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes
only. For more information go to:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
Citizens for Limited Taxation ▪
PO Box 1147 ▪ Marblehead, MA 01945
▪ (781) 639-9709
BACK TO CLT
HOMEPAGE
|
