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Taking a look at Rendell’s proposed tax increase

Republicans, as expected, are up in arms and, as usual, spreading untruths about Gov. Ed Rendell’s proposed increase in personal income tax to help cover the commonwealth’s expected $3.2 billion budget deficit.

Despite cutting more than $1 billion out of the proposed budget for fiscal year 2009-2010 with still more to come, the GOP is accusing Rendell of refusing to make any cuts and of trying to maintain prerecession spending levels during a time of economic crisis. Sounds like the right side of the aisle is either trying to make Dems look like the heavies here, or simply trying to eliminate some of the programs to which they are ideologically opposed, regardless of their importance to the citizens of Pennsylvania. Maybe a little of both.

But I think if Pennsylvanians had all of the facts, the rational among us at least wouldn’t be so quick to judge—and just might understand Rendell’s reasoning.

First of all, even if Rendell and the Dems went along with all of the GOP’s proposed cuts, we would still be facing a deficit because their proposals simply do not cover the massive hole in revenue the commonwealth is facing this year. And do we really want to sacrifice our future by cutting things like job training and educational spending, or our present welfare by reducing spending on health care and public safety (that would be cops) just because we’re peeved that our tax rates are going to be marginally increased on a temporary basis? Sounds to me like the proverbial cutting off of the nose to spite the face. And even with these proposed cuts, budget deficits are expected to do nothing but grow for the next several years—as great as $10 billion by 2012.

Pennsylvania’s current personal income tax rate, at 3.07 percent, is second lowest among the 41 states in the U.S. that have a personal income tax. Even with Rendell’s proposed .5 percent increase, we would still have the fourth lowest rate in the nation. And the governor is proposing that, by law, the rate revert back to its current level in three years, something that has been done successfully twice before In the state’s history, both times in response to budget deficits brought on by a national recession: once in 1983 under Republican Gov. Dick Thornburgh, and again in 1991 under Democratic Gov. Bob Casey. Rendell’s is not as fanciful a proposal as it may at first seem, or as some may insinuate it to be.

We are truly all in this together, and we all must shoulder our share of the burden. Everyone is facing difficult times right now, no one is immune, and trying to angrily place blame or shift responsibility to someone else is simply not going to cut it. We all need to remember there are 12 million of us in this state; it is not just about you or me. Isn’t it about time that we all, especially those who like to wrap themselves in patriotism and the American flag and hold themselves up as the moral arbiters of the land, remember that, according to most moral traditions, we are all our brothers’ keepers, and start putting the greater good above personal interests and gain?

Otherwise, what exactly is your “moral superiority” all about?

June 23, 2009 at 2:58 pm

--Tammy Alonso

Tags: Ed Rendell, Taxes

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