Tuesday, December 26, 2023
A new report singles out West Virginia for the state’s costly tax cuts enacted this year, and the drastic lost in revenue expected to exacerbate existing budget shortfalls in higher education and other state services.
The report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that beginning in 2025, the Mountain State will collect more than $800 million a year less in personal income tax revenue than it was previously.
The Center’s Senior Advisor for State Tax Policy, Wesley Tharpe, said the gains from that personal income tax cut are going to flow overwhelmingly to people at the top of the income-tax scale.
“West Virginia is one of many states that already has a history of underinvestment in public services,” said Tharpe. “The state of saying things like a very strained funding for colleges and universities, a state foster care system that is really struggling to keep up with need.”
According to the report, the cuts will result in the bottom 20% of West Virginia filers – those making under $19,000 a year – receiving $21 per year on average, while the top one percent will take an extra $10,000 a year.
Tharpe added that income taxes help buffer states against hard times.
“States really want to be raising enough revenue so that they have that cushion for things that may be entirely unexpected,” said Tharpe, “like, say, the COVID-19 pandemic, or things like an economic downturn.”
According to the report, twenty-six states cut their personal income tax rates and/or corporate income tax rates in 2023, thirteen of them multiple times.
Supporters of slashing personal income taxes argue such measures put more money in the pockets of residents and boost local economies.
Cut out the sales tax if you are serious about helping all the people.
Id love to do something about it,and make the rich pay their fair share,but how,this is our state and we have no say in how its managed,we elect those officials and if the majority isn’t happy with what they’re doing we,as any employer, should have the right to remove them and appoint someone that has our best interests in mind but good luck,asking them to leave will not work,they hang onto power like a fat kid hangs onto a candy bar,so,yea,,it sucks for the working man in WV but if anyone has any ideas on how to change things for the better plz let me know how
This is utter nonsense. The so called “report” is nothing but regurgitated propaganda from a liberal leftist group funded by none other than George Soros and controlled by a board filled with liberal government politicos from as far back as the Jimmy Carter administration and anti Reagan bureaucrats. Any time government, any government, cuts taxes and puts money back in the pockets of hard working taxpayers – that is a GOOD thing. Period. Be wise to anyone who argues otherwise.
I wish taxes took half our income. That way we’d have excellent roads and a bigger library.
Then KY can have a guaranteed deficit. Real smart.
Trust me. The LC library will continue to get bigger. What else will they do with their extra millions of our tax dollars coming every year?