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Originally Posted by Descant
Do we really NEED $500MM? Didn't the legislature cut the budget by 8% in 2009 and create a new floor for lower spending? In Chris Sununu's first term, we cut some (business) taxes and raised revenues. In the mid-teens, we eliminated taxes on NH Trusts, even for those who weren't residents and money flowed in for re-investment. Next year, we will eliminate the I & D tax and all the DRA folks who administer that program can result in lower personnel expenses, or be assigned to more "profitable" pursuits. All us retirees who need I & D income will have more money to spend.
Raising taxes to raise more money should not be the default option in a government budget process.
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You are failing to differentiate between taxes and rates. Lower rates lead to more economic activity and generally larger tax revenue.
The first option the budget will need about $500M to replace SWEPT and stop the donor community situation from returning. The SWEPT would be gone, but the new mechanism would need to be in place. The Legislature would need to act to remove the mandates pushing the grants up.
The second option is to keep SWEPT, accept the donor communities - their taxes would go higher; the Legislature would still need to remove the mandates pushing the grants up.
The third option is to keep the SWEPT, accept the donor communities; the Legislature does not remove the mandates... but constitutionally must come up with the revenues to pay for the mandates.
That all needs to be done in nearly one year.
No tax rate reduction will increase revenue to the State by $500M in one year's time... that is just math. Never mind if the Legislature fails to act on the mandate dismissal and needs to raise as much as $1B
So the budget process has to start with constitutionally required costs... and raise funding for at least those...
That means at a bear minimum the Legislature must find $500M in revenue in other sources, I get lot of landowners to say ''I love being a donor community''.
Politically both suck.