Descussion with City Council member and King Co Tax Assessor on state income tax (subsidized)

[margaretBartle]

There's a moderately interesting Civic Cocktail broadcast with a panel consisting of City Councilperson Lisa Herbolt, King County Tax Assessor John Wilson, and KVI commentator John Carlson at Civic Cocktail: Tax Shock & Better Gardening | seattlechannel.org

Of course, both Wilson and Herbolt want an income tax. The thing that perked me up, though, was when Wilson, at about 17 minutes, talked about the need for a serious tax reform discussion.

I've never seen that. Is it possible to have a serious discussion about tax policy that is not DOMINATED by egocentric celebrities and politicians?

The very issue of "regressive tax" is a good example. I have looked, for twenty years, to figure out why the people who support an income tax say that around 17% of the income of the lowest quintile goes to taxes.
(They divide the population into five income groups, each called a "quintile". The lowest quintile makes up to about $10,000 year, and the highest quintile makes over $120K a year. Give or take - it's been a while since I looked at these numbers)

This number makes no sense unless you assume that the lowest quintile gets free or highly subsidized housing, medical care, childcare, food, and transportation, and spends a huge percent of their disposable income on booze and alcohol. The closest thing I could find to explaning how those numbers are derived implied that very thing - mentioning the high "sinner" tax as affecting the poor disproportionately.

But aside from that claim,the real issue is: do you believe the politicians and pundits are really interested in helping the average working person? Do you really believe that pundits and politicians are immune to the interests of their super-wealthy owners and campaign contributors?

Do you really think the super-wealthy will pay their fair share of income tax? Or are they just pushing for an income tax, so the working-class families will pick up the slack when their multi-multi-million dollar mansions get their property taxes lowered?

Do you think that a "serious" discussion will include things like, "how do we ensure that the policically well-connected don't game the new tax system?" or "How do the politically-connected currently game the tax system?" or "What kind of transparency tools can be get BEFORE we enable a new revenue source, so that we can monitor the effects of tax policy change?

That last one is key, and I suggest that until we get a way to really look at where our tax monies are coming from and going to, we NOT open up yet another revenue stream.

Origianlly, the federal income tax was only for the duration of World War I, and was only 1% on income over $100,000 a year - a fortune in those days.

Once the state constitution is changed, all bets are off.

But it seems like tax policy discussion seems to be limited to sound bites, and oratorial blowhards.