Posted on 04/27/2002 5:37:42 AM PDT by GailA
Doctors urged to support hike of cigarette tax By Mary Powers powers@gomemphis.com April 27, 2002
Tennessee Medical Association members heard a plea Friday to help increase the state's cigarette tax.
Sen. Rosalind Kurita (D-Clarksville) and Sen. Curtis Person (R-Memphis) urged TMA delegates to lobby for passage of the first such increase since 1969.
"It is important to pass this to prevent children from picking up this deadly addiction," said Kurita, whose appeal drew applause from several hundred attending a luncheon at the Adam's Mark hotel. In Tennessee, 41 percent of teenagers use tobacco products, which means Tennessee leads the nation.
The proposal would push the current state tax on a pack of cigarettes from 13 to 43 cents. Person said that's about the national average.
In March, the Senate Finance Committee rejected the proposed increase. But Kurita told her physician audience she believes it still can win approval this year.
Today TMA representatives are scheduled to vote on a proposal to put the group on record in supporting the increase. Another resolution calls on the group to support legislative efforts to raise the legal age for purchasing cigarettes from 18 to 21 and bolster enforcement.
TMA has 6,600 members in Tennessee. Its 167th annual meeting ends today.
- Mary Powers: 529-2383
BARELY TWO months before the end of Tennessee's fiscal year, state lawmakers still don't know how they will eliminate a budget deficit that has grown to $480 million - an amount 37 percent higher than previous estimates.
When they figure that out, they can start to decide how to balance next year's $9.5 billion budget, which includes a projected deficit of as much as $1.3 billion. That is, assuming both parties' front-running candidates for governor don't try to sabotage that effort, too.
Lawmakers this week rejected Gov. Don Sundquist's emergency proposal to increase the state sales tax rate from 6 to 7 percent to help balance this year's budget. In the absence of comprehensive tax reform, that probably was the right thing to do.
"Temporary" sales tax increases have a nasty habit of becoming permanent in Tennessee. And another permanent hike in a regressive, inefficient tax that places the state at a competitive economic disadvantage is about the last thing the state needs now.
The General Assembly has a constitutional obligation to balance the state budget. But it finds itself with little time, few options, and an impotence of will that has lasted more than three years.
Lawmakers concede it is legally and practically impossible to cut state spending enough and lay off enough state employees, in such a short time and with such a big gap, to balance this year's budget in that manner alone.
Even if they were to apply every penny of reserves the state has squirreled away in various accounts, that still would not be enough to fix this year's budget. And blowing all the rainy-day money now would merely deepen the state's budget hole next year.
Legislators may yet cobble together a package of cuts and fund raids that will get them through this year. But they continue to evade their duty to enact a long-term solution to Tennessee's budget crisis that makes state taxes fairer and more efficient, and provides enough money to pay for vital state services - education, health care, public safety - adequately. The current tax structure does none of these things.
A reasonable - if not perfect - plan to accomplish those goals is before them. House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh (D-Covington) has proposed, and Sundquist appears to support, the creation of a 4.5 percent personal income tax with generous exemptions. The state would exempt groceries, clothing and non-prescription drugs from sales taxes, and repeal the special state tax on investment income. The plan would limit state tax collections to a prescribed percentage of total personal income.
The odds against legislative enactment of a broad-based income tax in an election year remain long. Yet bipartisan House approval of the plan would give it valuable momentum in the more lethargic, poorly led and income tax-phobic Senate.
Naifeh appeared to be making progress toward assembling a House majority for his plan. Then, however, gubernatorial candidates Van Hilleary and Phil Bredesen - who have run like scalded dogs from any substantive campaign discussions of tax and budget issues - both vowed to seek repeal of the income tax if they were elected.
Such self-serving, irresponsible pandering by Hilleary, a Republican, and Bredesen, a Democrat, could give timid lawmakers of both parties the excuse they need not to support the plan. Why cast a tough vote for something that will just be overturned?
Messrs. Bredesen and Hilleary will find it hard to believe, but resolving Tennessee's fiscal crisis now is more important than electing either man governor in November. Still, voters deserve to know how Gov. Bredesen or Gov. Hilleary would balance the state budget, with or without a broad-based income tax.
If either candidate has a budget plan that consists of more than slogans and cliches, let's hear it. And if they have nothing of substance to offer, both politicians would do a service to the officials who are truly trying to address Tennessee's urgent budget problems by keeping quiet.
Or they could cut the $58M in sports junk out of this purposed budget, the $131.3M in pay raises. (State workers got a 3% pay raise last year) When was the last time YOU got a 3% pay raise?) We haven't had a pay raise in over 4 years. And may have to take a pay cut if hubby can't find a job with the same pay level, (he is currently unemployed due to a buy out).
Lawmakers concede it is legally and practically impossible to cut state spending enough and lay off enough state employees, in such a short time and with such a big gap, to balance this year's budget in that manner alone.
So, just because it might not completely close the gap, no spending cuts should be part of a solution? And here's a radical thought, when it's legally impossible to do something, repeal the law, they are the "lawmakers" after all.
The plan would limit state tax collections to a prescribed percentage of total personal income.
How? What would they do, make it part of the law? How long would that last? Until the liberals had spent all the money the new tax would generate and needed more? Wouldn't they just amend the law to bump the amount? Sounds like a self-serving placebo entered to enhance passage but have absolutely no real meaning.
the creation of a 4.5 percent personal income tax with generous exemptions...
Generous by whose standard, and for how long? Generous exemptions remain at the whim of the legislature. "Generous exemptions" are, of course, code words for "If you're one of the little people, don't worry, you won't have to pay because the exemptions will shield your income, but not those rich folks. News flash for Clueless in Knoxville: punishing the achievers is a sure way to put Tennessee's economy in the toilet and keep it there. Once again, for those that took the short bus to editorial school, capitalism won, socialism lost. Time to take all the class warrior paraphernalia off to the Tennessee Museum for Really Stupid Ideas.
Still, voters deserve to know how Gov. Bredesen or Gov. Hilleary would balance the state budget, with or without a broad-based income tax.
Don't Tennessee voters overwhelmingly oppose an income tax? Aren't they saying, "I don't care how you lawmakers close the gap you created as long as it's not with an income tax? Is democracy something that's tolerated as long as the views of the people agree with those of the editorial staff?
I've followed the Tennessee struggle over the income tax with some interest. I moved to Connecticut shortly before Lowell Weiker saddled the citizens of this state with one against their wishes. Polls at the time had 80% against the income tax. Two-thirds wanted our budget gap closed by reduced spending. Weiker got himself elected by saying an income tax was a bad idea, them promptly set about encating one. Initially, he went about it the right way by touring the state and debating the merits of his proposal. However, he met with such hostility against the tax he quickly abandoned democracy and went to the oligarchs in the legislature and held on until the tax bill was passed -- would it surprise you -- by the Democrats. Connecticut went, instantly, into a 5+ year recession. Best wishes in you fight in Tennessee.
If an income tax is such a wonderful idea, why don't they just put the issue before the voters and let them approve it?
Since confiscating an additional 5% of everyone's income to pay for day care vans that are driven by drug addicts makes so much sense, why is the legislature afraid to let the voters impose that tax upon themselves?
Now you're playing their game. Let them figure out what to cut. That's their JOB. If they implement the tax you dont' think they're going to come up with ideas about where you can ecomonize do you? I called my state representative and urged her to vote against the income tax. She asked how the state's budget should be balanced. I told her with spending cuts. She asked what I wanted to cut. I asked her what she recommend I cut to pay my soon-to-be new $200 per month obligation to the state. She told me in so many words she had no friggin'idea. (OK, the friggin' part was added by me, but the rest was pure Janet Poss, Oligarch Extraordinaire).
Fixing TennCare alone would fix the budget criris.
King Don has 1.2B in BRAND NEW SPENDING he wants funded. Including MANDATORY pre-school for 4 year olds. There is $58M in SPORTS spending that is NOT ESSENTIAL that could be cut. Not to mention the $25M for the grizzlies parking garage.
King Don has demanded and gotten a $7 BILLION dollar spending increase in 7 years.
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