 |
Update April 2013
In this issue:
-- Right initiative, wrong revenue source
-- How to pay for college
-- On Air
-- Education tax rates: Get on it
-- Low unemployment isn't the whole story
Right initiative, wrong revenue source
The Vermont House rejected Gov. Shumlin's proposal to raise revenue for expanding child care by cutting the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). The Senate will decide later this month. Support of the EITC, which helps lift the lowest-wage workers out of poverty, has been almost unanimous in Vermont, from free-market economist Art Woolf to Public Assets' Paul Cillo. There are other child-care funding options. Yet the Shumlin administration is sticking by its plan. It has scaled back the child-care initiative, though, from $17 million to $12 million.
How to pay for college
Pay It Forward would allow Vermonters to attend college without paying upfront or taking on debt. Students would pay a fixed percentage of their incomes over their working lives to cover their college costs. As part of its campaign promoting smart investments in people, programs, and infrastructure, One Vermont arranged for John Burbank from the Seattle-based Economic Opportunity Institute (EOI) to speak to the House and Senate Education Committees and Vermont media about Pay It Forward. Read EOI's report.
On Air
Public Assets is a member of One Vermont, a leading critic of the Shumlin administration's proposal to cut the EITC. The coalition aired a statewide radio ad this month that encourages smart investments, especially in child care, and calls on legislators to make sure these investments benefit all Vermonters and are paid for equitably. Listen to the ad.
Education tax rates: Get on it
How do voters know what the tax impact of the next year's school budget will be? By figuring their taxes based on rates set by the Legislature before Town Meeting Day. That's how it worked for the first two years after Act 68—the 2003 overhaul of Act 60—was passed. Since 2006, however, lawmakers have been putting off that decision until the end of each session, and it looks like they're headed there again. H.265, which would set the fiscal 2014 education tax rate on nonresidential property at $1.44 and the base residential rate at $.94, has passed the House but is sitting in the Senate Finance Committee.
Low unemployment isn't the whole story
Vermont's unemployment rate dropped to 4.1 percent in March—by far the lowest rate in New England and among the lowest in the country. But there were fewer Vermonters employed this March than there were a year earlier, when the unemployment rate was 4.8 percent. How can that be? Read Public Assets' Jobs Brief.
Public Assets Institute is funded by grants and donations. Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to support our work.
|
|
Fact: State appropriations increases from 2003 to 2011:
• EITC—49 percent
• fuel assistance—142 percent
• food stamps—372 percent
Source: Governor's office; Finance and Management; JFO
town2town
bringing fiscal data home
Unemployment in 2012
Vermont's average annual unemployment rate was down to 5 percent in 2012, and unemployment dropped in more than four out of five Vermont towns. Still, the latest data from the Vermont Department of Labor show 113 towns with unemployment rates higher than the statewide rate in 2012.
The map shows the annual unemployment rate for each Vermont town with a labor force of at least 20 people.
Calendar
Put People First March & Rally
May 1, 2013
11 AM - 4 PM
Statehouse, Montpelier
Connect
Follow us on Twitter
Like us on FaceBook
Subscribe to our RSS feed
Receive this from a friend?
Sign up to get our future Updates.
|
|
