This legislative session’s priority tax cut bills have gotten their first airing in the Senate. Proponents make their cases.
The arguments are familiar, but they basically are that cutting business taxes leads to business growth which produces more money for state services and programs. The main attention has focused on Senator Eric Schmitt’s proposal to allow a fifty percent deduction of business income in five years.
One advocate, Kansas City lobbyist Woody Cozad, says Illinois is raising taxes; Missouri and Kentucky are standing still and all of the other neighboring states are cutting taxes. He says Missouri has to cut business taxes to keep up. “We don’t have an option about not being in this race…Missouri better get its track shoes on and get into the race and run,” he says.
Lobbyist David Overfelt of the Missouri Retailers Association says most of his members are the small business people who would benefit from the cuts. “We need the tools to create the jobs that will increase income for our vital services,” he says.
The proposal was part of a larger plan approved by the legislature last year but vetoed by the Governor. Enough Republicans in the House refused to vote the party line to defeat a veto override effort.
We’ll have the opponents’ side Monday.