How will your budget change when your sales tax goes up 25% overnight? Plan for it because that's exactly what will happen if you allow the REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION REFERENDUM (formerly the Transportation Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax) to pass in the special election this July 31st.
Georgia collects a 4 percent tax on nearly every product purchase you make. This referendum will raise that to 5 percent. While its proponents call this a penny-tax, those Lincoln-heads add up to hundreds of dollars a year in additional taxes ... potentially thousands if you make any big purchases such as a wardrobe for a new job or needed furniture. Since this is a consumption tax, it is transparent to the income of the person paying it. That will, of course, hit low and fixed income households hardest. Based on projected tax revenue and population, this new tax will cost an average family of four an extra $8,000 over the next 10 years. How's that for a penny hike?
Over and above the 4 percent sales and use tax that goes directly to the state, most of us Georgians already pay an additional 2 or even 3 cents more per dollar in sales tax to our county. So, what's another penny? In such counties, this referendum will raise sales taxes higher than the tax you pay on the income you receive to buy the products on which you pay the sales tax. Not counting federal or local taxes, you will have to earn $115 next year to pay the tax to buy a $100 dollar item.
Most of us realize taxes never die. Toll booths were installed on Georgia 400, for example, to pay for that infrastructure improvement with the promise that they would be removed once the debt was paid. That debt was retired in 2010. Tolls are still being collected. That's because the State Road and Tollway Authority led by then-governor Perdue voted to continue the tolls for ... you guessed it, another 10 years. If the tolls weren't extended, they told us, critical infrastructure projects supporting more growth would not be done. Sound familiar? With 157 projects approved by the Roundtable for the greater Atlanta area, and the need to prioritize these projects as funding comes in, you can expect this new tax to be extended beyond its initial 10 years at least once or twice. That would make it permanent.
Many of us Georgians are still seething over the new I-85 "HOT Lanes". That's understandable. Our bureaucrats spend our hard-earned tax dollars building projects they can then use to collect even more fees (taxes). But the real purpose of these lanes wasn't just to remove money from our pockets. No, the HOT Lanes are a pilot for future infrastructure projects that will, as the HOT Lanes have done, squeeze more traffic into few lanes and further constrict commuters. Why? To better justify more uneconomical spending on mass transit including MARTA. Ninety-five percent of job commuters in the Atlanta metro region use roads, 5% use transit. By constricting options and choices, more frustrated commuters will opt for transit. And this piece of social re-engineering will cost you dearly.
Unlike nearly every one of us drivers who pays 100% of our transportation expense, MARTA passengers in FY 2011 paid less than 1/3 (27%) of the line's operating expenses. To make up the shortfall, MARTA operations are funded by 50% of a one-cent sales tax collected in the City of Atlanta and in Fulton and DeKalb counties. In FY 2011, this amounted to $158.5 million. Federal grants (from tax revenue and borrowing) amounted to another $53.2 million. MARTA still ran a deficit of $70 million on operating expenses of $390 million. Likewise funding available for capital expense was reduced by $100 million when total expenses reached $320.8 million. Despite years of cost and service cutting and recent fare increases MARTA is expected to continue losing tens of millions of dollars every year.
Twenty-two of the 157 projects approved for "investment" in the Atlanta region under the referendum are for transit. These projects will cost us taxpayers $3.16 billion. Of these, at least 11 projects are for MARTA. Only in the inverted economic world of the career politician does it make sense to spend $539 million to upgrade a transportation system that will continue to lose more money.
Unless you VOTE NO on the REFERENDUM July 31, 2012, you can count on every politician, bureaucrat, special interest, MARTA rider, construction worker, union member, and business who stands to gain the use of your money to ensure it is approved. Only YOU can stop your tax from increasing.
Bruce Duncil
A Concerned Taxpayer
Duluth
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