Andre and Tom Crawford don’t much like the business tax cuts passed by the Senate yesterday. I’d like to take a moment to expand on what I wrote in the comments of that post.
In my mind, the bills that have now passed both houses of the Legislature signal that many of Georgia’s Representatives and Senators (Democrats and Republicans alike) understand that small business is the backbone of our economy. For the Republicans, I hope this is a return to being the party of small business, not just the Party of big corporations who throw around lots of cash through campaigns and lobbyists.
While Crawford’s article cited “tax gifts” (his words) to Delta, Gulfstream, Aflac and others as examples that tax cuts simply don’t work, I would counter that what doesn’t work is targeted tax cuts to a small number of large corporations. The bills passed yesterday benefit large corporations for sure, but they also benefit the small businesses that employ well over half of all those employed in this State. Giving those businesses a break will most certainly stimulate Georgia’s economy.
The proposal put back in by the Senate to phase out over time Georgia’s corporate income tax could prove to be a boon to our economy. As we compete with other Southern States for jobs having no corporate income tax could prove to be the deciding factor in many companies minds. I hope the House will agree to this proposal (they should since it was in the original proposal in the House).
As for the $600 million these bills will “cost” the State of Georgia, boo freaking hoo. While we’ve cut our budget about 10% this year, our budget has grown from $7.6 billion in 1990, to $14 billion in 2000, to about $18.9 billion this year (down from $21 billion last year). Each person’s share of the budget has grown from around $1100 in 1990 to almost $2000 this year (based on data culled from budget documents on the Governor’s webpage).
For those of you who think the fat from the State budget is gone I’ll tell you what I was told a few weeks ago: “The State Department of Education has two canning plants in south Georgia.” Why do they have these plants? “To teach kids how to can, of course.” Yep, there’s no more fat in our budget.
We trimmed $2 billion from the State budget this year but the work has just begun. Giving a $600 million tax break to the States businesses will help increase the pressure to keep on cutting waste from the budget.
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“For those of you who think the fat from the State budget is gone I’ll tell you what I was told a few weeks ago: “The State Department of Education has two canning plants in south Georgia.” Why do they have these plants? “To teach kids how to can, of course.” Yep, there’s no more fat in our budget.”
Yes, we can?
“The State Department of Education has two canning plants in south Georgia.”
I think we could get by with just one.
The biggest reason jobs are down is two fold. One we are buying more than we consume ie trade deficit and we hid the problem via easy access to credit ie debt. And now the credit market has become too tight.
The solution is fixing the credit market and America investing in products that we can export or products that take us off foreign dependency. Unless we focus on this we are just playing a shell game.
Education is the third rail of Georgia politics.
That is in the CAN.
Count one more lost job…that of Gena Evans as the new State Czarina of All Transportation…the House gutted Perdue/Cagle legislation today. Told you so, didn’t I? No way the Speaker was going to give up control of DOT after they had wrenched it from Perdue’s grasp:
Thursday, March 26, 2009, 5:13pm EDT
Georgia House to nix new transportation agencyAtlanta Business Chronicle – by Dave Williams Staff Writer
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Georgia DOT board ousts Evans
Metro Atlanta Chamber ready for transportation funding bill
Atlanta council gives qualified support to rail agreement
Atlanta, DOT bury hatchet in rail line dispute
House Republican leaders are abandoning Gov. Sonny Perdue’s proposal to create a new state transportation agency to assume key duties now performed by the Georgia Department of Transportation, House Speaker Glenn Richardson said Thursday.
Richardson, R-Hiram, told members of the House Transportation Committee that he and his leadership team have agreed to shrink the governor’s bill from 114 pages down to about 20.
The Senate narrowly passed Perdue’s legislation three weeks ago, but House members have expressed concerns that the new agency would be run by a board appointed only by the governor, lieutenant governor and speaker. All lawmakers, including rank-and-file members, get to elect members of the DOT board by congressional district.
“We heard what you said,” Richardson told the committee. “We understand that you don’t wish to create a new agency or change the way we elect the DOT board.”
Richardson said the pared-down bill will be reduced to dealing with transportation planning and appropriating issues and will ensure that the legislature has a say in those matters.
In pushing the bill, Perdue and Senate Republican leaders have argued that the DOT has become dysfunctional, failing to deliver needed transportation projects in a timely manner. They said the new agency’s structure would make it less parochial and more able to look at transportation needs from a statewide perspective.
The House committee will meet on Friday to take up the new version of the bill. It likely would reach the floor of the chamber by the middle of next week.
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Count one more job lost before it was even created…Gena Evans is toast in her envisioned new role as the Czarina of All State Transportation …the House has nuked her and Sonny and Casey…told you so 4 weeks ago…no way the Speaker and his henchman would give up the control of DOT after they had knifed Gena Evans…SB 200 is dead…Casey and Perdue are clueless.Thursday, March 26, 2009, 5:13pm EDT
Georgia House to nix new transportation agencyAtlanta Business Chronicle – by Dave Williams Staff Writer
Print Email Reprints RSS Feeds Add to Del.icio.us Digg This CommentsRelated News
Georgia DOT board ousts Evans
Metro Atlanta Chamber ready for transportation funding bill
Atlanta council gives qualified support to rail agreement
Atlanta, DOT bury hatchet in rail line dispute
House Republican leaders are abandoning Gov. Sonny Perdue’s proposal to create a new state transportation agency to assume key duties now performed by the Georgia Department of Transportation, House Speaker Glenn Richardson said Thursday.
Richardson, R-Hiram, told members of the House Transportation Committee that he and his leadership team have agreed to shrink the governor’s bill from 114 pages down to about 20.
The Senate narrowly passed Perdue’s legislation three weeks ago, but House members have expressed concerns that the new agency would be run by a board appointed only by the governor, lieutenant governor and speaker. All lawmakers, including rank-and-file members, get to elect members of the DOT board by congressional district.
“We heard what you said,” Richardson told the committee. “We understand that you don’t wish to create a new agency or change the way we elect the DOT board.”
Richardson said the pared-down bill will be reduced to dealing with transportation planning and appropriating issues and will ensure that the legislature has a say in those matters.
In pushing the bill, Perdue and Senate Republican leaders have argued that the DOT has become dysfunctional, failing to deliver needed transportation projects in a timely manner. They said the new agency’s structure would make it less parochial and more able to look at transportation needs from a statewide perspective.
The House committee will meet on Friday to take up the new version of the bill. It likely would reach the floor of the chamber by the middle of next week.
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How much of the budget reduction was enabled by the flood of money from Washington?
Can the canning plants. Bring in Hollywood. Have a can film festival.
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