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Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

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Matt
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by Matt » Fri Apr 05, 2019 4:54 am

NS8401 wrote:
Wed Apr 03, 2019 9:57 pm
Matt wrote:
Wed Apr 03, 2019 8:01 pm
craig11152 wrote:
Wed Apr 03, 2019 2:43 pm
If we are not going to raise a tax to fix the roads where will the money come from?
I'm not inclined to believe the state has billions of dollars hidden somewhere.
Well, when the person putting forth the proposal is also proposing using some of the revenue to increase the EITC and is robbing local municipalities of tax revenue on bullshit political grounds (Ionia), excuse me if I'm not willing to give her the benefit of the doubt on anything.
Ah the private prisons thing again... Ionia needs to consider branching out... prisons aren’t meant to be a business or the life blood of a community... they can attract something else if they really want to... I don’t think they have the will or the skill to do so however... they’d rather whine about not getting their prison... don’t care...

As for using some of the revenue as an economic boost... that’s right up the Reganomics alley isn’t it? Stimulate the economy and it’ll lead to more revenue...
The arrogance of "ionia needs to consider branching out" is astonishing. This property has sat un-utilized off the tax rolls for 10 YEARS! The property already has the infrastructure needed to become a detention center with little re-work. You are suggesting that Ionia can just sell the property to anyone, and if they can't "fuck em". That really makes a lot of sense.
TC Talks wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 8:55 pm
She put Schuette's face in the sand because we want the damn roads fixed. You boys are lost, sit back and let us get government working again. She's a moderate that's the best you're going to get. And fuck the losers in Ionia, I'm tired of reading about rapes and rotting food in private prisons.
Wrong on all accounts. She won because the state has been flipping parties after 2 terms (Engler being the exception, but the seat flipped after he was term limited) going back to when Jim Blanchard was elected in 1982. She's a partisan hack, not a moderate. If you can't see that with her childish moves in Ionia, Caro, and the Straits of Mackinac, you really have the blinders on.
NS8401 wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 11:37 pm
TheForce wrote:
Thu Apr 04, 2019 9:04 pm
Ohio passes gas tax

https://www.dispatch.com/news/20190403/ ... tem-vetoes
Gee even the Republicans are doing it!
Could you be any more dishonest? From the article:
House Bill 62 increases the gas tax by 10.5 cents per gallon, to 38.5 cents, and the diesel tax by 19 cents, to 47 cents a gallon, effective July 1. The money will be used to fund state and local highway and street improvements.
To even suggest that the Ohio increase is even slightly comparable to the clown princess of Lansing's proposal is insulting to anyone who reads this. Whitmer wants to increase our gas tax by more than Ohio's new tax. I think most people understand we do need additional revenue for roads, but $0.45/gallon is pure and utter bullshit.


What's more pathetic: harassing an old man who is paying to do a radio show or supporting a grifter like Trump?

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TC Talks
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by TC Talks » Fri Apr 05, 2019 8:59 am

Everything is wrong and everyone is stupid?

I missed the point when you figured out everything. Tell us, how do we start fixing the roads?


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craig11152
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by craig11152 » Fri Apr 05, 2019 9:32 am

The problem with using the sales tax at the pump to fix the roads is that money is used elsewhere including almost 73% to the School Aid Fund. So its a robbing Peter to pay Paul kind of thing.
And its not like Michigan is known to be overly generous to public schools. We are ranked about 21st in spending but are a smidgen below the US average.
So taking that money to fix roads may help solve one problem but will just make another problem equally worse.


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TC Talks
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by TC Talks » Fri Apr 05, 2019 9:51 am

Repeal some of the taxing mechanisms that were repealed during Snyders trainwreck.


“The more you can increase fear of drugs, crime, welfare mothers, immigrants and aliens, the more you control all of the people.”
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MWmetalhead
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by MWmetalhead » Sat Apr 06, 2019 9:44 am

Rick Snyder - for touting his CPA chops - sure did a shitty job of ensuring Michigan has all the revenue necessary to support basic needs.

Corporate taxes absolutely needed to be cut, but he cut them too sharply.

After his road funding proposal was overwhelmingly rejected by voters, he then took a victory lap after signing into law legislation that merely tempered the rate of decay to our roads and bridges.

Too many of our public schools are failing and have legacy liability issues. County & local roads are in miserable condition because of Lansing's moronic funding formula + state law that limits the types of taxes that counties and municipalities can levy.

Household budgets are being strained because of outrageously high auto insurance rates spawned by a system that resembles the very worst elements of Obamacare. (Snyder didn't put forth nearly enough effort over eight years to spur change here. I suppose it's because his Chamber of Commerce buddies weren't making a big deal of insurance rates at the time.)

Here is what I would do:
- FIRST: impose fee schedules for medical care provided under auto insurance policies, require other means of insurance to be exhausted before allowing use of the MCCA fund, and provide a menu of options for the PIP portion of personal auto insurance coverage. Also, allow insured motorists to opt-out of no fault. These changes would save the average two car household at least $1,000 per year. (Savings will be much greater if HH drivers opt for reduced PIP coverage and/or opt out of no-fault coverage.)
- SECOND: Remove the 6% sales tax from fuel and replace it with a $0.30 per gallon fuel tax. Devote 100% of the funds to road & infrastructure. At an average fuel price of $2.50 per gallon, this would amount to a mere $0.15 per gallon increase. At an average fuel price of $4.00 per gallon, this would amount to a mere $0.06 per gallon increase.
- THIRD: From item #2 above, the General Fund will need a way to replace lost revenue. About $800 million to $1.0 billion. I would propose raising the individual income tax by 0.75% for four years. I would expand the homestead property tax credit or personal exemptions to help low income filers. This change would raise about $1.3 billion in new revenue.
- FOURTH: I would raise the cigarette tax from $2.00 per pack to $2.50 per pack and I would raise the wholesale tax on tobacco from 32% of the wholesale price to 40% of the wholesale price. After adjusting for negative impact on product demand, these tax increases should raise at least $150 million in new revenue.

For a family of four making $75,000 per year, with two late model vehicles in the household the above changes would result in the following household budgetary impacts:
- Step one: $1,000 per year savings
- Step two: assuming an average fuel price of $3.00 per gallon, average vehicle fuel economy of 24 miles per gallon, and total household miles driven of 30,000 per year, $150 per year cost increase
- Step three: assuming no additional tax exemptions (total personal exemptions of $17,600 are claimable under current law) or credits are taken, $430 per year cost increase.
- Step four: if household is tobacco free, no change.

Net savings for my hypothetical family of four = $420 per year. If the drivers in that household opt for reduced PIP coverage, annual net household budget savings could easily exceed $1,000.

In the process, our roads and bridges would receive $1.3 billion in additional annual funding (on top of the new funding that is yet to come from the law passed in November 2015), and our general fund would receive at least $450 million in new annual funding, most of which could be invested in schools or natural resource protection.

One reason I limit the income tax increase to four years is to provide a checkpoint for behavior of auto insurance rates and examination of the MCCA fund balance. My guess is actual savings will exceed the projections I lay out above, meaning nearly every household in Michigan can absorb the 0.75% income tax increase on a permanent basis and still come out "money ahead."

It would not surprise me if the fee schedule concept & MCCA usage restrictions make the MCCA fund balance so lush that the statutory fee is able to be reduced by at least 75% in future years.

Why no corporate income tax increase? Bear in mind only C-corporations pay Michigan's corporate income tax, and that rate is currently set to 6%. Only $866 million of total annual state budget revenue comes from this tax. I think Snyder should've set this tax to 8% as opposed to the current 6%. Raising it now to 8% would probably cause corporations to scream bloody murder (even though the tax is only applied to adjusted net income, not gross revenue)- and I am not sure all the acrimony the political class and common citizens would be forced to endure would justify the incremental net tax revenue of $200 million to $250 million per year such a tax increase would raise.

All LLCs, partnerships and s-corps file their state taxes using the personal income tax form anyway, so they would all be subject to the 0.75% rate hike I mention in item #3 above.



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MWmetalhead
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by MWmetalhead » Sat Apr 06, 2019 10:11 am

I used this document as the backbone for most of my state budgetary impact assumptions:
https://www.house.mi.gov/hfa/PDF/Briefi ... y18-19.pdf



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Bryce
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by Bryce » Sat Apr 06, 2019 12:03 pm

Wow...

Excellent.

Run MW, Run.


New York and Chicago were all in with respect to their sanctuary status — until they were hit with the challenge of actually providing sanctuary. In other words, typical liberal hypocrisy.

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MWmetalhead
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by MWmetalhead » Sat Apr 06, 2019 1:22 pm

Thank you, sir! :)

Rest assured - I won't be running for office anytime soon. That said, I do intend to write my state representative, state senator, house leadership and senate leadership to share my ideas.

What I think will ultimately happen, legislatively, is this:
- House and Senate leadership will make the error of addressing road funding prior to addressing auto insurance reform.
- The Republicans will probably propose a road funding plan that consists of two parts: (i) a $0.10 - $0.15 per gallon fuel tax increase and/or an increase in vehicle registration fees, and (ii) additional funding tied to voters approving an increase in the general sales tax.
- Because households will not yet have received the benefit of auto insurance rate relief, they will be tax weary and likely vote down any ballot proposal seeking to increase the sales tax.

I know Speaker of the House, Lee Chatfield, wants all taxes collected at the pump to go toward roads. Right now, in the current 2018/2019 budget year, $356 million of general fund revenue goes toward roads.

Under the November 2015 law, I believe the mandatory number increases to $800 million by 2021. If fuel prices average $3.00 per gallon, that $800 million will be roughly equal to 80% of the general sales tax revenue collected at the pump (i.e. 80% of $1.0 billion). So, Chatfield essentially wants to increase the $356 million number to $1.0 billion, which would leave a ~$654 million hole in the general fund. I simply don't see how slashing general fund spending by $654 million is viable. I think there is where (ii) from the previous paragraph comes into play.



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MWmetalhead
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by MWmetalhead » Thu May 09, 2019 7:13 pm

Whitmer is such a piece of shit:
https://www.mlive.com/public-interest/2 ... ystem.html

(And for those who have short memories or are newbies to the Buzzboard - I hated Snyder, too.)



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TC Talks
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by TC Talks » Thu May 09, 2019 9:53 pm

MWmetalhead wrote:
Thu May 09, 2019 7:13 pm
Whitmer is such a piece of shit:
https://www.mlive.com/public-interest/2 ... ystem.html
(And for those who have short memories or are newbies to the Buzzboard - I hated Snyder, too.)
Being the minority leader of the Senate, ask yourself "What does she know that I don't know." Let's start with: She represents a wider breadth of citizens than you. So she's not a piece of shit, she is simply ensuring no one get fucked in this deal.


“The more you can increase fear of drugs, crime, welfare mothers, immigrants and aliens, the more you control all of the people.”
― Noam Chomsky

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Matt
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by Matt » Fri May 10, 2019 8:45 am

TC Talks wrote:
Thu May 09, 2019 9:53 pm
MWmetalhead wrote:
Thu May 09, 2019 7:13 pm
Whitmer is such a piece of shit:
https://www.mlive.com/public-interest/2 ... ystem.html
(And for those who have short memories or are newbies to the Buzzboard - I hated Snyder, too.)
Being the minority leader of the Senate, ask yourself "What does she know that I don't know." Let's start with: She represents a wider breadth of citizens than you. So she's not a piece of shit, she is simply ensuring no one get fucked in this deal.
This is possibly the dumbest comment ever posted. She is a partisan hack piece of shit. She isn't looking out for anyone.


What's more pathetic: harassing an old man who is paying to do a radio show or supporting a grifter like Trump?

bmw
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by bmw » Fri May 10, 2019 10:30 am

Funny how Whitmer ran and campaigned as a moderate who could work with republicans to get things done, and now that she's in office she won't even support a bill with bi-partisan support.

It is gonna be a long 6 years.



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ZenithCKLW
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by ZenithCKLW » Fri May 10, 2019 10:42 am

The bill was a bipartisan turd. Get both parties back to work to come up with something better. Moving on.



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TC Talks
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by TC Talks » Fri May 10, 2019 11:45 am

bmw wrote:
Fri May 10, 2019 10:30 am
Funny how Whitmer ran and campaigned as a moderate who could work with republicans to get things done, and now that she's in office she won't even support a bill with bi-partisan support.

It is gonna be a long 6 years.
Even more funny is that the Republicans didn't get the message that the citizens of Michigan are not happy with ineffective governing. The Republicans dominated the Senate, the House and the Governor's office and look how screwed up the state is right now. I understand that doesn't seem to bother someone like Matt, because he's a lemming that can only parrot the party line. But I ask you, where is your scrutiny to the party that accomplished nothing in all of the time they had control?


“The more you can increase fear of drugs, crime, welfare mothers, immigrants and aliens, the more you control all of the people.”
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bmw
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Re: Whitmer ultimatum: No budget signature without 'real' road funding

Post by bmw » Fri May 10, 2019 12:19 pm

I think I've been quite clear that I was no fan of Snyder. Not sure how that is relevant to Whitmer governing very differently than how she campaigned.



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