Governor Kasich recently hosted a Tax Cut Town Hall with Ohio small business owners to discuss the two-year state budget proposal and $1.4billion tax cut for Ohioans.
In case you missed this event, you can watch it below:
You can watch the original video here.
In this recent editorial, the Intelligencer calls for Ohioans to support Governor Kasich’s proposed income tax cut. Read more below:
Some have suggested Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s drive to reduce income taxes is not a comprehensive enough approach to spurring the state’s economy. Perhaps not. Attention also needs to be given to specific aspects of the tax and economic development program.
But targeting specific businesses for tax relief and development spending should not be given precedence over general tax reform. That would amount to picking winners and losers – seldom if ever a good idea for government at any level.
Kasich is right: Providing income tax relief to Ohio families and businesses is the best strategy. After all, the economy is driven by consumer spending.
Allowing Ohioans to keep more of their hard-earned money, rather than sending it to Columbus, would have a multiplier effect benefitting the economy as a whole. The idea should be pursued.
You can read the original editorial here.
In this Dispatch editorial, Gov. Kasich is praised for his leadership in working with legislators to balance Ohio’s budget and lay the groundwork for economic success. Read more here:
Two years ago, when Ohio was headed for an $8 billion shortfall and John Kasich was running for governor, talking about cutting and maybe eliminating the state income tax, skepticism was understandable.
The weak economy and enormous deficit made any talk of a tax break seem impossible.
Yet now, two years into Kasich’s administration, the budget not only is balanced, but the state’s rainy-day fund has grown from $1.78 (that’s not a typo) to $482 million, with the likely prospect of another $500 million when the state receives an anticipated payment from JobsOhio, the independent economic-development authority that will make the payment in exchange for the use of future profits from state-controlled liquor sales.
A healthy rainy-day fund is essential for more than keeping the state government running during tough times. The state’s bond rating, which is essentially its credit score, is based in part on how much money the state keeps on hand for emergencies. A prudent amount of savings means that Ohio’s taxpayers get a better interest rate when the state borrows money for large projects.
The rebuilding of Ohio’s finances was accomplished without raising taxes, and Kasich wants to take that a step further, to give Ohioans an income-tax break. Because most small businesses pay taxes via personal income tax, such a break could be a powerful boost to the state’s economy.
A tax break will be easier to consider if Kasich can win over legislators to his plan to raise taxes on oil-and-gas drillers in Ohio’s Utica shale to rates closer to, but still generally lower than, those in neighboring states.
Not everyone is happy with Kasich’s plans; many Democrats and local governments are inclined to see any new revenue source, including the revitalized rainy-day fund and the possible shale tax, as a chance to undo cuts made to balance the budget. Forces in the legislature are pushing to revert to the same careless attitude of a few years ago, when Gov. Ted Strickland and the Democrat-controlled House spent the state into a disastrous $8 billion shortfall.
Kasich is right to withstand the pressure. The long-term solution is a healthy economy, and tax relief will do more to spur job creation than would an increase in city and school-district spending.
You can read the original editorial here.
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The Wall Street Journal recently wrote about Governor Kasich’s plans to support Ohio’s booming energy industry while providing all Ohioans with some economic relief in the form of an income tax cut. Read more here:
The U.S. fracking boom is leading an economic transformation, at least in the states with the wisdom to manage it well—c.f., gas-rich North Dakota’s unemployment rate of 2.9% versus gas-rich New York’s 8.9%. Less noticed is that it can also improve the tax climate, as evidenced by Governor John Kasich’s plan to convert Ohio’s energy wealth into a tax cut.
And
Severance taxes are routine in energy states like Texas and Alaska, and they also commonly apply to other nonreplaceable resources like timber and coal. Mr. Kasich wants to modernize the tax structure now that Ohio is becoming an energy producer, but without enlarging government. Annual proceeds would go into a fund devoted to lowering all personal income tax rates dollar for dollar.
The proposal would raise the severance tax to about 2.7% of the market value of oil or gas, depending on the type of well. As the industry matures and production peaks, the tax would on present price trends raise between $459 million and $547 million each year, equivalent to a 5% across-the-board tax cut for each of Ohio’s nine brackets.
And
The energy levy shouldn’t stifle development. A study by Ernst & Young for the Ohio Business Roundtable compared the proposed severance levy to those in seven competing states, including North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Texas and West Virginia. It found Ohio’s tax would be 16% lower than the average for wells producing dry gas, 40% for oil. Including all energy taxes, Ohio would be 40% and 48% lower than the average, respectively.
The plan is controversial in Ohio’s Republican-controlled legislature and among some Tea Partiers, and as with any tax increase the danger is that some future government will renege, pocket the revenue and return to raising income taxes. But the energy levy is sure to increase if production booms, and the Kasich formula ensures the money isn’t spent on new programs. Meantime, lower rates on income and capital investment are a net plus for economic growth.
You can read the entire article here.
The Canton Repository recently wrote this editorial about Governor Kasich’s proposed severance tax adjustment and subsequent income tax cut for Ohioans. Read more here:
Can Republicans in the Ohio House come up with another reason for opposing Gov. John Kasich’s plan to raise the severance tax on oil and natural gas? Not that they should — the tax hike is a perfectly reasonable proposition that will benefit Ohioans in a big way. Thankfully, the drawback some GOP legislators are citing doesn’t pass the calculator test.
Kasich wants to raise to 4 percent the tax on much of the oil and gas extracted by horizontal fracturing. Some of his fellow Republicans say this will put a damper on drilling in the state. One House member said soon after Kasich unveiled his plan that she didn’t want to “cripple a fledgling industry when there’s so much potential there.”
No crippling on my watch, Kasich has said, because even with the increase, Ohio taxes would remain among the lowest levied by states where drillers do business.
This week, the accounting firm of Ernst & Young backed him up.
The new tax still would put Ohio 16 percent below average among major oil- and gas-producing states and 80 percent below the average for all taxes on drillers, the firm’s study found.
The state currently charges 3 cents per 1,000 cubic feet of natural gas and 20 cents a barrel for oil. “Two dimes,” Kasich has said incredulously.
Given the richness of the Utica shale formation in Ohio, including in Stark and Carroll counties, drillers have plenty of incentive to stay here.
And Kasich has plenty of incentive to push for the severance tax increase, which GOP legislators say they may study by the end of the year. It’s part of a great plan, which he pitched this way to state legislators (who promptly removed it from his midbudget review bill): “Every cent — 100 percent — of new tax revenue from the high-volume horizontal wells like those used in Ohio’s Utica and Marcellus shale formations will be used to reduce income taxes the following year. Each of Ohio’s nine tax brackets will be reduced to ensure that taxpayers of every income level receive a tax cut.”
What’s not to like? Anyone?
You can read the original editorial here.
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