Graduated income tax amendment asks the most fortunate among us to pay a little more

For five decades, Illinois’ income tax system has left working Illinoisans paying higher taxes and rich Illinoisans paying lower taxes than their counterparts in virtually any other state.

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Gov. J.B. Pritzker signs legislation last year setting out a rate structure for a graduated income tax in Illinois, in anticipation of approval of a constitutional amendment this fall.

AP Photos

This coming election, the graduated income tax amendment presents Illinois voters with the opportunity to nix the flat tax and replace it with a progressive system that would give 97 percent of Illinois taxpayers a tax cut and help us get out of the coming budget deficit, while asking the most fortunate to pay just a little more. 

Opinion Newsletter

For five decades now, Illinois’ income tax system has left working Illinoisans paying higher taxes and rich Illinoisans paying lower taxes than their counterparts in virtually any other state with a similar state-level income tax. Our state now shamefully boasts the third highest effective tax rate on low-income families and the 8th highest level of wealth inequality in the country, a direct result of taxing all income the same under a regressive tax. 

SEND LETTERS TO: letters@suntimes.com. Please include your neighborhood or hometown and a phone number for verification purposes. Letters should be 350 words or less.

On its face our current system may seem fair, but taxing rich and poor incomes the same is actually incredibly unequal. Take it from a rich person, a dollar to me means a lot less than a dollar to any person making the minimum wage. And with so many struggling under the pressures of a COVID-19 economy that has disproportionately hurt low-income and middle-class families, it’s time we start shifting some of the state’s tax burden onto the wealthy Illinoisans who can most afford to pay more.

Come November, we’ll have the rare opportunity to directly attack the inequality and imbalance that has upended countless lives. Vote Yes on the Graduated Income Tax Amendment, and tax rich people like me to make our state a better place for future generations.

Michael Pine, member, Patriotic Millionnaires

Obama economy stronger

As President Trump desperately seeks a magic bullet, he is testing the argument that the economy will only recover if he is re-elected. 

Contrary to Trump’s claims, though, he inherited a pretty good economy. A look at unemployment and gross domestic product graphs makes it easy to argue that he merely rode a wave that President Barack Obama had set into motion a half dozen years earlier.

In Trump’s first three years, 1.48 million fewer jobs were created than were created in Obama’s last three years, so a claim of improvement is debatable.

When considering Trump’s promise of economic recovery, consider his 2016 promise of 4% annualized GDP growth (or higher, depending on the day). The reality is that, in his first three years, the GDP grew at an annualized rate of 2.5%, with a high of 2.9% during the economic “sugar high” year that followed the tax cut. This was mediocre.

Regardless of who received the direct benefits of the tax cut, it was not the promised “rocket fuel” for the economy. Instead, its effect quickly faded and resulted in the first trillion-dollar federal budget deficit in a non-crisis year, 2020, before the pandemic arrived. This made the economic hole that we are in deeper.

The stock market is not the economy, but it is going up partly because the low interest rates that the recession requires drive money away from safer investments and into the stock market. So some of the growth in the markets is actually a symptom of economic weakness.

There has been little economic magic and a lot of hot air in Donald Trump’s promises. Why should he be believed now?

Curt Fredrikson, Mokena

Rebalance economy

The U.S. economy is struggling to recover from the impact of COVID-19 while China’s economy is on the path to a full recovery. The basic reason is that the Chinese economy has a balanced economic makeup with an industrial sector at 41% and a service sector at 52%, while the U.S. has an unbalanced economic makeup with an industrial sector at 19% and a service sector at 80%. The U.S. economy needs a top to bottom realignment and the sooner the better.

Warren Rodgers Jr., Matteson

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