Tax Caps/Schools
Tax revolts seem to be an American tradition. Since the American Revolution, American citizens have fought the payment of what they felt were unjust taxes. School taxes have not been any exception to this. Proposition 13 (California), Proposition 2 1/2 (Massachusetts) and the New York State 2% property tax cap all have marked similarities but were born during radically different times. In this short essay, the author will research the three and compare and contrast their initial intentions, successes or failures. We will consider whether these laws were instituted by the vote of the public or of only their representatives. Further we will consider if municipalities or other unites were impacted in the same manner, namely schools, towns, village and/or cities. Primarily, this examination will be from the perspective the educational leadership as these financial topics impact education and the operations of their school districts.
Analysis
Property taxes are the manna of educational funding. Unfortunately, they are also the source of revolt. In the case of Proposition 13, it has served as the grandfather of these families of laws, in California and nationwide. Proposition 13 ( People's Initiative to Limit Property Taxation) was an amendment to the Constitution of the state of California passed in 1978, by the initiative process. California voters approved it on June 6, 1978. The proposition decreased individual property taxes through the assessment of property values at the 1975 value. It then restricted annual increases of the assessed value of real property to the inflation factor which was not to exceed 2% per year. It also forbade a reassessment of a new base year value except in the case of a change in ownership or upon completion of new construction. Besides decreasing property taxes, Proposition 13 also had language that required a two-thirds majority in both legislative houses with regard to future increases of state tax rates or amounts of collected revenue collected. This further included income tax rates. It also required a two-thirds majority vote in local elections for local government units that wanted to increase special taxes (Ferreira, 2009, 661-662).
60 in 1986 and in Proposition 90 in 1988. Those propositions allowed homeowners who were 55 or older who sell their house and buy another one of equal or lesser value to retain the tax base value of the original property. In other words, the property tax caps have a mobility never seen before (ibid., 662). Obviously, this effectively ties the hands of many school administrators to raise money through new tax levies. They are forced to cut, outsource or find alternative sources of funding.
The wide ranging effect of these low tax rates does not just benefit the middle class. In an interesting case study, financier Warren Buffett announced in 2003 that he paid property taxes of $14,410 (2.9%) on his $500,000 home in Omaha, Nebraska. However he paid just $2,264 (or 0.056%) on a $4 million California home. While Buffett may known as an astute guru, the low California property taxes were not his doing, but due to Proposition 13.
Basically, this is not just a tax break, but one that is not based upon income. A good example of how it would hit a school district is revealed in a Brookings report. They cite a parcel tax of $293 annually per property levied on behalf of the Palo Alto Unified
School District on all property within the district boundaries. This 2001 tax needed a two- thirds majority to pass (Wasi & White, 2005, 61). The income limitation of Proposition 13 are profound and severely limit the ability of schools to raise money.
Proposition 21/2 was passed as a Massachusetts statute that limits property tax increases on the part of Massachusetts municipal units that was passed by ballot initiative. It specifically called for an initiative petition in…
Public finance is an area of study that has received a great deal of attention throughout the years. In recent years public finance has become more of a critical issue because of the economic recession that has plagued the country. There are various methods of public finance that exist and remain as a popular way for local and state governments to raise revenues. For the purposes of this discussion the
The fair / unfair distribution of school resources. In 2000, the ACLU filed suit (Williams et al. v. State of California et al.), claiming that the obligation of the state to provide all students with "basic educational necessities" was not fulfilled. One million of California's students are deprived of educational basics, such as qualified teachers, decent school facilities, and appropriate textbooks. An important part of these problems are caused by the
It occurs due to the change in effective tax rates in the form of property tax amount related to the market value among the groups of property owners. It is known that the appraised market value in the form of yardstick for the property tax equity was used because it is considered as a reasonable way (Dennis-Escoffier & Fortin, 2007; Mikesell, 2011; Nelson, Collins, & Healy, 2008). Economic Effects The tax
This means that they should have alternative sales taxes imposed. These small increases will result in school districts receiving more income. As the legislature can avoid making dramatic cuts backs from the general fund and will have another source of revenues. This will improve their ability to provide educators with the resources they need. (Balu, 2011) A good example of this can be seen with a study that was conducted
reason I had time was that it was summer and we don't have as much work in the summer. In fact I urge you to double-check the salary numbers because even with a magnifying glass they were very hard to read. In the future I would urge you to send full-sized pages of everything, or you may find that at the last time a model paper writer has discovered that he
finance and financial entrepreneurship. The basis of the article is on a discussion that was held on this subject among four leading lights of financial entrepreneurship in the United States - Michael Milken, Lewis Ranieri, Richard Sandor and Myron Scholes. These people are famous in their own right and have had a sizeable role in financial entrepreneurship in the U.S. over the last 20 years. We have first discussed
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now