This week’s economic forecast was nothing short of devastating for Colorado’s short-term future. The economists who work for the Joint Budget Committee in the state legislature delivered the worst revenue forecast in decades, and lawmakers are now faced with previously unthinkable choices in order to cut $3.3 billion out of our state budget — about three times what we faced during the Great Recession.
It’s a terrible situation, but there is hope in a proposal that would recalibrate Colorado’s tax system by cutting taxes for the 95% of Colorado’s families and businesses who make less than $250,000 per year and raising them on the 5% of Coloradans who make more than that. The proposal would close at least half of that devastating budget gap in one fell swoop.
It’s what’s commonly known as a progressive income tax, and 32 states already have it.
This budget catastrophe faced by Colorado is worse than it appears at first glance: lawmakers only have discretion over less than half of the total $30 billion budget, meaning that a $3.3 billion cut is 27% of the $12.2 billion in general fund dollars. We face painful choices between cutting funds for our worst-paid-in-the-nation teachers at our public schools, our already embarrassingly underfunded system of higher education, and payments to doctors who treat the most vulnerable and lowest income Coloradans on Medicaid. We also have the “discretion” to eliminate tax breaks for senior citizens to help them stay in their homes, which no one wants to do.
Fortunately, new polling from my friends at Fair Tax Colorado shows that 68% of voters, including more than half of Republicans, support a progressive income tax instead of slashing schools, roads and health care.
What’s the catch? The so-called Taxpayer Bill of Rights requires any ballot initiative that increases state revenue, no matter how and from who, beginning with the total amount of revenue raised in order to scare voters, in all caps, like a Trump tweet. In this instance, “SHALL TAXES BE INCREASED BY $2,000,000,000” will be the first thing voters see. The fact that 95% of us get a tax cut is buried in a mountain of legalese. The misleading sticker shock concocted by tax cheat and convicted felon Douglas Bruce could mean that an idea enjoying almost 70% support loses at the ballot box.
I asked Scott Wasserman, president of The Bell Policy Center for his thoughts on progressive tax reform in the current context of the coronavirus cuts, and he said, “there’s a popular idea about how to change our tax code in a way that makes it fairer and avoids some of the budget cuts that are going to devastate our schools, our seniors, and our kids. Are we really going to walk away from an opportunity to prevent the worst cuts to our essential services when the answer is staring us in the face? The political will is there, the support across the partisan divide is there, the answer is there. Shame on us if we ignore it.”
Many of the right-wing’s self-appointed budget “experts,” have been uncharacteristically quiet since the nightmare economic forecast this week, with the credibility of their typical mantra, “we don’t need more revenue, just prioritize the budget,” shipwrecked on the shores of mathematical reality. But one Republican senator, John Cooke of Weld County, spilled the beans when he said to a reporter, “I’m happy it will cut back their agenda by quite a bit. I think there is going to be pain for both sides, but more on the Democrat agenda than ours.”
Their government-drowning fantasy has come true, and yet their brilliant budget-cutting ideas are, so far, nowhere to be found. Meanwhile, the legislature is going to have to make catastrophic cuts this year, and Republicans in the state House and Senate will vilify the majority Democrats and Gov. Jared Polis for the horrible choices they have to make while offering no constructive ideas of their own.
But we could have a chance to reverse some of these devastating cuts this November. The voters could be asked a very simple question: should the top 5% of income earners pay more in taxes, while the other 95% of us get a tax cut, which will bring an estimated $2 billion into a state that now has just cut $3.3 billion out of our budget?
If voters can see through the deceptive language in TABOR, I have a hard time believing that a large majority of Coloradans won’t be voting yes.
Ian Silverii is the executive director of ProgressNow Colorado, the state’s largest progressive advocacy group.
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