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Conservatively Speaking
State Senator Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin) represents parts of four counties: Milwaukee, Waukesha, Racine, and Walworth. Her Senate District 28 includes New Berlin, Franklin, Greendale, Hales Corners, Muskego, Waterford, Big Bend and parts of Greenfield, East Troy, and Mukwonago. Senator Lazich has been in the Legislature for more than a decade. She considers herself a tireless crusader for lower taxes, reduced spending and smaller government.
Senate Democrats are at it again
By Mary Lazich
Saturday, Dec 15 2007, 11:10 AM
Democrats who control the state Senate aren’t happy unless they’re coming up with new ways to reach into your pockets and take away more of your hard-earned money.
Remember “Healthy Wisconsin,” the Senate Democrats’ incredibly expensive government health care plan proposed in the state budget? The plan became the target of national ridicule.
In an editorial in July titled, “Cheese Headcases,” the Wall Street Journal wrote:
“Wow, is "free" health care expensive. The plan would cost an estimated $15.2 billion, or $3 billion more than the state currently collects in all income, sales and corporate income taxes. It represents an average of $510 a month in higher taxes for every Wisconsin worker.
Employees and businesses would pay for the plan by sharing the cost of a new 14.5% employment tax on wages. Wisconsin businesses would have to compete with out-of-state businesses and foreign rivals while shouldering a 29.8% combined federal-state payroll tax, nearly double the 15.3% payroll tax paid by non-Wisconsin firms for Social Security and Medicare combined.
This employment tax is on top of the $1 billion grab bag of other levies that Democratic Governor Jim Doyle proposed and the tax-happy Senate has also approved, including a $1.25 a pack increase in the cigarette tax, a 10% hike in the corporate tax, and new fees on cars, trucks, hospitals, real estate transactions, oil companies and dry cleaners. In all, the tax burden in the Badger State could rise to 20% of family income, which is slightly more than the average federal tax burden.
As if that's not enough, the health plan includes a tax escalator clause allowing an additional 1.5 percentage point payroll tax to finance higher outlays in the future. This could bring the payroll tax to 16%.”
The plan did not make its way into the final state budget. But Senate Democrats aren’t giving up on their plan to mandate government health care. Senate Majority Leader Russ Decker told the Wausau Daily Herald that their government health care plan will be re-introduced early next year.
According to the Wausau Daily Herald, “The plan would group employer-sponsored health insurance into one pool, thereby spreading risk among a larger population and lowering costs for employers and workers alike. Those who are self-employed would be able to buy in as well. The plan would be funded through a $15 billion payroll tax.”
That’s not all.
Senator Decker also told the newspaper that Senate Democrats will introduce a measure exempting the first $60,000 of a home's value from local school taxes.
The Daily Herald reports, “That would ease the burden on low- and middle-income folks but bring less money to school districts. To make up for the loss, tax rates on home values above $60,000 would be raised -- a rate that also would apply to commercial and industrial properties. For example, the owner of a $150,000 home would pay no taxes on the first $60,000 of the home's value, but a higher rate on the remaining $90,000 of value.”
That could result in a huge tax increase for Wisconsin homeowners who already pay some of the highest, if not the highest property taxes in the nation.
The Senate Democrats see government spending, tax increases, and government mandates as the solution to every problem. It appears their goal is to see the day that Wisconsin ranks number 1 in all forms of taxes. We must do everything possible to make sure that does not happen.
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