“So, where’s my money?” or political fuzzy math
Published on Oct 14, 2006 at 12:02 am.
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Well the governor’s race here in Texas is heating up. It is interesting. We have a sitting governor up for re-election, but he is facing such a groundswelling of resentment from his own party that a major section of the party has broken off and is backing an independent candidate, who herself broke with the Republican party when it was clear that the current governor was going to win the primary election. Facing off against those two is an entertainer, who’s main campaign point is that he is not a politician running for the office. He’s got quite a following of people just sick of Texas politics. And then there’s the Democratic candidate, who is running fourth in a four person race. In fact, most people in the state know the other three candidates, the governor and the two independents, but would have a tough time thinking of the name of the fourth guy. We haven’t had an election this mixed up in years.
Well, anyway, the governor has had advertisements running for a month or so praising the job that he did on tax reform and public school funding. I blogged about this back when they were talking about it before, but I can’t find that entry just yet to reference. At any rate, he is claiming tax relief, with a statement that he has repeated since the law was signed, saying that the average Texan will get a $2000 tax break. At the time, I pointed out that the math didn’t work, and I even blogged about it. People at the college take me seriously when I say things so definitely, and I imagine that some of you do, too. A lot of other people, like at church or neighbors or such, haven’t seen me doing my thing so much, so they didn’t take me seriously. After all, he’s an astronomy professor, what does he know?
Well, lately one of the independents has been running her campaign commercials on TV saying that the governor isn’t playing straight on the tax issue, which I’ve said for a while. Well, now the numbers are really in. I have now gotten my property tax bill for this year. Carefully looking at it, I notice several things. First, instead of a decrease in my property tax, this year I owe more than last year, by about $60. Some decrease. The much bantied about “school tax reduction” did, in fact, cut my school tax … by $4. County, city, and other taxes made up the difference. So, what gives?
Well, for one thing, my home is appraised for more than last year, so a property tax rate cut can still lead to higher property taxes. But, if I look at that effect, and apply the current tax rate to my last year’s appraisal, I find that the promised $2000 tax cut is really a drop of $115. OK, even a politician can figure out that 2000 is not the same as 115. What gives? Well, there is fine print. According to the legislation, only half the cut goes into effect this year, so next year the full thing hits. OK, so that would be a savings of $230. That is still only 11.5% of the promised savings. Well, whenever they show that commercial, there is very quick fine print flashed at the bottom of the screen. The $2000 is a savings over five years. OK, but for me, five years, with $115 this year and $230 the other four only adds up to $1035, about half. Oh, but there’s more fine print. Only part of the school tax is cut — the operations and maintenance part. School districts can still issue bonds to pay for construction and other things, and the debt service on those bonds doesn’t count when it comes to tax cuts. Up to 1/3 of the school tax can be from debt service. Only the other 2/3 is subject to the tax cut. But even that doesn’t add up. Think back to what he said, the “average” tax payer. That doesn’t mean the average home owner. It is the average tax payer. That means all the businesses out there that have multimillion dollar assets. Now, this starts to make sense. As an individual voter, I am not the one getting the savings, because I am not average. (Actually, I have long known that I am far better than average in most things!)
Actually, this issue is coming back to bite the governor. He’s been running these ads prominently featuring his claims of $2000 tax cuts, and now people across the state are getting tax bills with $4 tax cuts, or tax increases. His campaign has pulled those ads.
So, why can’t politicians just be honest? Actually, I don’t know if the governor really even knew that the tax cut wasn’t going to amount to much. I sort of think that he is totally disconnected with reality. Normally, I am a pretty loyal Republican voter, sort of typical for this part of the state, but I didn’t think much of this guy as a legislator, and even less as the lieutenant governor, and even less as governor. I rather wish that we had Bush back here as governor. Of course, I don’t really much like anyone who has had anything to do with the Texas legislature.
-Astroprof
