The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, along with local governments and school districts, is receiving billions of “Biden Bucks” from the most recent federal COVID-19 relief bill. The result of that windfall should be a full stop on proposed state and local tax increases that would take money out of the pockets of Pennsylvania’s families and small businesses at a time when folks are still struggling to make ends meet.
While this latest round of federal relief is an ill-conceived debt undoubtedly to be paid by future generations of Americans through higher taxes it should not be coupled with an immediate money grab by the very government entities it is designed to help.
At the state level, Pennsylvania is receiving nearly $9 billion in federal money. While we are still awaiting guidelines for exactly how that money can be used, it is clear that it can and should be used to take the governor’s proposed massive middle class and small business job creator tax hike off the table.
In his budget address earlier this year, Gov. Tom Wolf proposed increasing the personal income tax paid by a family of four with each parent making just over $42,000. In addition, such a tax increase would impact many small business job creators, many of whom pay the personal income tax.
While the governor said he wants to use the additional revenue to go toward education, what he did not reveal publicly was that much of this money would go to pay for deficit spending.
Though such a tax increase was a non-starter with the House of Representatives, the governor has never taken the idea off the table in conversations with the media and his political allies.
Now that we have received such a large sum of money from the federal government, it is easy to see how continuing to talk about advancing a middle-class tax increase is, in reality, an unwise discussion about implementing additional burdens on Pennsylvania families and small businesses already devastated from pandemic-era economic shutdowns, job loss, and uncertainty.
During the pandemic, Republicans in the General Assembly ensured the Commonwealth kept its commitment to fully fund public education during the most uncertain of times. With the latest round of federal money coming into Pennsylvania, we can do that with certainty and without the need for tax increases.
The same goes for school districts that are thinking about raising taxes on Pennsylvanians to cover school costs.
Pennsylvania’s school districts are set to receive a combined $5 billion from the federal government as part of the last round of COVID-19 relief.
Instead of going back to taxpayers to pay more via the onerous property tax, school districts should take this money and use it prudently while considering keeping property taxes level for as long as it remains prudent to do so.
Over the last year, traditional public schools have had to develop new educational delivery tools and rethink educational models. They should use the easing of the pandemic to follow the science and get students back into the classroom while also using the lessons of the pandemic to rethink how they can do a better job of delivering high-quality education at a better cost to taxpayers.
So often during the last year, we have time and again seen the sacrifices being made by Pennsylvania’s front-line workers, middle class families, small businesses and their employees, and teachers and students.
With such a massive influx of dollars coming from the federal government that will already be saddling future generations with additional debt burdens and higher taxes from the federal government, now is not the time to be putting a greater burden on those we have already seen give so much for so many.
In the legislature, we are working to jump-start our economic recovery and endeavor to get back the 500,000 jobs that the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry has said were lost during the pandemic.
However, it is true that nobody has ever taxed themselves into prosperity. It is similarly true that the best form of economic stimulus is a steady job without the yoke of government impeding the American dream.
With the massive amount of federal money coming into Pennsylvania, it seems only right that we do not impede the road to recovery with more ill-conceived taxes.
State Rep. Kerry Benninghoff is the Republican Majority Leader of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives. He represents portions of Centre and Mifflin Counties.
