Author Topic: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent  (Read 2705 times)

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Offline ABX

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #25 on: April 12, 2019, 03:56:42 pm »
In the past our local voters would shoot down just about every bond issue that would come up.  In the last few years everything has changed they tend to support about every bond issue.  The change is that the senior citizen's property taxes are frozen, so a rise in taxes does NOT affect them and they are the ones who in the past rejected the bond issues.

Exactly... And political marketers and city government's know this and target these communities more than others. I've even seen the overtly sell it as 'it won't effect your rates so vote for it...'

Offline Night Hides Not

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #26 on: April 12, 2019, 03:57:11 pm »
Racist.

btw, an influx of Asian kids into your school will cause standards to INCREASE, not decrease.  Asian kids perform better than your average American cracker kid.  Their admissions standard into college is more stringent as well.  White kids get points for signing their name on the application that Asian kids don't get.  It's called 'affirmative action'.  It is also the reason that Asian kids perform better, since their parents already know the deck is stacked against them.


We're both racists, with your use of "cracker".


We're also talking about different kinds of "Asians",  friend. These kids are great at performing tasks according to a checklist. Like their parents, there's not a great deal of critical thinking that goes on...perfect students for our modern public education system.

Teachers now primarily "teach to the test", something we never had to deal with in school. I grew up when the CA public schools were still excellent. For example, we read The Count of Monte Cristo as a class when I was in 6th grade. I tested at a 12th grade reading level in sixth grade, too.


Apartment complexes, as commercial property, enjoy a lower tax rate than homeowners. They're notorious for turning a blind eye when it comes to multiple families living in the same apartment. The parents of those students are paying much less for those of us in single family homes.

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Offline Night Hides Not

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #27 on: April 12, 2019, 04:01:08 pm »
Without a plan to drive down property taxes this looks a lot like just another tax hick. Property taxes go to the county and school districts. Sales taxes go to the state. I guess the idea is that the state could do more for the local gov so that local gov would not raise PT. I'd need to see the details. Sounds like a bait and switch.

It is a bait and switch. County assessors will just raise the property values to make up the difference.
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Offline Sanguine

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #28 on: April 12, 2019, 04:05:18 pm »
It is a bait and switch. County assessors will just raise the property values to make up the difference.

And, that's the truth!

Offline ABX

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #29 on: April 12, 2019, 04:06:47 pm »
It is a bait and switch. County assessors will just raise the property values to make up the difference.

Yep

Online Hoodat

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #30 on: April 12, 2019, 05:55:29 pm »

We're both racists, with your use of "cracker".

That's "Mr. Cracker" to you.


We're also talking about different kinds of "Asians",  friend. These kids are great at performing tasks according to a checklist. Like their parents, there's not a great deal of critical thinking that goes on...perfect students for our modern public education system.

They still have higher admission standards than the white kids.  And they perform better than the white kids, too.  And their parents choose to live in the districts with the better schools.  There wouldn't be an 'American Dream' without them.


Apartment complexes, as commercial property, enjoy a lower tax rate than homeowners. They're notorious for turning a blind eye when it comes to multiple families living in the same apartment. The parents of those students are paying much less for those of us in single family homes.

As commercial property, the appraised value of said property is considerably higher than the value of private residential property.  As for multiple families in the same apartment, the same holds true for houses.
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Offline berdie

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #31 on: April 12, 2019, 09:11:07 pm »
It is a bait and switch. County assessors will just raise the property values to make up the difference.



That does seem to seem the history of the situation...doesn't it?

Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #32 on: April 12, 2019, 11:39:35 pm »
Without a plan to drive down property taxes this looks a lot like just another tax hick. Property taxes go to the county and school districts. Sales taxes go to the state. I guess the idea is that the state could do more for the local gov so that local gov would not raise PT. I'd need to see the details. Sounds like a bait and switch.
Do you have a production tax on oil and gas in Texas? We do in ND, and a portion of those monies are earmarked for property tax relief (primarily to fund schools). How that comes back to benefit the areas where Oil and Gas are produced, is that those are areas where property tax assessments are likely to spike with the 'boom', and the relief skews to those areas because of the property value increase. While the entire state benefits from oil production in 17 out of 53 counties, the areas hardest hit by reassessments get more relief, dollar wise.
It works.
That doesn't stop school districts form seeking more funding from other means, bond issues, etc., but Local Bond issues must be approved by 60% of the voters in the school district, and there is a distinct tendency for voters not to be as forthcoming with their hard won money as the Schools would like.
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Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #33 on: April 12, 2019, 11:52:15 pm »
In the past our local voters would shoot down just about every bond issue that would come up.  In the last few years everything has changed they tend to support about every bond issue.  The change is that the senior citizen's property taxes are frozen, so a rise in taxes does NOT affect them and they are the ones who in the past rejected the bond issues.
I'd love to see that freeze on senior's property taxes.

Heck, I'd love for the property tax to be eliminated completely. That way you own your property, you don't rent it from the Government (how feudal!)
But if there is to be a property tax at all, then let a house (or undeveloped land) be taxed based on the last price for which it sold. (fair market value at the time of sale), and that price could be adjusted for inflation, but not for the real estate market. I think that might help stabilize neighborhoods, too, where the folks who bought that house in 1947 and paid $5,000.00 for it (and still live there) aren't being taxed based on someone's current price of 350K for the same dwelling, so long as they own it and live there. When it sells next, it can be revalued, and taxed at that higher sale price (or lower, as the case may be). Adjusted for inflation, the owners of that $5,000.00 property bought in 1947 would be paying taxes on a property valued at $58,426.28 in 2019 dollars.
How God must weep at humans' folly! Stand fast! God knows what he is doing!
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

C S Lewis

Offline InHeavenThereIsNoBeer

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #34 on: April 13, 2019, 12:08:23 am »
I'd love to see that freeze on senior's property taxes.

Heck, I'd love for the property tax to be eliminated completely. That way you own your property, you don't rent it from the Government (how feudal!)
But if there is to be a property tax at all, then let a house (or undeveloped land) be taxed based on the last price for which it sold. (fair market value at the time of sale), and that price could be adjusted for inflation, but not for the real estate market. I think that might help stabilize neighborhoods, too, where the folks who bought that house in 1947 and paid $5,000.00 for it (and still live there) aren't being taxed based on someone's current price of 350K for the same dwelling, so long as they own it and live there. When it sells next, it can be revalued, and taxed at that higher sale price (or lower, as the case may be). Adjusted for inflation, the owners of that $5,000.00 property bought in 1947 would be paying taxes on a property valued at $58,426.28 in 2019 dollars.

In FL, your appraised value for taxation cannot be increased by more than (I think) 3% per year.  The idea is that (primarily) seniors (/fixed income) can't be priced out of their homes just because people suddenly want to move into the area.

I actually got a bit lucky there with the housing bust driving prices way down.  Eventually, they came right back up, but the cap only applies in one direction.
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Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #35 on: April 13, 2019, 01:43:19 am »
In FL, your appraised value for taxation cannot be increased by more than (I think) 3% per year.  The idea is that (primarily) seniors (/fixed income) can't be priced out of their homes just because people suddenly want to move into the area.

I actually got a bit lucky there with the housing bust driving prices way down.  Eventually, they came right back up, but the cap only applies in one direction.
I got lucky here, bought after an oil boom went bust in the 80s, after the housing market had made some severe downward adjustments.
How God must weep at humans' folly! Stand fast! God knows what he is doing!
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

C S Lewis

Online Hoodat

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #36 on: April 13, 2019, 03:10:24 am »
In FL, your appraised value for taxation cannot be increased by more than (I think) 3% per year.

In Georgia, they figure out how much money they need, and then set appraisals accordingly.
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Offline RetBobbyMI

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #37 on: April 13, 2019, 03:57:54 am »
Without a plan to drive down property taxes this looks a lot like just another tax hick. Property taxes go to the county and school districts. Sales taxes go to the state. I guess the idea is that the state could do more for the local gov so that local gov would not raise PT. I'd need to see the details. Sounds like a bait and switch.
Unless there is something codified into law that forces counties, cities and independent school district to reduce taxes, anyone that believes this bait and switch, is a country fool.
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Offline GrouchoTex

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #38 on: April 13, 2019, 11:51:42 am »
Those who live in apartment complexes should be forced to pay a surcharge to the local school district. Call me a racist, but the vast majority of apartment complexes are filled with H-1b families. My ISD has gone from majority white to 50% Indian over the past ten years. The carryover from their culture, the caste system, permeates the interpersonal dynamics as well. Assimilation is not a concern for most of them.

They do pay property taxes, just not directly.
The property taxes that the landlord pays is included in the tenant's rent.
They just don't send an itemized bill that says $ for rent and $ for taxes, but they are collecting it from their tenants.
Just like anything you buy, you are also paying that persons ot corporations taxes, merely by buying their products.
They mark it up to collect them.
They say corporations don't pay taxes and that is true in a sense.
It is built into their selling price to you and I.

Where's @Bigun to help me explain?

Offline GrouchoTex

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #39 on: April 13, 2019, 11:56:09 am »
In the past our local voters would shoot down just about every bond issue that would come up.  In the last few years everything has changed they tend to support about every bond issue.  The change is that the senior citizen's property taxes are frozen, so a rise in taxes does NOT affect them and they are the ones who in the past rejected the bond issues.

In Texas, the property taxes are frozen when you hit 65, this is true, but the school taxes are not.
They can continue to rise.
In my home (I am not yet 65) the largest portion of my property taxes is the school taxes.
I have seen a large jump in that last decade, from roughly $1700 to $3000.
My home is appraised at approximately $160K.

Offline GrouchoTex

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #40 on: April 13, 2019, 11:58:21 am »
Hey, all you fellow Texans, do you remember when the sold us on the idea of the lottery by saying it was for education?
Not so much, part maybe, by default, as it goes into the general fund.

Offline Night Hides Not

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #41 on: April 13, 2019, 01:16:57 pm »
Hey, all you fellow Texans, do you remember when the sold us on the idea of the lottery by saying it was for education?
Not so much, part maybe, by default, as it goes into the general fund.

I do remember that, GT. I also remember how Ma Richards ran away from that like a jackrabbit running from a coyote.
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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #42 on: April 13, 2019, 01:44:52 pm »
They do pay property taxes, just not directly.
The property taxes that the landlord pays is included in the tenant's rent.
They just don't send an itemized bill that says $ for rent and $ for taxes, but they are collecting it from their tenants.
Just like anything you buy, you are also paying that persons ot corporations taxes, merely by buying their products.
They mark it up to collect them.
They say corporations don't pay taxes and that is true in a sense.
It is built into their selling price to you and I.

Where's @Bigun to help me explain?

@GrouchoTex

You got that right!

Everyone here knows that I would prefer a sales tax over property taxes or an income tax but the problem we have here is that there is no mechanism in ANY current bill that would ensure an increase in the sales tax rate goes entirely to reducing property taxes.  Without that, I'm a firm no! 

We Texans also have a problem in that while we have large Republican majorities in both houses of the legislature we have nothing like conservative majorities in either.
« Last Edit: April 13, 2019, 01:45:52 pm by Bigun »
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Online Hoodat

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Re: Gov. Abbott, top lawmakers push to raise sales tax to 7.25 percent
« Reply #43 on: April 13, 2019, 04:17:37 pm »
the problem we have here is that there is no mechanism in ANY current bill that would ensure an increase in the sales tax rate goes entirely to reducing property taxes.  Without that, I'm a firm no!

Exactly.  Never trust government.  Ever.
If a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power.

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