thats gonna be a national security issue at some point, financials are important in vulnerable sector checks. just pay your guys a decent wage, thats what work is for unless the whole social contract thing is breaking down.
"I've had three clients who would've had income that would've meant they'd have the millionaires tax every year, and all three of them have left for Florida," Matthew Erskine, a Worcester-based estate attorney, said in an interview.
If they’re leaving for Florida, they’re idiots and/or assholes anyway. I don’t see a downside.
Great, all three people who have an INCOME of a million dollars a year might have to pay tax if they don't move. Stop passing income taxes and then patting ourselves on the back thinking we taxed the rich, income is just one flavor of money and most rich people with a brain don't have any income, it is the most taxed type of money.
I hadn't heard of this. Here's the rates which I was interested in I found in a separate article:
The new tax, set to take effect Jan. 1, will apply to any portion of taxable income above $1 million. For example, a taxpayer earning $2 million will pay the state’s current 5% tax rate on the first $1 million. The second million dollars will be taxed under a higher rate: 9%. That adds up to an extra $40,000 in state income taxes."
The tax also applies to “one-time millionaires,” including people who make more than $1 million in taxable income from selling their homes or businesses. According to an analysis by the Center for State Policy Analysis at Tufts University, an estimated 0.6% of tax filers would see their tax bill increase as a result of this measure.
Can we talk about RCV just one fucking time without someone mentioning “it has a ton of problems”, as if that makes it worse than FPTP? Because I honestly struggle to think of a single thing FPTP is better at than RCV.
Don’t let perfection be the enemy of good (or more accurately, meaningful incremental improvement).
Sorry, I didn't mean to imply it's worse than Plurality, as it's not. But if we're going to change voting systems then it's only ever going to happen once. If we fuck it up it ain't happening again, and we've already fucked up IRV/RCV in several locales in the US. We need to switch to something that has almost 0 problems, like 3-2-1 or STAR voting. You're going to have to explain it to the populace anyway. Better to get something that's almost perfect rather than something that people will hate because it's change and because it spoils elections. See this article on how IRV does that. https://electionscience.org/library/irv-degrades-to-plurality/
Notably, that Center for Election Science is the one that has shown that 3-2-1 or STAR are technically the best, but they actually advocate for Approval Voting, rather than those two. https://electionscience.org/approval-voting-faqs/
I think what is hard to explain is how you determine who wins. Most people understand that in "old school" voting the one with the most votes wins. With ranked choice, how does it handle multiple people with very different rankings. Its easy to say "the one that most people preferred" or "instant runoff" but explaining how that is calculated is not easy. I am very much for ranked choice, and I was devastated when it lost the vote, but it's biggest hurdle is comprehension, and that is something for FUD'lers to prey on.
While the concept of ranking choices is straightforward, the confusion and complexity often lies in understanding the counting process and how votes are redistributed in multiple rounds.
There may be good arguments against the project -- traffic and parking, certainly -- but arguing that letting the soccer team use the stadium is equivalent to selling off public land to private ownership seems like such a stretch that it undermines their whole position. They're not getting exclusive use, and they're helping pay for the renovation.
tax rates double for “investment properties” being rented out / not lived in by the owner. This can be ramped in somewhat gradually, but there won’t be any perpetual grandfathering of exceptions.
corporate entities are not allowed to own residential properties. Banks can own residences transactionally in the event of a foreclosure, but any sales must be to a private party, with preference given to buyers who will actually live in the property.
Can’t we be happy they did a thing? Instead of bringing up a different thing?
FYI - to some extent ….. in Massachusetts I pay a certain tax rate times the assessed value of my house MINUS an exemption for it being my primary home. So, yes, people buying a house in Massachusetts to live in do pay less taxes than people buying an investment property.
That exemption was always too small, and it’s a fixed amount, so the percentage has gotten smaller every year. But it does exist
That’s great and all, but you’re talking from the perspective of someone who owns a house. I’m talking about changing policy to help people who are effectively locked out of buying a house due to hypercapitalism and caustic corporate investment strategies.
No, I’m saying we already have part of what you’re asking for, but phrased oppositely
“ tax rates double for “investment properties” being rented out / not lived in by the owner”
Similar to
Tax rate is same for all, but those living in it are taxed on reduced assessed value
My towns website says this year the exemption is $285k, so for houses worth $570k, it’s exactly what you’re looking for: landlords taxed double… if there are any such houses. I know there are at least condos for less, so those people get an even bigger break on taxes than you’re asking, vs what a landlord would pay, and it’s theoretically possible some pay no tax at all for living in their own home. You could easily argue this approach is better than yours, since it works even better for low income, although that exemption should be even higher, given the high costs of houses here
We do have a huge housing affordability crisis here, but it’s not really the corporate investors. In general Massachusetts has a very high cost of living and decades of under building, too few housing units for needs. The residential exemption makes a difference to the extent local communities can, but it’s nowhere near enough. Encouraging development of more multi family housing (especially near transit) will make a bigger difference
Linking back to Boston, it’s not as clear since they talk about an amount of tax reduction, but I find it interesting there is a max discount of 90%. If there are houses that meet that criteria, a landlord would be taxed ten times what someone living there would
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