The Imperial Dominion of the South's Legislature

[Associate Justice PiT]

     I guess I'll get in touch with the GM on this and see what his take is.

[Adam Griffin]

Wow. I had no idea the accelerator was capable of going from 0 to crazy in such a short period of time.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

Nay

Too much uncertainty here.

[Wisconsin+17]

:zzz:

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

Can I still vote for speaker? In our constitution, it is clear there is a time deadline?

[Wisconsin+17]

Speaker vote is over, Duke.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     I spoke to GM shua and he said that since our sales tax revenue is already so high (the benefit of Texas's success), we would only get about $14 billion of additional revenue from eliminating income tax. That leaves us $55 billion short. The rainy day fund gives us $50 billion, but we still have to cut $5 billion more.

     My suggestion is that we not dip into the Rainy Day Fund, or at least not empty it. If we roughly halve our corporate income tax to 3%, then that reduces revenue by $6.27 billion. Then we can reduce personal income tax to 5%, which will reduce revenue by $7.76 billion. Keeping the other suggested tax introductions and approximating the increased sales tax revenue as linear, we can get an extra $2.84 billion in revenue. This would leave us with a surplus of $970 million.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

I think at the very least, we need to cut our corporate taxes to the levels of other regions. As it stands, it is more expensive for corporations subject to that tax to do business in the IDS, and I think that is something we need to change. I would be fine cutting our personal income tax to 5% as well assuming no one will be uncomfortable with a mere $970M surplus.

[Wisconsin+17]

Can I get any support for 3 and 3, halving both rates with some spending cuts?

[Associate Justice PiT]

I think at the very least, we need to cut our corporate taxes to the levels of other regions. As it stands, it is more expensive for corporations subject to that tax to do business in the IDS, and I think that is something we need to change. I would be fine cutting our personal income tax to 5% as well assuming no one will be uncomfortable with a mere $970M surplus.

     The Mideast employs a progressive corporate tax, and we may consider doing the same. The problem is, that makes it difficult to figure what rates would be in line with theirs unless we just copied their tax rates.

     The size of the surplus is small, though if we have emergency spending needs then we can use the rainy day fund. I don't want to dip into that just for a tax cut, though, prompting my much smaller suggested cuts.

Can I get any support for 3 and 3, halving both rates with some spending cuts?

     In that case, we're still down $6.27 billion from corporate income, but now we're also down $27.16 billion from personal income tax revenue. We'll then get an additional $6.76 billion from sales taxes, leaving us $14.51 billion in the hole. Far from impossible to cover, but not trivial either.

     We also finished last year with a surplus of $4.22 billion, as I recall (exact number should be somewhere in my office thread, but I think that's right). We should decide what to do with that.

[Wisconsin+17]

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Ok, so on 400 billion dollars revenue, that's a cut of 3.6 percent that would be required for this to pay for itself. We could also raise sales taxes by a percent.

Are people willing to go with a 4 percent spending cut or a sales tax rise of a percent to get 3 and 3?

I think that a 4 percent spending cut in order to halve our income and corporate taxes is a pretty good deal.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     Spending cuts are always difficult to pass, since pretty much everything the government spends money on sounds good on paper, and everyone has their own pet projects. I would be interested in discussing spending cuts, though I sort of doubt that we will find $14 billion worth of them to agree on.

[Wisconsin+17]

True, true. I think good ol' TR would have a few things to say about that!

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

Let's cut it to 5% for income tax and 3% for corporate taxes. We want to have some wiggle room in case the economy turns south in the future and our overall revenues drop.

[Wisconsin+17]

If it's wiggle room you want, then we should cut spending.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

Where can we cut spending? PiT already suggested it would be more trouble than its worth. I surmise that our spending is already under control given our budget surplus.

[Wisconsin+17]

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I've spoken to him quite extensively on this - he believes there are areas we should be cutting in order to allocate our dollars more efficiently. Perhaps this is what you believe, it's not what PiT believes

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

     Spending cuts are always difficult to pass, since pretty much everything the government spends money on sounds good on paper, and everyone has their own pet projects. I would be interested in discussing spending cuts, though I sort of doubt that we will find $14 billion worth of them to agree on.

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I've spoken to him quite extensively on this - he believes there are areas we should be cutting in order to allocate our dollars more efficiently. Perhaps this is what you believe, it's not what PiT believes

It's about compromise. I know you're not one to do that, but it's clear PiT is attempting to be pragmatic here. He and I both would rather have lower taxes, and I doubt either of us would hold those tax cuts hostage to get spending cuts that really are not needed.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

I'd like to offer this amendment.

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[Wisconsin+17]

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As opposed to holding tax cuts hostage in order to prevent spending cuts from coming at all?

I've offered up a 3 and 3 compromise that's halfway (more! even), between what I want, which is zero and zero, and what you want.

You've been unwilling to support anything other than exactly what it is you want. Nothing more nor less.

[Wisconsin+17]

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And now you're moving in the other direction. I surmise you're not interested in cutting taxes at all. Never were in fact.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

Did you read my bill? It is what the governor explained in his post. Please, explain what you want and how we will achieve it without going into debt, which is something I am absolutely unwilling to consider.

[Wisconsin+17]

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Yes, I did. Earlier yesterday you were happy with 5 and 1. Now you're 'offering' 5 and 3. That's like haggling with someone and raising the price even higher than your first offer.

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Spending cuts and an increase in the sales tax. This isn't rocket science.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

A raise in the sales tax will hit the lower income people hardest and will really nullify any income tax cuts we make. They would help the wealthy and shift the burden down to the poor who would make up for halving the income tax.

I want to leave the sales tax the same and cut income and corporate taxes. At least get our corporate taxes as low as the mideast. But the point of this is to not do away with services we already offer. Like I said, our budget as it stands is already fairly lean.

[Wisconsin+17]

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Not so. It will hit those who spend the most hardest. Which isn't lower income people.

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Then, you should support 100 percent spending cuts, to reduce the burden of government on the people of the IDS.

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Which is why you're opposed to spending cuts. Which, is exactly what I said. What does government offer other than what it takes from other people?

Your priorities are thus.

1 - no spending cuts.
2 - no increase in the sales tax
3 - cut corporate taxes
4 - cut income taxes.

Mine are:

1 - cut income taxes
2 - cut corporate taxes
3 - spending cuts
4 - increases in sales tax.