We need a new taxation model
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Resting all of New Hampshire's costs on property taxes is awful. It forces people out of their homes because they can't pay the taxes on them, and it increases rent until nobody can afford it.
Taxes should be based first on income and next, at very high levels, on wealth.
If an income tax instead of property tax is unpalatable, then we should index property tax to income.
Our taxes should be based on our ability to pay them, not on what someone else would pay to make us unhoused.
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Posted by:Anonymous
6 months ago
I agree with a new taxation model us needed, but I think we need to abolish the property tax and instead fund via a sales tax and if needed, an income tax. People should be able to own thier homes outright; this would allow seniors to stay in thier communities, and then the tax burden is based on what we purchase or if we are still working.
Posted by:Anonymous
6 months ago
Many of the school districts are in an overspending freefall for sub standard education. Cost for a student in my town is over $28,000. with below standard scores, the system is bloated with administration. Town not much better. Schools and towns need to begin to develop realistic budgets that reflect what the communities can afford. Just asking for a state income tax will just allow them to waste more and more of our money
Posted by:Anonymous
6 months ago
I see this comment a lot of social media forums, bloated administration is such a generic term. I'm always curious as to what that actually means. Are there positions in your Town that should be cut? If yes who would perform the work that these staff members are currently doing.
Profile of Kyle H.
Posted by:Kyle H.
6 months ago
To put it in perspective, since 2001 we have lost 43000 students, gained 900 administrators, and seen test scores fall 21 points when the national average was -7.
Yes, we need to slash those admin positions. And consolidate the SAUs. Over 100 for our small state is so inefficient
Profile of Rebecca M.
Posted by:Rebecca M.
6 months ago
I encourage you to look into Baumol's cost disease as a framework for understanding why education is soooo expensive. The more our economy leans into high-productivity tech sectors, the more it raises wages across the board, which hurts "low productivity" sectors that cannot be sped up for efficiency. You simply cannot speed up human development without hurting children, so education will get more expensive the more our economy speeds up.
Profile of Rebecca M.
Posted by:Rebecca M.
6 months ago
@Kyle Haines The issue is that the state and feds mandate the work done by these administrators. If we cut administrators without fundamentally changing state and federal policy, classroom teachers will have to spend even MORE time on bureacratic reporting tasks and even less time working with our youth.
Profile of Kyle H.
Posted by:Kyle H.
6 months ago
@Rebecca Menard we absolutely need to take a long hard look at reporting tasks, but I just can’t believe that losing almost 50000 students could ever be offset by that much extra bureaucratic reports.
As for Baumol it does explain teacher cost pressures though I’d argue us being behind every New England state aside from Maine is still something we need to rectify. But it doesn’t explain the administrative bloat
Profile of Maureen M.
Posted by:Maureen M.
6 months ago
Very well said. Our seniors on a fixed income are particularly burdened by property taxes. First time home buyers cannot afford to buy. Rents are sky high . Developers are afraid they can’t turn a profit unless they build luxury units. Schools are vastly inequitable across the state. We don’t have enough state income to fix the roads and keep the rest areas open. Our infrastructure exudes poverty- how does that attract investment in our state? So many of our intractable problems arise from our stubborn refusal to apply an equitable tax system. We need an income tax. It would actually lower the tax burden on most of us.
Profile of Zebra Koala
Posted by:Zebra Koala
6 months ago
@Maureen McNulty
I agree wholeheartedly. It is obvious that we need to reduce our reliance on the property tax. We already have stealth sales taxes, for example, on utilities and insruance premiums. How are those fair? Taxing items that are indispensable and recurring. Underhanded and cowardly.
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Let's hammer out a small general sales tax exempting the fundamentals of life. Add a progressive income tax so as to reduce the burden on those who have the least. Add exemptions to the property tax to alleviate the burden on those who, as Squirrel Llama says, may become the next unhoused.
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proposed