INCREASE OF TAX BASE
Editorial: Dallas homeowners’ tax burden continues to rise
If you live in Dallas, you're justified in dancing a quiet jig over the growth of the city's tax base. The 4.4% increase announced this week is no great shakes next to the stratospheric growth of some suburban communities, or even the 9.5% bump recorded by Fort Worth. But it's a big improvement over the past few years, when Dallas struggled to avoid slipping into negative numbers as it did in the late '80s and early '90s. The one nagging cause for concern is submerged in the overall numbers: The percentage of total city taxes paid by homeowners continued to rise while the percentage paid by businesses continued to shrink. That's a trend that goes back at least 20 years. In 1985, commercial real estate was 51% of the city's tax base and residential real estate was 31%. (The rest is what's called business personal property, which includes office equipment, inventories and the like. That share has remained relatively constant.) This year, commercial real estate is 37% of the tax base, and residential real estate is 46%. That's a big shift. It isn't necessarily disastrous, but if you're a homeowner, it's worrisome.
SOURCE: Dallas Morning News
What I can't understand is why cities can't plan and budget according to the growth in the tax base, instead of raising taxes and inhibiting the growth of that tax base! What mental condition is it that requires city, county and state governments to do the very thing that is inimical to its own growth and existence!
As an example of that disastrous thought process, the state of Connecticut just instituted a 16% death tax on estates over two million dollars, which will send wealthy people scurrying out of Connecticut to places like Florida - which has no death tax! Why would Connecticut wish to drive wealthy people out of the state?
If you live in Dallas, you're justified in dancing a quiet jig over the growth of the city's tax base. The 4.4% increase announced this week is no great shakes next to the stratospheric growth of some suburban communities, or even the 9.5% bump recorded by Fort Worth. But it's a big improvement over the past few years, when Dallas struggled to avoid slipping into negative numbers as it did in the late '80s and early '90s. The one nagging cause for concern is submerged in the overall numbers: The percentage of total city taxes paid by homeowners continued to rise while the percentage paid by businesses continued to shrink. That's a trend that goes back at least 20 years. In 1985, commercial real estate was 51% of the city's tax base and residential real estate was 31%. (The rest is what's called business personal property, which includes office equipment, inventories and the like. That share has remained relatively constant.) This year, commercial real estate is 37% of the tax base, and residential real estate is 46%. That's a big shift. It isn't necessarily disastrous, but if you're a homeowner, it's worrisome.
SOURCE: Dallas Morning News
What I can't understand is why cities can't plan and budget according to the growth in the tax base, instead of raising taxes and inhibiting the growth of that tax base! What mental condition is it that requires city, county and state governments to do the very thing that is inimical to its own growth and existence!
As an example of that disastrous thought process, the state of Connecticut just instituted a 16% death tax on estates over two million dollars, which will send wealthy people scurrying out of Connecticut to places like Florida - which has no death tax! Why would Connecticut wish to drive wealthy people out of the state?
posted by John and Flo Martin at 2:44 AM
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