Internet sales tax and cigarette tax and teachers union! Oh my!
Posted on April 12th, 2008 by bile Categories and Tags: Uncategorized, economics, education, healthcare, Internet retailers, internet sales, New York, New York State United Teachers Association, politics, schooling, taxes, your money, your rightshttp://www.buffalonews.com/cityregion/story/318885.html
A last-minute fight over relaxing public school teacher tenure provisions stalled enactment of the state’s budget late Tuesday, with lawmakers set to approve a $121.7 billion spending plan featuring more than $1 billion in increased taxes and fees.The budget will include $429 million in what Paterson considers “tax loophole closings,” which include requiring collection of sales taxes by Amazon and other Internet retailers now not charging the tax. It also envisions $265 million, as expected, from a $1.25-per-pack increase in the cigarette tax and $130 million in various fee increases. The tenure fight pitted the powerful teachers unions, which provide much funding and many foot soldiers for legislative campaigns, against school districts. Some districts were seeking the right to use student test scores as one measure in granting tenure.
The unions late Tuesday were successful in banning student performance in the classroom from the tenure process. School officials say the test scores could be an indication of a teacher’s ability to teach, while unions say the scores do little to judge a teacher’s creativity and could end up being used as a tool against teachers in lower-performing school districts.
The New York State United Teachers Association, which was unavailable to comment late Tuesday, is among the most potent unions in Albany, and its influence showed by being able to stop the final budget passage over the nonbudget issue.
1. The internet sales tax thing isn’t a loophole. Taxation is a positive action of theft and if it doesn’t cover X that’s not a hole, it’s the way it was created. Besides, the judicial branch has said that it’s fully in the rights of the individual to take advantage of every tax reduction legally possible. 2. Why do they tax cigarettes to fund things like children’s healthcare when they are aiming at getting people to stop smoking and getting more children covered? If everyone stops smoking are they going to claim that the former smokers hate children? At this point those who actually still buy cigs in NY on a regular basis does so on the black market. Raising the taxes will likely push more people to the black market than stop them from smoking. Thankfully not every government is so stupid as to prohibit them so the black market is a lot less risky and therefore safer. 3. It is truly sad that the teacher’s union can stop the entire budget in such a way. It’s even sadder that these people who supposedly are looking out for the children’s best interests are removing metrics to determine whether they are in fact sucessfully educating their students.
