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<H2>How Can States Raise Revenue? Hint: Not from Us.</H2>
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<DIV id=story_byline><FONT face=Calibri><A
href="http://labornotes.org/2011/03/how-can-states-raise-revenue-hint-not-us">http://labornotes.org/2011/03/how-can-states-raise-revenue-hint-not-us</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV>Mark Brenner </DIV>
<DIV id=field_pubdate>| <SPAN class=date-display-single>March 22,
2011</SPAN></DIV><SPAN class=clear></SPAN>
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src="http://labornotes.org/system/files/imagecache/story_image/files/leads/seiuboaaction.300.jpg">
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<P>Several unions are targeting Bank of America, which paid no federal taxes
last year and benefits from local subsidy schemes that starve schools. Photo:
CSEA/SEIU Local 2001.</P></SPAN></DIV></DIV>
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<P>The traditional union approach to budget politics is to accept the limits of
what’s possible—typically defined by politicians and lobbyists—and push for the
best deal we can within those fiscal constraints. </P>
<P>Labor leans heavily on its inside game, and builds outside pressure in the
form of anti-cuts coalitions that highlight the vital services public employees
provide, and the harm that cuts will cause to the poor and vulnerable.</P>
<P>Unions may organize lobby days, but they don’t do sustained member education,
much less community outreach, pressure, or more militant tactics. </P>
<P>Raising taxes is painted as the political kiss of death, so politicians—and
most unions—aim low. They avoid engaging with the deeper question of what a fair
economy would look like and what role budgets play in getting us there.</P>
<P>That approach is a disaster these days. With no hope that the federal
government will plug the states’ $112 billion budget hole this year, the
“politically realistic” options are all bad. </P>
<P>Some unions are looking beyond “stop the cuts.” They’re proposing how
governments can go where the cash is to raise money for services. </P>
<P>In the best cases, they’re planning more than one step ahead. They’re looking
years down the line, to a point where winning budget fights isn’t about what we
can live with but what we deserve. </P>
<H3>TAX THE TOP</H3>
<P>In Connecticut, union activists are telling Democratic Governor Dan Malloy
how to raise more revenue. The first step is strengthening his proposed income
tax hike.</P>
<P>“What’s a piddly two-tenths of a percent increase for the people at the top?”
asked Carol Lambiase, a United Electrical Workers representative. “They just got
a huge windfall from the Bush tax cut extension.” </P>
<P>Through Better Choices Connecticut, a coalition of dozens of community
groups, advocacy organizations, and unions, heavily backed by the Service
Employees, the teachers, and the state employee bargaining coalition, activists
are pressing to close corporate loopholes and business tax exemptions; lower the
estate tax threshold to $2 million; and hike taxes by 2 percent on residents
making more than $500,000.</P>
<P>Their proposal would reduce or leave taxes unchanged for 85 percent of the
state’s residents, and bump taxes significantly only for the very wealthy.</P>
<P>Unions and community allies are taking their message to town hall meetings
and targeting tax dodgers like Bank of America, which paid no federal taxes last
year. (The company is <A
href="http://www.labornotes.org/2011/02/no-money-left-you-looking-wrong-places"><FONT
color=#003366>hardly the only tax scofflaw</FONT></A>, of course).</P>
<P>SEIU, which represents many state employees, staged actions against Bank of
America in five towns March 12, part of a national effort (the "Fight for a Fair
Economy") that one local officer likened to a “Tea Party of the left.” </P>
<H3>TURN UP THE HEAT</H3>
<P>In Chicago, reformers elected last year to head the Chicago Teachers Union
are pressing to reshape the city’s spending priorities. Their target is
Chicago’s "tax increment financing" (TIF) program, which the union says drains
$250 million yearly from schools and doles out cash to politically connected
developers and big banks.</P>
<P>The money was supposed to encourage development in blighted areas but instead
subsidized luxury housing and big-box retail stores.</P>
<P>“There are over 100 schools that don’t have stand-alone libraries because
Chicago’s elected officials are spending millions on political patronage and
calling it economic development,” said Jesse Sharkey, CTU vice president.</P>
<P>On March 19 the union kicked off its campaign to steer TIF money into
schools, with a rambunctious group of teachers, parents, and community members
taking over the showroom floor of one of the largest TIF recipients, a Chrysler
dealership in Chicago's tony Gold Coast. </P>
<P>A CTU staffer and a community activist were arrested in the action, which
began at a Bank of America branch, highlighting the TIF program’s Wall Street
connections.</P>
<P>Community activists in New York are also putting politicians on the hot seat.
Seventeen activists from Community Voices Heard, a grassroots community
organization of low-income residents, were arrested March 2 in a sit-down inside
the state Capitol, after pressing pols to raise revenue by taxing Wall Street
and the wealthy instead of pushing through more cuts. </P>
<P>CVH leader Agnes Rivera noted that because of the state's heavy reliance on
sales tax, poor people in New York pay 11 percent of their income in taxes,
while the rich only pay 4 percent.</P>
<P>“Does the governor think we’re so dumb that we don’t realize they’re not
paying an equal part?” Rivera asked. “They need to tax the
rich!”</P><BR></DIV></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>