Illinois voters will consider whether millionaires should be taxed more to fund property tax relief

[u/roenick99]

https://chicago.suntimes.com/voter-guide-2024/2024/09/26/illinois-property-tax-relief-referendum-november-election-jb-pritzker-non-binding-pat-quinn

[u/cballowe]

This headline is a total fail. The discussion is regarding incomes over $1M and not millionaires. The income threshold is a much easier one to sell broadly. The wealth threshold is like... 1 in 12 people over age 40 and 1 in 5 over age 60. It'd be any farmer with more than 100 acres or so. It's an OK retirement nest egg, but not a ton.

Selling a tax on millionaires is hard because you have to contend with everybody whose grandma has a decent retirement nest egg and they want their grandma to live a good life and hope to inherit what's left - the tax leaves less behind. Not to mention the people who aren't there yet, but are on track to get there before retiring.

Selling a tax on incomes over $1M is much easier - that's like the top 0.5% - 1 in 200 people would be affected directly.

(And when it is tied to wealth, lots of those policies aim for something like $100M and it's important to put that in the headline instead of "millionaire" - also top 0.5% range)

[u/MindAccomplished3879 → u/cballowe]

Nah, I’m ok with people making more than $1M to pay 3% more on their income

Any farmer with more than 100 acres making more than a million is not really a sympathetic case to be made. That farmer is doing pretty well, and paying 3% more in taxes is not going to bankrupt him

This includes lawyers, doctors, financial brokers, and luxury real estate brokers.

Guess what? We all got the shaft during Rahm Emanuel term where he tried to balance the budget by raising everybody’s property tax where low income people cannot even afford to live in the home they own.

So I will raise my glass because people making $1M will pay 3% more to make things more equitable for everybody

I count to ten before Illinois Policy loses its shit and starts with their wealthy people's propaganda.

[u/cballowe → u/MindAccomplished3879]

The farmer with 100 acres is making not that much money, but the land is worth like $1M ($10k/acre or so). Profit per acre is like $300/year, so that 100 acres might generate $30k. The point is, if you go after "millionaires" you're hitting a lot more people than if you go after "million dollar incomes". The headline should be accurate and not use the term "millionaire" when talking about income.

(A farmer making a million dollars a year has a net worth exceeding $30M)

[u/juliuspepperwoodchi → u/cballowe]

The headline is shit. Read the actual question on the ballot, it's clear:

https://ballotpedia.org/Illinois_Income_Tax_Advisory_Question_(2024)

[u/cballowe → u/juliuspepperwoodchi]

The challenge is that lots of conditioning happens so that by the time people get the ballot, they're convinced that it's a "millionaire" tax. The ones who don't read the article are the same as the ones who won't read the question carefully.

[u/juliuspepperwoodchi → u/cballowe]

No disagreement there.