Governor Pat Quinn last week stated that the temporary income tax increase he implemented three years ago may become permanent.
According to a recent Chicago Tribune article, “Keep tax hike or face stark cuts, Quinn says” by Rick Pearson, Ray Long and Monique Garcia, the option is between keeping the tax increases or facing “major cuts in state spending on education and social services.”
Political experts are already speculating that Republicans and their gubernatorial candidate, millionaire Bruce Rauner, will likely come after Governor Quinn based on this tax increase.
Perhaps what puzzles us most at The Xavierite is the fact that the ultimatum if the tax increase leaves us between state spending on education and social services.
There is no reason that those two areas of government spending should be the spending areas that are cut.
This income tax was implemented to stabilize the state’s weak economy.
Within the three years that the tax has existed, the economy has not progressed to the point to which the Illinois state government wished it would have.
We do not doubt that the Illinois economy needs extra help. To put it simply, the only ways it seems that the Illinois economy can be salvaged is by implementing either tax increases or by creating government spending cuts.
Obviously, Republicans would rather see major cuts and Democrats would rather implement higher taxes.
Perhaps we could imagine for a moment that we live in a state where politicians are accountable for their actions – Democrat and Republican alike.
If these income taxes were in essence ineffective and failed to do what politicians said that they would, why should the people of Illinois have to pay? Why should Illinois Democrats pursue a higher tax agenda when it’s been proven to be ineffective? Why should Republicans only try to cut funding for education and social services? Are there no other areas of the government to cut funding? Is there no middle ground?
This state has been set up to fail by severe partisan politics. Either way, the hardworking people of Illinois are being taken advantage of by politicians who have implemented ineffective policies.
Now the citizens are trapped in a lose-lose game of chicken between tax increases and social program cutting.
The best way to remedy this situation would be to allow government officials who headed this tax program to be the ones to assume responsibility and take pay cuts in order to help remedy Illinois’s budgetary woes. That would include Governor Quinn.
But let’s be honest. We all know that is not going to happen.
What The Xavierite does implore is that in November you vote for a candidate who is going to act responsibly in Illinois government.
You have the power of a voter. You can turn this government around.
As to which candidate you feel is most responsible, we cannot tell you.
What we can tell you is that there are high stakes in this election and that the stakes are higher for you, the common voter, as opposed to the members of our legislature.
The Xavierite Staff
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