You may have heard that Governor Healey has spent significant time away from the state she supposedly runs. It totals up to the equivalent of 2.5 months out of state, all while taxpayers are suffering the consequences of her bad policy decisions within the boarder. Based on her recently filed FY2026 budget, we question if any of that time away was on a different planet.
Healey’s budget includes several measures that increase taxes and expand government overreach. While touted as a modest increase, the proposed 7.4 percent spending hike over last year’s FY2025 budget she signed into law, signals a troubling trend of unsustainable growth in state spending at a time when the state can ill afford it.
Governor Healey’s administration has cunningly framed the budget as only a 2.6 percent increase when factoring in supplemental spending, claiming it remains below inflation. This sleight of hand isn’t fooling anyone, and the real spending increase is reckless at a time when the state is already facing fiscal woes with the untallied costs of the migrant crisis, residents and small businesses grappling with rising costs of living and economic headwinds which are driving them out of state in record numbers.
There was another head scratcher when just the day before Healey filed her budget, she was on the record responding to a question if she would raise taxes in order to pay for a new pricey bill she was proposing for decarbonizing higher education infrastructure. She responded: “Hell no. No, no, no, no, no,” ... “I’m the CEO of the state. I gotta run the state like a business, and so I’m looking to make the most [of] maximized taxpayer dollars, not new taxes.”
Could have fooled us. The Governor’s budget package proposes to refile a plan allowing municipalities to raise taxes on meals and hotels through local option taxes, an idea soundly rejected last year.
Her budget package also seeks to expand tobacco taxes ($2 million dollar tax increase) to synthetic nicotine products and extend the sales tax to candy ($25 million dollar tax increase). When all else fails, Governor Healey will tax candies.
In addition, the package includes a $164 million tax hike by setting up a cap on the charitable deductions law approved by the voters in 2000. The plan calls for a $10,000 cap for joint filers and a $5,000 cap for individuals. Healey is capping tax benefits for taxpayers who donate to Massachusetts charities in order to pay for her 7.4 increased state budget. New taxes on candy, capping tax benefits for Massachusetts charities, if that isn’t heartless, we don’t know what is.
As if that weren’t enough, it also includes a new plan to deploy camera enforcement of traffic violations, a policy both New Hampshire and Maine prohibit. This expansion of government surveillance raises significant privacy concerns for residents as well as questions other states have faced regarding false readings resulting in people getting tickets for doing nothing wrong.
Just last week, Governor Healey gave a State of the Commonwealth speech in which she highlighted her 2023 minor tax cuts. This begs the question, if tax cuts in 2023 were noteworthy, why didn’t the Governor propose any last year, or propose any in this year’s budget? Don’t be fooled, Healey likes to talk about tax cuts but her actions are full of new and higher taxes.
We at MassFiscal will keep you informed on the progression of these tax-and-spend policies and try to drive the focus on common-sense policies that promote economic growth and fiscal responsibility through tax cuts and spending reductions. With residents and businesses leaving the state for lower-cost alternatives, or no tax states like New Hampshire and Florida, it is critical to keep the pressure on.
In the next few days and weeks ahead, MassFiscal will be urging constituents to contact their lawmakers and the Governor in opposition to some of these bad policies. Stay tuned! |
|
|
|
|