The MA legislature’s conference committee just made another $300 million in cuts to state health care, education grants, elder home-care services, child care for working parents, human services, and other areas of the state budget for FY2011, conveniently putting the blame on our newest senator, Scott Brown.
Not mentioned in the press releases is the fact that our legislature gave away $300 million they would otherwise have this FY2010 in “single sales factor (SSF)” tax expenditures to Fidelity/Raytheon/related manufacturing corporations for “job creation,” even though many of those corporations are actually cutting jobs. According to the Boston Globe, “Fidelity’s Massachusetts workforce now stands at a more than 9,000 workers, down from 13,000 four years ago.”
As Jill Stein often puts it, these tax expenditures are literally “payoffs for layoffs.” In my opinion, they are also the legalized theft of public funds.
Why not use the tax dollars we’re throwing away on tax expenditures like these to really create jobs by rehiring laid-off teachers, firefighters, librarians, and health care workers? Why not collect the taxes we would otherwise be due instead of raising the sales tax?
Want to know how the “single sales formula” or “tax apportionment” scam works? Read on.
Continue reading Payoffs for Layoffs Continue As Massachusetts Legislature Cries Crocodile Tears