Tax Referendums

[AndrewF]

The local parks district wants $53 million in bond sales to finance two new parks.

These parks take 3-7 years to go in, it's a long process.

Renters move every 2-3 years.

Ergo, if I vote yes and it passes, I lay down a tax on my landlord, a property tax hike. I calculated that for this apartment building it would cause the annual property tax to go up $1,500. 

Landlords operate on an expected profit margin. They usually just pass property tax hikes directly into the rent.

The government sells these referendums to homeowners as "It's only $143 a year on a house worth $400,000." There are no $400,000 houses in Skokie, Illinois. They start at about $1.6 million dollars. So your property taxes will go up at least $572 a year, not $143, if you own a house.

They say that "property valuations go up", theoretically this helps homeowners list their houses higher, but it furthers an affordability crisis if that house is now "worth" another $50,000, because if you mortgage it, that also adds another $50,000 in interest over 30 years, so that $1.6 million house won't cost $3.2 million over 30 years, it will cost $3.3 million over 30 years.

Renters will just get stuck with a bill for a thing that might never exist while they're renting an apartment in Skokie. Then higher property valuations lead to higher rents as well as the property tax hike.

These referendums are deeply harmful to renters. Putting money into a town beautification process you get no benefit from, which directly increases your costs, is a very bad idea.

That's why when the government wants money and has to ask, the answer is always no. Unfortunately, it usually passes anyway and it's never, ever, something that makes my life better.

If it's for the schools, I have no kids. If the schools are so great, why do I hand a grown adult a $20 for something that was $18.50 even and they stand there not knowing that the change is $1.50?

If it's a park or forest preserve, that's even worse.

[FicoMike0]

In with you here, @AndrewF 

Good government is less government. I really don't understand people voting for this nonsense. 

Several years ago I visited great falls mt. As I drove around town I didn't see any gummit presence. At home, I pass the local town police, the township constable, the metro park rangers, the highway patrol and more. I went into a dollar store, bought 5 items and paid $5 even. No sales tax!  It was a nice town.

[crystal626]

We have a .333% district sales tax rate hike and a 1% city sales tax rate hike on the ballot this year. I'm a no for both but I have no doubt both will pass and I'll have to throw away that much more of my money on the basics to survive (at least we don't tax groceries here though, only junk food and hot items). 

[AndrewF]

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@crystal626 wrote:

We have a .333% district sales tax rate hike and a 1% city sales tax rate hike on the ballot this year. I'm a no for both but I have no doubt both will pass and I'll have to throw away that much more of my money on the basics to survive (at least we don't tax groceries here though, only junk food and hot items). 

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We have a tax on groceries. It got repealed by the State but Cook County's board just voted to put it back as a local tax.

It's "only" 1% but I don't think there should be a tax on food except for cookies, ice cream, candy bars, sodas, etc.

I think like 80% of the "food" items at the store should be untaxed. It's not a luxury to get a pound of ground chuck or a can of beans.

Sure you can avoid the cookie tax by making cookies in Indiana, but when you make cookies you're not going to put all those fake ingredients and preservatives in them.

They won't be health food but it's better than Oreos or Chips Ahoy.

[AndrewF]

We went to the Chicago Botanic Gardens today and it was free because I have SNAP.

It used to be free for everyone, but the Cook County Forest Preserve District decided that taxpayers who built and funded it for over 50 years shouldn't have access to it anymore unless they get a paid annual membership or cough up almost $90 between parking and admission fees. 

Previously, they got some of their money from a $25 per car parking fee, but there was no admission fee, so as many people as fit in your vehicle got in, and you could always take the bus and just use the pedestrian or bike paths to the main entrance to bypass the parking fee.

The Pace 213 bus stops right in front of the main gates.

I do get that it's expensive to operate a place like that, however, it seemed to me like there were way fewer people in there than I recall when it was free. I don't know how this isn't _costing_ them money to have the fee.

When you get in, it's the usual rub, $4.50 for a Coke, the on-site restaurant is pretty expensive, but the food is decent. 

When you charge for an entrance fee, less people bother showing up at all, so parking revenues go down. You go from at least hitting up most people for food, drink, and parking, to having people go "You know what, we're in the middle of a recession, my hours got cut, my landlord raised the rent another $300, property tax went up 50% in a single year. Maybe $200 to go to the Botanic Garden isn't in the budget.

It's so sad that this was treated as a massive (and good!) public park for generations, and they still get tax revenue, but you must be "this rich" to be able to enjoy one of the few outdoor spaces in the region, unless you're broke enough to be on food stamps, or show up on a free day, which are statutorily required, but they pepper most of them through winter when nothing is in bloom, or on a Tuesday so that working people can't show up.

I feel like this has more to do with keeping out the people the wealthy elite don't want in there bothering them while they unwind than it has to do with revenue generation.

I was intensely bitter about something they tax us for and then charge exorbitant fees to use. If the public pays for it, the public should get to use it. Property taxes in Cook County have never been higher. People should be madder than Hell that they're being asked to pay for things that they can't access.

They're happy with the "SNAP/WIC" loophole. Many people who get those programs are too poor, too tired from overwork, to actually show up, or they don't even know the Museums For All benefit exists because it isn't promoted.

One of the things I fully expected to be gypped for today was the usual "You want water? Here's a $5 botttle of water." but the cafeteria does offer free filtered ice water that tastes amazing.We kept coming back to the cafe to refill as we made it through the gardens.

I know it costs a lot of money to maintain this, but certainly there is a way to balance the costs against the public interest.

I feel like admission tickets should be sold only to people who don't live in Cook County and contribute to the tax base.

[FicoMike0]

We don't pay sales tax on food here in Oh10, but we pay plenty on everything else. It varies by county,  6.5% to 8.25%. I'm old enough to remember when it was 4%, with no state income tax. I make a point of shopping in a nearby co that's lower than mine. It's not much difference, but I try. It may be working, I noticed in a lower tax co one of the shopping malls actually replaced an anchor store that closed. Now, they have a brand new Rural King, which turns out to be a nice store. I bought a pair of jeans for $10.

The food tax exemption applies to most groceries. They do tax carbonated beverages. No tax on sweets, but there is tax on chewing gum, since it's not food. No credit for swallowing it.

If you go into a fast food restaurant here, you might notice some of us order to go, then sit down and eat it. The tax applies to restaurant food, unless it's to go.

@AndrewF ,We have the same deal with the world famous Columbus zoo. Those of us who pay for it with taxes can't afford to go. Btw the name is a lie, it's not in Columbus. It's not even in the same county.

[AndrewF]

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@FicoMike0 wrote:

We don't pay sales tax on food here in Oh10, but we pay plenty on everything else. It varies by county,  6.5% to 8.25%. I'm old enough to remember when it was 4%, with no state income tax. I make a point of shopping in a nearby co that's lower than mine. It's not much difference, but I try. It may be working, I noticed in a lower tax co one of the shopping malls actually replaced an anchor store that closed. Now, they have a brand new Rural King, which turns out to be a nice store. I bought a pair of jeans for $10.

The food tax exemption applies to most groceries. They do tax carbonated beverages. No tax on sweets, but there is tax on chewing gum, since it's not food. No credit for swallowing it.

If you go into a fast food restaurant here, you might notice some of us order to go, then sit down and eat it. The tax applies to restaurant food, unless it's to go.

@AndrewF ,We have the same deal with the world famous Columbus zoo. Those of us who pay for it with taxes can't afford to go. Btw the name is a lie, it's not in Columbus. It's not even in the same county.

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Yes, I remember when Indiana's sales tax was only 5%. It also exempted clothing, food, and prescription drugs.

They raised it to 7% to fund an income tax cut. Basically, this raised taxes on people with Social Security who were so poor they were below the threshold to pay federal tax (which is what triggers it to be taxable under State law).

But Cook County, IL has a 10.25% combined rate in most cities. A pro-tip is if you want to buy some major thing like a TV or a laptop or something, go to Deerfield, it's in Cook County but iit's "only" a 7% tax there. You can also have Amazon packages shipped to a locker there and pay 7%. You can also go to Dolton, or Indiana, if that's close enough.

No this is not illegal. Illinois law says that the Use Tax only applies if the combined GST you paid in another jurisdiction was less than the Illinois part of the GST, which is only 6%.

I was singing Big Yellow Taxi on the way in only when it got to the part about "they took all the trees and put 'em in a tree museum, and charged all the people a dollar and a half to see 'em" I replaced that with "charged all the people fifty dollars to see 'em".

Inflation on that $1.50 in 1970 would only be $12.50 today and she was singing about that as a way to get the listener to envision a dystopian hellscape where only the rich could afford to see nature.

[millionsofmiles]

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@AndrewF wrote:

We went to the Chicago Botanic Gardens today and it was free because I have SNAP.

It used to be free for everyone, but the Cook County Forest Preserve District decided that taxpayers who built and funded it for over 50 years shouldn't have access to it anymore unless they get a paid annual membership or cough up almost $90 between parking and admission fees. 

Previously, they got some of their money from a $25 per car parking fee, but there was no admission fee, so as many people as fit in your vehicle got in, and you could always take the bus and just use the pedestrian or bike paths to the main entrance to bypass the parking fee.

The Pace 213 bus stops right in front of the main gates.

I do get that it's expensive to operate a place like that, however, it seemed to me like there were way fewer people in there than I recall when it was free. I don't know how this isn't _costing_ them money to have the fee.

When you get in, it's the usual rub, $4.50 for a Coke, the on-site restaurant is pretty expensive, but the food is decent. 

When you charge for an entrance fee, less people bother showing up at all, so parking revenues go down. You go from at least hitting up most people for food, drink, and parking, to having people go "You know what, we're in the middle of a recession, my hours got cut, my landlord raised the rent another $300, property tax went up 50% in a single year. Maybe $200 to go to the Botanic Garden isn't in the budget.

It's so sad that this was treated as a massive (and good!) public park for generations, and they still get tax revenue, but you must be "this rich" to be able to enjoy one of the few outdoor spaces in the region, unless you're broke enough to be on food stamps, or show up on a free day, which are statutorily required, but they pepper most of them through winter when nothing is in bloom, or on a Tuesday so that working people can't show up.

I feel like this has more to do with keeping out the people the wealthy elite don't want in there bothering them while they unwind than it has to do with revenue generation.

I was intensely bitter about something they tax us for and then charge exorbitant fees to use. If the public pays for it, the public should get to use it. Property taxes in Cook County have never been higher. People should be madder than Hell that they're being asked to pay for things that they can't access.

They're happy with the "SNAP/WIC" loophole. Many people who get those programs are too poor, too tired from overwork, to actually show up, or they don't even know the Museums For All benefit exists because it isn't promoted.

One of the things I fully expected to be gypped for today was the usual "You want water? Here's a $5 botttle of water." but the cafeteria does offer free filtered ice water that tastes amazing.We kept coming back to the cafe to refill as we made it through the gardens.

I know it costs a lot of money to maintain this, but certainly there is a way to balance the costs against the public interest.

I feel like admission tickets should be sold only to people who don't live in Cook County and contribute to the tax base.

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@AndrewF 

You object to subsidizing things that do not matter to you, like schools and parks, and then mention you are on SNAP. We are subsidizing you.

Sounds like a case of "One rule for me, another for thee."

[AndrewF]

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@millionsofmiles wrote:

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You object to subsidizing things that do not matter to you, like schools and parks, and then mention you are on SNAP. We are subsidizing you.

Sounds like a case of "One rule for me, another for thee."

---

I don't think taxpayers should have to foot the bill for sports stadiums and "quality of life" improvements that only benefit people who are rich.

There's sort of a difference between "Humans need to eat." and "The Bears need a new stadium when there's nothing wrong with the one we're still making bond payments on."

Since 2003, taxpayers in the US have had to spend $40 billion on sports stadiums. In return, we got $200 tickets to a baseball game at the stadium we already had to buy for them. In the 90s, you wanted to see the Cubs, you paid less than $20 sometimes.

Also, regarding my SNAP, I don't get much. The free museum program and Comcast Internet Essentials are worth more than the food assistance, honestly. 

You go into a grocery store thanks to the last 10 years of "leadership", and you take $150 into that store, and you're out of food in three or four days, because the US Dollar has been completely destroyed in just 10 years.

You can blame landlords for why I get SNAP at all. They raised the average rent in the area to $1800 a month. The IDHS caseworker has to consider what you pay in rent. If my rent was what it was in 2020, there'd be no food stamps.

You're subsidizing my bloodsucking landlord, not me, pal.

Unchecked rent hikes extract wealth from working-class tenants without adding any real value to the community, effectively turning public safety nets like SNAP into an indirect subsidy for property owners.

Why don't you go tell Walmart a 1% annual pay increase when rent goes up 13% per year and groceries go up 8% is not fair? Why don't you say "Hey, we're subsidizing you!"

Why don't you scream at the slumlord "Hey, where do you get off charging $1800 for something that was $900 in 2020? We're subsidizing you!"

If someone would get hyperinflation under control and give a one-time COLA to match the last 6 years we've had, there would be no food stamps for me.

I might get steamrolled by people who think that we need a $53 million dollar park more than I need to eat when we already have parks, but I'm still going to vote agains the massive tax hike.

I do all of the things that the poor-shamers say to do. Cook at home, eat leftovers, don't go to Disney World on a credit card, make coffee myself. But then I still get poor-shamed. But I don't have any debt so there's still that.

The fact that internet jerks still shame me for needing basic, legal, assistance proves that poor-shaming isn't actually about helping people manage money; it is about shifting the blame away from stagnant wages and predatory pricing onto the individual.

Anyway, the point was that at least I can still enjoy the Botanic Garden as it was originally intended. A public good, instead of a dynamic surge-priced tourist trap.