Money! Money. State lawmakers want your money. This particular time they've set their sights on the Commonwealth's fifteen thousand plus millionaires and billionaires.

Some time during the legislative session, the State Representatives and Senators will take up a Constitutional Amendment proposal to add a graduated tax to Baystaters earning more than one million dollars per year. These money grabbing lawmakers need 50 votes to add the taxing question to the 2018 election ballot. They cultivated 135 votes when the topic came up for consideration last year. So expect the Constitutional [unconstitutional by my standards] question on the November 2018 ballot.

Should the majority of voters approve, anyone daring to earn more than a million dollars gets slapped with a 4% surtax on top of their regular, high income tax payment. For instance, if you earn $1,500,000, you would pay 5.1% on the first one million dollars, then 9.1% on the remaining balance of a half million dollars. That's $96,500 tax dollars from one individual!

Using 2014 numbers, it is estimated Massachusetts had 15,422 millionaires, that's a whole lotta money. We're belching between $1.5 B and $1.9 B in tax collections courtesy of the millionaires.

There are numerous reasons why I will vote against this regressive, graduated millionaire tax. The numbers show each time we pay more, our lawmakers spend more.

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Brian Thomas is the host of Brian’s Beat on 1420 WBSM New Bedford.  He can be heard weekdays from 10am-Noon and Saturdays from 6am-9am.  The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.

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