Governor Justice signed HB 2526 into law this week. Rather than utilizing state revenues to create shared prosperity by investing in programs and services that benefit all West Virginians, HB 2526 enacts permanent tax cuts that undermine public investments and further rig our tax system for the wealthy. Nearly two out of every three dollars of the…
Budget Beat
Last weekend, the Senate Finance Committee unveiled and passed their second attempt at a tax cut without discussion or questions and then suspended rules to pass it out of the chamber. The legislation, HB 2526, looks very much like the plan they passed earlier this session (SB 424). Both versions overwhelmingly benefit the wealthy, contain a workaround for the tax cuts rejected…
Last week, Governor Justice held a round table promoting fiscally irresponsible tax reform policy. Notable speakers included Stephen Moore and Grover Norquist, staunch supporters of Kansas' failed tax experiment of 2012. WVCBP executive director, Kelly Allen, recently published an op-ed outlining why it defies both evidence and common sense to follow supply-side pundits down a path of…
The 2023 state legislative session has seen both chambers heavily focused on turning the state’s revenue “surplus” into personal income tax cuts, despite the clear need for new spending after four years of austerity forced by flat budgets. We’ve covered at length the temporary factors driving the surplus, as well as the fallacy of calling it a surplus at…
With a relatively short 60-day legislative session, the bills that get considered—and the ones that don’t—tell us a lot about our lawmakers’ priorities. Now that we are exactly halfway through the 2023 session, the WVCBP team lends insight into what we’ve seen prioritized so far and what we would like to see prioritized during the…
Come work with us! We’re hiring two full-time, paid summer fellows. The WVCBP seeks a Criminal Legal Policy Fellow to research and write about best practices for improving the criminal system, with a focus on the areas of excessive sentences and reducing the harms caused by jails and prisons. The WVCBP also seeks an Economic…
Come work with us! We're hiring two full-time, paid summer fellows. The WVCBP seeks a Criminal Legal Policy Fellow to research and write about best practices for improving the criminal system, with a focus on the areas of excessive sentences and reducing the harms caused by jails and prisons. The WVCBP also seeks an Economic…
During last week's State of the State address, Governor Justice proposed a budget-busting personal income tax cut that he promised would be a "tsunami." Earlier this week, the West Virginia House passed the Governor’s proposal, HB 2526, which will cost a staggering $1.5 billion annually once fully phased in. WVCBP executive director Kelly Allen released…
After four years of flat budgets failing to keep pace with inflation and the needs of West Virginians, Governor Jim Justice announced another year of largely the same during his annual State of the State Address which took place Wednesday evening. Instead of presenting a budget that meets the needs of all West Virginians, Governor…
Governor Justice has once again touted the state’s so-called “surplus” as reason to pursue more tax cuts favoring the wealthy. But make no mistake, the state’s surplus isn’t a sign of uncharacteristically strong revenue growth, or a sign that the state’s needs are all being met. Instead, the surplus has been largely manufactured by artificially low revenue estimates,…