Kasich tax plan compliant with anti-tax pledge – just barely

COLUMBUS (AP) — Conservative activist Grover Norquist said today Gov. John Kasich’s proposed tax-reform package is disappointing but technically compliant with his organization’s famous anti-tax pledge.

Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform, told The Associated Press that further spending cuts would have been superior to more than $3 billion in tax increases over two years.

The Kasich tax package includes a 17 percent income-tax cut. State officials said during Monday’s budget rollout the proposal would deliver tax relief to nearly every Ohio household and shift to more of a consumption-based tax system that doesn’t discourage investment and job creation.

Providing that income-tax reduction would cost the state about $3.127 billion, while proposed increases in eight taxes – including those on sales, alcohol, tobacco and oil-and-gas drilling – would raise about $3.088 billion, according to administration estimates.

Norquist characterized that $39 million net tax cut as little more than a rounding error. He said the fiscal impacts of excise taxes on goods like cigarettes or alcohol are often underestimated.

“It’s like if somebody brought you a pizza that had pepperoni on it, which I like, and shards of glass on it, which I don’t like,” Norquist said. “Then they asked me, ‘Do you like the pizza?’ I’d say, ‘Well, I like the pepperoni.”’

Americans for Tax Reform’s “Taxpayer Protection Pledge” commits those candidates and elected officials who sign it to oppose net tax increases.