February 9, 2012
Question of the Week?
Question of the Week?
A question of the week might be fun if anyone in cyber space would like to take a shot at knowing local policies. I know the candidates know it.
What is the income tax rate for St. Mary’s county and how does it compare with the neighboring Southern Maryland counties?
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What is your position on this Mr. Morgan? Do you think the rate should be lowered? If so, how would the revenue reduction be mitigated in order for the BOCC to balance the budget?
6/18/10
Well, the 3 main sources of tax revenue to the county are: Income tax, property tax and real estate transfer tax. While the St. Mary's income tax is a bit higher, property taxes in St. Mary’s county are a bit cheaper than Charles and Calvert. The tax that puts St. Mary's at a disadvantage is the Real Estate Transfer tax; this is a tax paid each time a piece of property has its ownership "transferred" to someone else. St. Mary's transfer tax is set at 1% of the property sales price. Neither Charles nor Calvert has a transfer tax.
The transfer tax was a less painful revenue source when sellers were leaving the settlement table with money and buyers basically had access to borrow closing costs. But, more times than not now-a-days, the seller ends up paying the transfer tax in order to sell their property. This is another case of redistributing money from the property owners to the government.
If St. Mary's were to do away with the transfer tax, the revenue lost could be offset by spending cuts or combining departments. Maybe to save some money in the future, the county could start paying list price for multi-million dollar farms it purchases unlike the Hayden farm.
Matt Morgan
Mr. Morgan - You initially raised the issue of our income tax rate, and did not answer my question. However, since you bring up the transfer tax in response; how much revenue would be lost by eliminating the transfer tax? Where exactly would you cut spending, and which County departments would be combined? Most importantly, as a delegate, would this even be in your swim lane?
I initially raised the question of county income tax rate for educational purposes. I've been visiting lots of people in my district and was surprised that so many people don’t know their exact tax rate. For example, a lot of people in this area are taxed at: 28% Federal, 4.75% State, 7.125% Social Security, and 3% County. That equals almost 43%. If you own a small business or get paid via a 1099, you pay both sides of the social security tax for a total of 15.3%. People in this situation have their total tax at over 50% of their income. Plus, don't forget Maryland's 6% sales tax, a gas tax at 23.5 cents/gallon,a cigarette tax at $2/pack - the list goes on and on.
When people start to understand just how much of their money is paid back government as taxes, they start to question what they are getting for their money. They also start to realize that their elected officials are out of touch.
And what are you going to do about it if elected? PLEASE be specific.
You could have just Googled all this data.
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