Nutter's answer - tax the poor

Mayor Nutter is offering regressive taxes as a solution to the city budget deficit, showing just how limited a vision our elected leaders have for addressing this economic crisis. 

Nutter came out from the start saying he wouldn't cut "core services", a clear sign that he's learned a lesson from last year - Philadelphians will fight (and win) to keep their basic public infrastructure. A year ago, communities across the city were organizing and rallying to save their libraries, their pools, and other essential services from closure, earning the mayor a new nickname - "Mayor Cutter". 

Despite all this, it's clear that our elected officials haven't learned enough - because our mayor is still opting to balance this budget by disproportionately charging the poor and working people of the city. 

The budget that Nutter laid out on Thursday features the so-called "Keep Philly Clean Service", a $300 a year household tax for trash pickup ($200 for low income families), and the supposed "Healthy Philadelphia Initiative", a 2 cents-an-ounce tax on soda.

These measures are supposed to close a deficit projected at $120 million for next year, and $500 - $700 million over the next five years, according to the city's numbers. 

"Clean Streets"

The city administration has been talking about increased trash collections fees for a while, and in the interest of "keeping it simple", they propose charging every household in the city $300 a year for trash pickup. A family of four that earns less than $48,000 a year can apply for a reduced fee of $200. 

Instead of rolling back the ten year tax abatement, or taxing the richest among us, the mayor is choosing to implement what is essentially a flat tax that will be a real burden on families that are already struggling to get by on fixed incomes, or dealing with unemployment. 

The city is expecting that this "fee" will raise $108 million a year towards balancing the budget, and Nutter says some of the money will go towards expanding street cleaning and leaf collection - both services that have been cut back recently.

But this isn't really about making our streets cleaner - no one is arguing that we'll get $300 worth of expanded street cleaning every year. Nutter simply chose to attach this fee to one of our most essential municipal services - trash collection - making a political calculation about how best to sell a regressive flat tax.

"Healthy Philadelphians"

The second part of the mayor's plan to raise revenue is a tax of 2 cents per ounce on soda sold in the city. This is expected to raise $77 million a year. It's also supposed to discourage soda drinking, bring down obesity, and generally make philadelphians healthier.

First of all, there are serious doubts as to whether this tax will actually cut soda consumption. Although there is proof that taxing soda makes consumers buy less, this tax is actually set to go directly to retailers, who will be able to choose to spread the cost of the tax over all the products they sell, instead of simply raising the price of a 12 ounce soda can by a 24 cents, and potentially loosing profits on sales.

Regardless of how this tax is implemented, it's simply another regressive tax - one that could have much more of an impact on the family owned corner store down the street than on your neighborhood Wal-Mart or Target.

What would it take for Philadelphians to be healthier? Access to supermarkets, and exercise opportunities are an important first step - and the city has said that $20 million of the tax will go towards initiatives like these.

But let's not be fooled into thinking that simply taxing people's bad habits is the way to better public health. This tax is not going to address the structural reasons why poor people in this city are less healthy - or take steps to give working people what they really need - things like healthcare, worker's compensation, and paid sick days, to name a few.

Nutter's budget proposal goes to City Council for hearings tomorrow, starting with the Five Year Plan for city development.

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