GET MORE DETAIL NOW: CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE RECORDED WEBINAR
Governor Tom Wolf’s budget proposal for the 2016-17 fiscal
year once again puts small-business owners directly in the cross hairs. Last Tuesday, the Governor announced a budget
plan that increases state spending by nearly 8 percent, which is about 4 times
the projections for real GDP growth and the rate of inflation.
To pay for this massive increase in spending, the Governor
proposed 15 new tax increases totaling about $3.6 billion over the next two
years. Most worrisome for small business
is his proposal to increase the personal income tax to 3.40 percent, which
would represent an 11 percent increase.
He also proposed new taxes on property, casualty, and fire insurance
premiums, increased taxes on community banks, a severance tax on natural gas
extraction, and several more. Even more astonishing is the fact that a number
of his proposed tax increases would actually be retroactive to January 1, 2016.
In addition to massive tax increases, many small-businesses
owners could also see higher labor costs for entry level jobs, if the Governor
gets his way. His proposal calls for an
increase in the minimum wage to $10.15 an hour, which would represent a 40
percent increase in mandated labor costs for entry level, low-skilled
workers. The state’s Independent Fiscal
Office has already reported that this increase would eliminate 31,000 jobs in
Pennsylvania, which NFIB has reported on here.
WATCH THE RECORDED WEBINAR DETAILING GOV. WOLF BUDGET PROPOSAL – CLICK HERE
