08/24/2020
The following is a slightly modified version of a letter sent to Gov Murphy.
Governor Murphy!
We hope you’re not the one who summoned those 100 knucklehead and corrupt economists to send you an open letter telling you that, in this pandemic, it’s preferable to raise taxes instead of cutting costs, because cutting costs will also cut services. They advise you to raise taxes including income taxes on all people making over $250,000 instead of cutting spending. As we always suspected Governor, you first wanted to raise taxes on the millionaires and now you're going after people making $250,000. How much lower will you go?
Is it your intention Governor to rely on this letter in your upcoming budget speech to justify raising our income taxes, the sales tax and other taxes, in addition to all the other taxes, fees and tolls that you already raised?
This study is so flawed, so single-sided and so heavily signed, that it lacks any credence. Did you need 100 people to sign it to make it more credible?
This study focuses mainly on raising taxes to avoid cutting services, without a single mention that you can cut costs without cutting any services or raising any taxes. This study does not even address how money can be saved by cutting the exorbitant healthcare and pension benefits your public workers and teachers receive.
How much money can be saved by cutting those exorbitant benefits? How about the 4.9 billion dollars that you already contributed or are planning to contribute to their pension funds this year and every year in the future? By cutting those exorbitant benefits and bring them on par with what similar workers in the private sector receive, New Jersey would save at least $5 billion dollars every year and not a single public worker would lose his job, not a single service would need to be cut, not a single tax would need to be raised and there will be plenty of money left to hire more workers and offer more services. These are the changes that will go a long way to reducing economic inequities in New Jersey. Not those mentioned in that letter.
New Jersey is broke now, not because you’re not taxing enough, it’s because you’re giving it all to your public workers. You might be able to better understand this common sense principle Governor, if you stop acting as an agent of those workers and their unions against the taxpayers. And you might be able to put New Jersey back on a sustainable healthier fiscal footing for the long future. Surprisingly, that’s something those 100 economists failed to mention in their letter, but it seems they needed to provide you with the justification you need to raise taxes. Hence, their misleading and fraudulent letter.
Governor, we’ll be watching your budget speech to hear where this letter fits in your budget.
NJ Citizens for Property Tax Reform!
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