Show MORE EQUAL TA XA TION shall utah broaden the basis of oe taxation in utah b by y shifting some ot of the tax load form tangible property to intangibles tangi bles and income this question rises above all others in the consideration that the people should give to the constitutional amendments amend m ants coming before them next november many other questions are dinv inv involved 0 ived but the one dealing with the red redistribution of the tax load la Is the keynote of the proposed tax revision revis ion program the state tax revision commission has haa proposed to redraft the tax system of the state to partially take into account e aull t the ability of a person to pay by means of two income taxes this naturally gives rise to the question why two one income tax Is directed against corporations it has been found that n many I 1 any corporations do a big profitable business in utah and pay little in taxation to the state because they own little or no tangible property upon which our present tax load rests many corp corporations 0 rations are owned by residents of 0 ther other states and the profits derived by such such corporations doing business ta in utah can be reached only by taeng the business itself it will readily be seen that to enact a personal income tax without an accompanying compa nying corporation tax would tend to discriminate aganet a resident of th the estate state whose income would be reached and in favor cavor af 0 the noa nonresident rest t who collects from bustness business income earned here but whose income could not be reached by the personal income tax A similar discrimination applies under our present tax system between carpo corporations po rations one may have large tangible property holdings in utah and since our tax base Is general property that corporation pays heavy taxes another may have practically no tangible property located in utah but may extract profits as large or larger than the first without paying any tax tor for the support of state and local governments by taxing business income and applying the proceeds to reduce the tangible property tax therefore a readjustment would be made tending to equalize the burden between the two furthermore it would reach the profits earned in utah but paid to persons through stock ownership out iside the state tile the income tax field Is one to which the states are rapidly turning in equalizing and their tax systems twenty states now have state income taxes of some kind the experience peri ence gained in those states and also in administering the federal income tax has pioneered the way and established certain well defined economic rates of taxation exemptions or deductions by which this state may profit in setting up its own income tax system in the suggested personal income tax for utah it Is proposed to a allow if low an exemption exem of 1000 for a single man and 2000 tor for married man with about additional tor for each child or dependent person by allowing for these exemptions the income tax could be so BO framed as to make the tax tall fall primarily on those individuals who do not now pay a proportionate share of the burden when judged by the standard ot of ability to pay such a tax would not reach the man of relatively small means at all but would reach the larger incomes which have taxable y but cannot be reached proportionately at present unless the incomes are earned from tangible property rates on personal incomes differ in various states the following tables show how the personal tax would work under rates and exemptions proposed here single person ath no dependents net income exemption 1000 1000 2000 1000 1000 1000 1000 1000 1000 taxable income tax none none 1000 10 2000 7 25 46 45 70 married man with four dependents and less 3 none none 4 1400 16 2400 33 56 55 82 these schedules show only about what might be expected under a personal income tax in case the legislature should follow the average in other states all state personal income taxes provide tor for some exemption or deduction and in none are th tax rates such as to prove burdensome the proposed corporation income tax would be based upon the net income of the business done within the sta state to at the rate of 4 per cent an interesting phase of this pr proposition 0 is the cost of administering the income lincome tax the national Con conference conferee feren e board in a recent publication antic entitled aled state income taxes reports that the cost ot at administering assessing and collecting income taxes varies from a little less than 1 per cent ol of the total collections in north carolina to per cent in massachusetts the present cost ot of administering an income tax in this state should not be laterally mate rally different from the cost of administering the present en prop property arty tax 7 F AT FOWLER chairman |