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Show Utah Foundation Reports on Beehive State Tax Payments Utahns paid a total of $437 million in federal, state and local taxes during 1958, according to a year end review of government in Utah, released today by Utah Foundation, the private, nonprofit non-profit governmental research organization. or-ganization. Taxes, both direct and hidden, took 30c out of every dollar received re-ceived by Utahns last year, the study continues. The total tax burden was equal to $520 per capita or approximately $2,080 for the average family of four persons. According to the report, fed-, eral taxes accounted for 64 per cent, state taxes 20 per cent and local taxes for 16 per cent of the total tax burden. This is almost a direct reversal of the situation in 1930 when local taxes accounted for 48, state 28, and federal taxes 24 per cent of the total taxes paid by our Utahns that year. Government continued to play an important role in the Utah economy during 1958. Nearly one out of every four non agricultural agri-cultural employees in Utah last year was working for some unit of government. The number of governmental employees in the state increased 169 per cent between be-tween 1940 and 1958, compared with a rise of 83 per cent in private pri-vate employment during the same period. The year 1958 was a big year for education in Utah. Utah spent more than $102.9 million for education during 1958. This amount was equivalent to 7.14 per cent of the total personal income of all individuals in the state. Most of the rise in educational edu-cational expenditures last year resulted from liberalization of the state school aid formula by the 1957 Utah legislature. State and local funds provided to Utah public schools exceeded $70.7 million, equal to 4.9 per cent of Utah income. Total public pub-lic school revenues were up $12 million from 1957, the largest increase in any single year in Utah history. Expendtiures for other major governmental functions rose in 1958, the report continues. The recession experienced in Utah during the early months of 1958 resulted in an increase in welfare wel-fare and unemployment costs. Also contributing to the rise in welfare expenditures last year was the establishment of an expanded ex-panded medical care program for welfare recipients. Highway expenditures rose in the year, and it is expected that they will continue to increase during the next few years as the state swings into action on the federally sponsored national highway improvement program. Last year, $28.9 million was spent on the state highway system, sys-tem, $2.7 million in state aid was distributed for use on local roads, and $5.9 million in local funds were expended on city streets and county roads. Foundation officals point out that Utah is one of the fastest growing states in the nation. Utah's population, estimated at 865,000 on July 1, has increased 25.5 per cent since 1950, compared com-pared with a national rise of 15.0 per cent during this same period. Only seven of the 48 states have a greater relative growth than Utah. Utah's population growth trend is expected to continue. According Accord-ing to the latest projections, Utah population may reach 905,-000 905,-000 by 1960. Personal income has also increased in-creased markedly in Utah with an expanding economy. Total personal income in Utah, which was $1,442,000,000 in 1957, increased in-creased 62 per cent since 1950 in per capita income, however. Nationally, the increase in personal per-sonal income was 53 per cent between be-tween 1940 and 1957. Despite the relatively greateT rise in total to-tal personal income, Utah's per capita personal income of $1,694 during 1957 was still 16 per cent below the per capita income of $2,027 for the entire nation. The state ranks among the 48 states and 436 per cent since 1940. |
