It’s budget season at the statehouse, which means lawmakers are continuing to debate both the state budget and ways to potentially boost revenue.
One of those is a new resolution that poses a solution to save Illinois billions of dollars by introducing taxes intended for the ultra-wealthy…
But as we previously reported, it’s one some lawmakers are already urging Pritzker to put a stop to.
The Illinois Revenue Alliance proposed a joint resolution that said it’ll generate 6 billion dollars of revenue into the state of Illinois.
It includes proposals to tax digital advertising, taxing billionaires on net worth, and increasing the corporate income tax.
Representative Will Davis is one of the resolution’s sponsors…
He said the resolution isn’t meant to be passed as is…
But to start the conversation of where additional revenue can come from.
"We’re starting our conversation needing to cut about 1.3 billion dollars out of the current state budget. So for those of us who don’t always think that the scenario should be cutting services and opportunities in the budget, but in order to fund those services," Davis said.
Davis said the point isn’t to push the burden onto Illinoisians.
"That’s the nuance of having the discussion and why the resolution is important. So we can talk about those things and bring all of those conversations to the table, to acknowledge that we don’t want to have a disparate impact on smaller businesses or mom and pop situations,” Davis said.
But senate republicans like Jason Plummer said raising taxes is the last thing Illinois needs.
"It’s a tax on small businesses. We all know, LLCs and S-corps, which are all of our small businesses, tax at the owner level. So that’s not a millionaire or billionaire getting taxed, that’s the person that runs the local Subway," Plummer said.
He said those taxes could only encourage more people to leave the state of Illinois…
"If you make it more expensive for businesses to do business, they’re going to raise their prices. You wanna grow revenue, expand the tax base, by growing the population, and incentivizing people to come here and start businesses so Illinoisans have opportunities,” Plummer said.
A representative from Gov. Pritzker’s office told NewsChannel 20 the proposal the governor supports is the balanced budget he introduced in February.
Pritzker said earlier this year he does not plan to raise taxes for Illinoisans.
The state budget and any revenue proposals must be approved by the general assembly before the end of session on the 31st.
