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The lopsided benefits of Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli’s tax plan are back in the news following the release of a new report featuring data from our partner organization, the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP).
Cuccinelli has proposed eliminating a variety of local business taxes (like his Democratic rival) and slashing the state’s corporate income tax. But the centerpiece of Cuccinelli’s tax plan would scrap the state’s top personal income tax bracket. Under his proposal, the top income tax rate would fall from 5.75 to 5.0 percent, and would even apply to taxpayers starting at the very low level of $5,000 of taxable income.
According to an ITEP analysis published by the Center for American Progress (CAP), and picked up by the Washington Post this week:
- Attorney General Cuccinelli’s personal income tax plan would have cut his own tax bill by $985 last year if exemptions, deductions, and other “loopholes” benefiting him had remained unchanged.
- A typical $1 million-a-year earner would see their tax bill drop by $6,391 per year under Cuccinelli’s plan.
- Overall, 47 percent of all the personal income tax cuts proposed by Cuccinelli would flow to the wealthiest 5 percent of Virginians.
- An average middle-income family could expect to see a tax cut in the range of $98 (or just 0.2 percent of their total income).
- A minimum wage worker, or an elderly taxpayer relying mostly on Social Security income, should each expect to receive no tax cut at all. (An earlier ITEP analysis published by the Commonwealth Institute showed that 39 percent of Virginians overall would see no benefit.)