What are your state's "hot issues?"

[mom'sfolly]

Texas doesn't have an income tax, but this issue may be the one that tips it over.

 

[oldrooster]

Texas doesn't have an income tax, but this issue may be the one that tips it over.

If they decide to switch and eliminate all property tax and perhaps reduce sales tax then it may be more palatable to the voter/resident. it may be explained away that in essence if you reduce/eliminate property tax the prices you pay in stores and rents may drop or stay the same for quite a while since the property owners would not need to pass on the cost to the persons/companies in the lease of the property.

 

[sezjasper]

Heck, if they eliminate property tax and reduce sales tax and as I've just learned, there's no income tax, not to mention how far my housing dollars would go...I'm moving there! But maybe I'll wait until my youngest has finished school

 

[sezjasper]

Rural Texas, especially west Texas is empty in a way that few on the East Coast can imagine. Much of the West fits this model. Additionally, west Texas is dry, and many acres are required for grazing, and even irrigated, it isn't the greatest land in the world. In our neighborhood, the average home price is about $180,000 on 1/5-1/4 acre lots. Ten acres of homes would have about $8 million in property value (180,000 x 4.5 homes/acre x 10 acres), the same ten acres in Fort Davis Texas would have a property value of between $4.5 million in town to perhaps only $200,000 outside town. Ft. Davis spends over $7000/student and Round Rock about $4500/student, but one Round Rock High School has more than double population of the entire town of Ft. Davis In addition to home property taxes, Round Rock has businesses, some of them very large.

It is truly a rural vs urban issue. This issue plays out far differently in most areas of the country than it does in the East. Here in Central Texas, rural land can range from about $3000/acre to $100,000+/acre for close in, Hill Country acreage. In West Texas, some acreage goes for $1000/acre.

http://www.bigpictureagriculture.com/2011/07/us-farmland-average-price-per-acre.html

This is fascinating stuff and you're right, hard for a life-long east coast resident to imagine. So I went to see the map that you linked here, and maybe it's started to click a bit...the west Texas land that you refer to, isn't that the area affected by the Dust Bowl of the Depression years? And the land has never really recovered? I read a book about the Dust Bowl era a couple months ago and it left me with so many questions, I wished there were people who lived through it that I could sit down and talk with. I also wish our schools spent more time teaching kids about their country because there's so much they never learn, and I'm a prime example of that.

 

[oldrooster]

Heck, if they eliminate property tax and reduce sales tax and as I've just learned, there's no income tax, not to mention how far my housing dollars would go...I'm moving there! But maybe I'll wait until my youngest has finished school

you misunderstood my post it was suppsed to read that they would shift property tax and perhaps some sales tax to an income tax.....

 

[hemet dennis]

Here in Texas the tax laws have gone round and round on school funding...no foreclosures involved. The law is written so that rich districts have to send money to poorer districts. Because school funding is by property tax, a district in west Texas with only grazing land has a much lower tax base than a city/suburban area with businesses, and homes. My school district has over 10,000 high school students. Its tax base includes Dell corporate HQ, State Farm HQ, an outlet mall, plus all the other small and large businesses, homes etc. There is no way an agricultural district can compete with that. We don't get to keep all our tax money, even though our rate is maxed out...money gets sent to smaller, poorer districts, often who still have rates under maximum. Poorer districts need money, but districts like ours do too. Texas, a small government state, constantly ends up in court over funding issues for schools and prisons.

As for marriage...the government has a responsibility to treat them the same...if you are married in one state, you should be married in all. I think the legal and religious aspects of marriage should be separate. Then when you marry in the legal sense, you are conferred all those rights, regardless of sexual orientation. Your religious ceremony would be a completely different matter; something between you and your church. I know many of you hate hearing about a European model, but in France, and other European countries, no marriage is legal unless it is preformed by a civil authority. You register your marriage at the courthouse, then go on to your religious ceremony. Your marriage is not official if you skip this part. You can be married in the eyes of the Church, but if it unregistered, it is not legal. In most of Scandinavia the laws are equally applied to all couples.

Again, marriage is between consenting adults. Animals and inanimate objects cannot say "I do" so they don't. Children are not adults, so they can't marry either.

I don't think because one state passes a law it can be imposed on 49 other states.

 

[ChickensRDinos]

I don't think because one state passes a law it can be imposed on 49 other states.

Marriage is federally recognized. If you are married in one state you are married everywhere and it has local and federal legal consequences. That is the way marriage works and if it is going to be equal then it ultimately has to be all or nothing. If I am married in CA or TX or DE then I am married in the US. period. Marriage effects federal taxes, federal college financial aid, social secruity and if you are a federal employee or in the military it affects your pension, etc.

If I take a domestic vacation and am in an accident or injured do I really need to worry that my wife and children will not be able to be with me in the hospital or that my power of attorney will be contested because, though I am married in my home state and am still in the country in which I am a citizen and work and pay taxes, I happen to not be married on the street some car hit me? It can not work that way.

 

[chickened]

Here in Texas the tax laws have gone round and round on school funding...no foreclosures involved. The law is written so that rich districts have to send money to poorer districts. Because school funding is by property tax, a district in west Texas with only grazing land has a much lower tax base than a city/suburban area with businesses, and homes. My school district has over 10,000 high school students. Its tax base includes Dell corporate HQ, State Farm HQ, an outlet mall, plus all the other small and large businesses, homes etc. There is no way an agricultural district can compete with that. We don't get to keep all our tax money, even though our rate is maxed out...money gets sent to smaller, poorer districts, often who still have rates under maximum. Poorer districts need money, but districts like ours do too. Texas, a small government state, constantly ends up in court over funding issues for schools and prisons.

As for marriage...the government has a responsibility to treat them the same...if you are married in one state, you should be married in all. I think the legal and religious aspects of marriage should be separate. Then when you marry in the legal sense, you are conferred all those rights, regardless of sexual orientation. Your religious ceremony would be a completely different matter; something between you and your church. I know many of you hate hearing about a European model, but in France, and other European countries, no marriage is legal unless it is preformed by a civil authority. You register your marriage at the courthouse, then go on to your religious ceremony. Your marriage is not official if you skip this part. You can be married in the eyes of the Church, but if it unregistered, it is not legal. In most of Scandinavia the laws are equally applied to all couples.

Again, marriage is between consenting adults. Animals and inanimate objects cannot say "I do" so they don't. Children are not adults, so they can't marry either.

Marriage and civil unions are not the same.

 

[chickened]

I don't think because one state passes a law it can be imposed on 49 other states.

That is right. That is why some states oppose the DoMA

 

[mom'sfolly]

Civil unions are a legal contract. Animals cannot enter a legal contract, nor can inanimate objects.

If the government separates the legal and religious aspects of marriage than civil union are the only legal marriage.

Utter nonsense, complete hogwash, etc. that marriage equality would lead to marriage to children or animals or bacon.