There are rumors/speculation that a deal may be in the offing in the House for enough Democrats to vote with Republicans to allow HB16, the Repeal of the Estate Tax to pass, while garnering enough Republican votes to allow an Amended HB109 and HB102 to pass. HB109 would create two new Income Brackets of $125,000 [7.05%] and $250,000 [7.80%] with a tax cut of 0.05% for every other bracket. HB102 would raise the Corporate Franchise Tax. Sources tell me that HB109 would likely be amended to remove the tax cuts of 0.05% across the board.
I would first see if a Estate Tax Cut rather than a full repeal would be enough. Because the Delaware Estate Tax only applies to estates worth more than $5.49 million. So we are talking about a tax only on a fraction of wealthy estates. But, the facts are, to get any tax increase on the wealthy and corporations passed, we will need at least one Republican vote to garner the 3/5 majority needed. But I don’t trust Republicans, at any level, at all, so I would need HB102 and HB109 to be passed first.
Your thoughts?
So what are the numbers here? How much money is raised via HB109 and HB102 v the amount of money lost in the repeal? Off the top of my head, wealthy people (with qualifying estates) look to be getting the better part of the deal.
I don’t have that. I do know that HB109 will not by itself raise enough to close the entire gap, which of course will be widened if HB16 passes. I don’t know how much HB102 raises. Let me check to see if there are any Fiscal notes.
The Fiscal Note the following loss of revenue for the Estate Tax Repeal. There are no fiscal notes for HB102 or HB109
FY 2019 ($3,750,000)
FY 2020 ($5,000,000)
So, w/ 109 & 102 not yet passed, those voting Yes for HB16 are voting to add $8.75m to the state deficit? Got it… I would expect nothing less from the GA. It would be serrendipitous if right after they passed HB 16, Bushweller runs his annual “give more money back to floundering DE casinos” bill.
My position would be that 109 and 102 must be passed first before any vote on Estate Tax Repeal. If you want to do it as a new omnibus bill that does it all at the same time, fine.