Senate panel OKs income tax cuts for most Marylanders – Baltimore Sun
A Maryland Senate committee approved tax cuts Thursday that would affect people at all income levels, and the governor’s office signaled that it supported the reductions.
The Budget and Taxation Committee voted 11-2 to reduce income tax rates for high earners, expand a tax credit for the working poor and increase the income tax exemption for middle-income families.
The tax cuts proposed by Democrats differed from those proposed by Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, but a spokesman said the governor saw any cut as a good cut.
Committee members called the Senate proposal a balanced approach.
“It seems logical that we’re going to help out people at the bottom and the top,” said committee Chairman Edward J. Kasemeyer, a Democrat who represents Howard and Baltimore counties.
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The Senate panel’s package drew criticism from a liberal-leaning think tank.
“This is a giveaway to the very wealthiest Marylanders, at the expense of everyone else. It can’t legitimately be called middle-class tax relief,” said Benjamin Orr, executive director of the Maryland Center on Economic Policy. Orr praised the decision to strengthen the Earned Income Tax Credit but panned the income tax cuts, saying they would give the top 1 percent of earners an average $2,500 tax break.
