Question 1

What is the Fair Share Amendment?

Accepted Answer

It's Question 1 on the November ballot, and Massachusetts voters like you can vote on it this year. The very rich pay less of their income in taxes than the rest of us, and Question 1 would tax the very rich slightly more to make our tax system fairer.

Question 1 would create a 4% tax on the portion of a person’s annual income above $1 million and constitutionally dedicate the funds raised to transportation and public education. This will allow Massachusetts to improve our roads, bridges, schools, and transportation by guaranteeing in the text of the Massachusetts constitution that every dollar raised by the surtax will go to only public education and transportation. And if you don’t make more than $1 million a year, you won’t pay anything more.

The Fair Share Amendment will generate $2 billion a year, every year, that is constitutionally dedicated for quality public education, affordable public colleges and universities, and the repair and maintenance of roads, bridges, and public transportation.

Only the wealthiest Massachusetts residents—individuals who earn MORE THAN $1 million per year—will pay more: just 4% on the part of their annual income that is ABOVE $1 million. Over 99% of all Massachusetts taxpayers will not pay a penny more. And we’ll all benefit from better schools, colleges, roads, bridges, and public transportation.

It’s a win-win for Massachusetts.

Question 2

Would we really raise $2 billion a year?

Accepted Answer

Yes.

The state Department of Revenue estimates that the Fair Share Amendment would raise approximately $2 billion a year, entirely from the top 1% of taxpayers.

Question 3

Will the money really go to transportation and public education?

Accepted Answer

Yes.

Dedicating the funding from Question 1 in the text of the constitution means that the legislature would be constitutionally required to spend this new money on transportation and public education. The state constitution is binding on the legislature, and the Fair Share Amendment creates an ironclad dedication that the funds raised by the amendment must be spent on those two areas.

There’s already plenty of willpower to get money to transportation and education: the Student Opportunity Act promises to increase state aid to local school districts by $1.4 billion a year, and a recent transportation bond bill authorized $16 billion in unfunded transportation investments. But in order to make these and other critical investments, we need a reliable, long-term funding source: the Fair Share Amendment.

Question 4

How exactly will the money be spent?

Accepted Answer

With $2 billion in new revenue every single year, every community in the state will benefit from the Fair Share Amendment.

Specific investment decisions, such as rebuilding a bridge, hiring more teachers or counselors, increasing college scholarship funding, buying electric transit buses, or building new vocational school classrooms, will be made by the state legislature through the annual budget process, or by local cities and towns.

When we pass Fair Share, local communities will advocate for their specific funding priorities to make sure that the funding goes where it’s most needed, and we will have more money, every single year, to fund those priorities.

Question 5

Why is a constitutional amendment needed at all?

Accepted Answer

The federal government and many other states have graduated income taxes, meaning they tax higher income at higher rates—the more money you make, the more you pay in taxes. This is a fairer system: people who can afford more pay more; people who can’t afford to pay as much don’t. But the Massachusetts constitution only allows income to be taxed at one flat rate, currently 5 percent.

This means that under existing law, if Massachusetts attempted to raise the income tax for the very rich, it would also affect low- and middle-income people — working people who already pay their fair share and can’t afford to pay more. It also means that right now, the richest people are paying less of their income in taxes than the rest of us. But Question 1 gets those very rich earners to pay a more equal amount of income in taxes: it makes our tax system more fair.

The Fair Share Amendment creates a single additional tax of four percentage points on the portion of a person’s annual income above $1 million—just 4¢ per $1 over their first $1 million. All of the revenue is constitutionally dedicated to investments in transportation and public education. That means Massachusetts will have billions of dollars a year, every year, to improve our roads, bridges, public transit, and schools from pre-K to higher education — just by ensuring the very rich pay their fair share in taxes.

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