Rep. Mazzochi's opposition to Fair Tax ignores reality

Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R- 47th) reached a huge audience with her anti Fair Tax letter in two major Chicago newspapers. It's a shame she didn't offer a fair assessment of Illinois' dire financial condition from an egregious and unfair tax system that requires an honest, sensible re-boot. Mazzochi simply re-iterated the staunch Republican position Illinois doesn't have a revenue problem, just a spending problem. Don't tinker with taxes she warns, simply cut, cut, cut, ending with a plea to readers to call her to find out how to help.

She could help them simply by stating what she and every legislator knows: Illinois has the 8th most regressive tax nationwide in which the bottom earners pay roughly double the tax rate of the wealthiest Illinoisans when considering all forms of taxation. She could help them by truthfully stating that cutting our way out of the crisis is a non-starter. Illinois has been cutting for two decades now. We've run out of mental hearth, substance abuse, child care resources to cut. We've run out of educational resources to cut which have already degraded Illinois' once outstanding educational system. We've run out additional taxation to impose on the least able to pay simply to protect the vast wealth of the 3% at the top being asked to pay a little more. That's right, 97% will see a modest tax cut, while the top 3% get a modest increase.

It is irrelevant to speculate why Rep. Mazzochi would present such an inaccurate analysis of and remedy for Illinois' financial future. But it is relevant to call her office to find out how to help...by pleading with Rep. Mazzochi to support the Fair Tax.