Soak the poor

Kevin Drum did a post on the upcoming Teaxs tax cuts, proposed by Republicans and shown to be beneficial to the wealthiest residents of the state while shifting the burden to the poor. Today, the Houston Chronicle further examines impending bill:

Time and again in the House's proposed tax bill, which will be debated Monday, the largest political donors are the businesses that receive the biggest tax breaks or have their taxes left untouched. Some of the biggest industrial sector donors in the past two years and their proposed tax cuts are:

Finance, insurance and real estate -- $896.5 million a year in tax cuts; $7.3 million in political contributions.

Utilities and transportation -- $222.2 million in cuts; $6.1 million in donations.

Oil, gas and petrochemical -- $399 million in cuts; $5.1 million in donations.

People and companies' political committees in the biggest losing industries -- construction, services and trade -- also made millions of dollars in political donations but rarely in the concentrated amounts of the potential winners. They will pay $1.4 billion in increased state taxes.

(snip)

The biggest winners in the bill are the capital-intensive industries, particularly petrochemical companies. They probably will benefit from proposed changes in the business tax. But more importantly, like homeowners, they will see a substantial property-tax cut.

These companies have been paying a substantial share of the state's business taxes because they are covered by the state franchise tax while many service industry firms and partnerships are not.

Because most tax records are private, determining the impact on specific companies is difficult.

But in the property-rich school district of Deer Park, the Shell Oil Co. refinery would save at least $4.8 million a year on its school property taxes. Currently, those taxes on the refinery, which is valued at $1.3 billion, exceed $24 million a year.

Drum calls the whole think "breathtaking." And I think you'd have to agree.