Today, we joined together with a coalition of Maryland business organizations to release a study analyzing the economic and fiscal impacts of tax policy options being discussed by state policy makers as they deal with Maryland’s $1.5 billion structural budget deficit. Click here to download the study (pdf).

Some of the main points include:

• Maryland businesses will pay a significant share of the increased taxes under most of the options evaluated. Business would pay 40 percent of a sales tax rate increase, 79 percent of a sales tax expansion to professional services, and as high as 33 percent of adding a 6 percent top individual tax rate bracket.
• Changes to corporate taxation have the highest cost of all the policy options in number of jobs lost per $1 million of tax revenue raised.
• The incidence of jobs losses across the sectors of the economy varies. A comparison of the corporate income tax rate change and the sales tax rate change shows that the corporate income tax increase results in a larger share of jobs losses in higher-paying occupations.

Participating organizations include the American Council of Engineering Companies / Maryland, Greater Baltimore Committee, Greater Washington Board of Trade, Maryland Association of CPAs, Maryland Bankers Association, Maryland Chamber of Commerce. Local chambers participating include: Baltimore-Washington Corridor, Baltimore County, Cecil County, Frederick County, Garrett County, Greater Silver Spring, Greater Bethesda/Chevy Chase, Hagerstown/Washington County, Harford County, Howard County, Montgomery County, Prince George’s County, Queen Anne’s County, St. Mary’s County, Talbot County and West Anne Arundel County.