(Reid Wilson) At the moment, seven states across the country don’t levy a tax on income, and North Carolina Republicans want to make it eight, according to a powerful member of the state legislature.
State Sen. Bob Rucho, a Mecklenburg County Republican and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said Wednesday that he hoped to use the 2015 legislative session to eliminate the state income tax, replacing it with a consumption-based sales tax to make up for the lost revenue.
“That’s a direction we’d like to go,” Rucho said in an interview as the state Senate adjourned for the year. Rucho said it was impractical to push for such a steep cut during a short session the legislature holds in even-numbered years, but that cutting the income tax was a top priority of his when the legislature reconvenes for its biennial full session.
North Carolina’s income tax accounts for about 61 percent of state revenue, Rucho said. But the revenue stream has been choppy in recent years, given the impact of the recession. The uneven results on a year-over-year basis can play havoc with annual budget planning in a state that requires a balanced budget, and it’s something Rucho said he wanted to avoid.
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