Senate closes in on a “chips-plus” bill. The Senate may agree today to vote on a semiconductor manufacturing grants and tax incentives bill. It now includes a multi-year 25 percent investment tax credit for semiconductor plants estimated to cost $24 billion annually. But it does not restore immediate expensing of research and development costs. The Senate may vote on the bill itself next week. The House still must OK the Senate version.
Next Monday with SLFI: How states are navigating volatile fiscal times. TPC's State and Local Finance Initiative will host a virtual event that examines fiscal year 2023 budgets. Some states are collecting higher than expected revenues, but others face strong economic headwinds and other fiscal challenges. Journalist Liz Farmer will moderate a panel discussion of states’ budget outlook featuring TPC’s Lucy Dadayan, Shelby Kerns of the National Association of State Budget Officers, and Mark Zandi of Moody’s Analytics. Learn more and register here.
Some property taxes are falling in Florida. Miami-Dade commissioners approved a 1 percent cut to the county’s rate. From 2020 to 2021, property values grew by 10 percent in South Florida. In Miami-Dade County, the taxable value of properties climbed by $34 billion, increasing tax revenue by $154 million. Meanwhile, Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry will present a budget that reduces the city’s property tax rate. Taxable values of properties there are nearing $81 billion.
A lawsuit alleging tax avoidance by major travel companies heads to trial in Nevada. Companies like Orbitz, Expedia, and Travelocity didn’t pay hundreds of millions of dollars in hotel room taxes in Nevada, according to a lawsuit filed on behalf of the state. According to the plaintiffs, some booking companies acquired hotel rooms at discounted prices and rented them to consumers at higher rates. They allegedly collected room taxes based on the higher rates but paid Nevada based on discounts. The plaintiffs seek over $1 billion in lost revenues and damages.
If California phases out oil drilling, what happens to Kern County revenue? Seventy percent of California’s oil and gas industry is produced in Kern County. The industry employs 16,000 people and generates nearly 25 percent of the county’s property tax revenue. The New York Times reports on the county’s efforts to identify other sources of revenue as California tries to reduce its carbon footprint.
Never mind: Amid falling crude oil prices, India cuts its windfall tax on producers and refiners. Just three weeks ago, the nation levied the windfall tax on crude oil producers and taxed exports of gasoline, diesel, and aviation fuel. Yesterday, it reversed those decisions. It cut the tariff on diesel and aviation-fuel exports by 2 rupees a liter, cut the tax on domestically produced crude oil by about one-quarter and repealed its export tax on gasoline.
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