JeffK wrote:rcthompson04 wrote:If you lowered the state Personal Income Tax by 20% and raised a SEPTA income tax equal to that amount you would more than plug the SEPTA portion of the funding problem.
That assumes the amount of state income taxes collected locally equals the amount the state sends to SEPTA. Such a diversion would certainly fill SEPTA's funding holes but might also take away from funding elsewhere.
Regardless, some form of tax swap could still be a kind of "karma solution". It's already well-known that SE PA sends more to Harrisburg than it gets back. Short-circuiting the path through H'burg could be a surprise for those parts of the state that moan endlessly about how much they "lose" to Philadelphia & environs.
I was only looking at the Capital Funding component. I ran the numbers this evening based on the 2016 Personal Income Tax numbers by county. The SEPTA counties could cover the Capital Budget plus approximately $150 million extra with the equivalent of a 10% in the state income tax being shifted to the SEPTA counties (approximately $430 million in revenue). The state would lose approximately $1.1 billion revenue.
If you wanted to eliminate the whole SEPTA operating and capital state subsidy, you would need to get around a 22% cut in state Personal Income Taxes.
I would give the option to any county who wanted to fund public transit to use this option of an optional personal income tax. The revenue would almost certainly help cover the PAT in Allegheny County along with the smaller players.