Political Horizons for May 31, 2009

• By MARK BALLARD
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: May 31, 2009

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In the seventh chapter of “The Grapes of Wrath,” John Steinbeck’s narrator becomes a crooked used car salesman who reviews all the various tricks that hoodwink unsuspecting buyers. The passage is a great description of how the unscrupulous divert attention from just how bad the vehicle is he’s selling.

It’s too early to say whether Gov. Bobby Jindal and the 55 Louisiana House members who vow to derail a state Senate plan to find more money for higher education are raising legitimate arguments, or just using sawdust to squelch a noisy debate. They haven’t really said much about it at all, so far.

The proposal, sponsored by state Sen. Lydia Jackson, D-Shreveport, would divert $118 million to higher education. Jindal proposes lopping $219 million — roughly 15 percent — from state spending for public colleges, universities and technical schools.

Jackson’s alternative is backed by the state Senate’s top leaders — Republicans included — and some of Jindal’s biggest supporters in the business community.

Jindal has not articulated his reasons beyond a broad resistance to taxes and to the use of one-time money for recurring expenses.

Higher education cuts, arguably, could be necessary. After all, state government pays for a whole lot of colleges, universities and technical schools — almost all of which have many, many administrators who make six figures annually.

And there are arguments for keying higher education budgets to performance goals, such as how many students they graduate rather than how many they recruit. These are questions taxpayers must mull.

But the 55 House members argue that the plan amounts to “a $118-million-per-year state income tax increase on middle-class Louisiana citizens.”

They’re referring to only part of Jackson’s alternative, but let’s take a look at that claim.

At issue is the last step in a gradual increase of a tax benefit that was granted under former Gov. Kathleen Blanco.

The Jackson alternative would postpone for three years a jump from 65 percent to 100 percent of the amount of federal itemized deductions a taxpayer could claim on state tax returns. Nobody would pay more, Jackson said, but the money that otherwise would go to taxpayers as a result of the jump to 100 percent this year would stay in government to help out higher education.

Generally, people choose either standard or itemized deductions. Deductions decrease the amount of taxes a person owes. They cover a percentage of certain expenses, such as mortgage interest, charitable contributions and medical costs.

The term “excess” refers to the amount by which the taxpayer’s federal itemized deductions exceeded the federal standard deduction — $10,900 for married filing jointly in 2008 — had the taxpayer not itemized.