A source at the capitol said there is talk legislative Democrats Thursday will propose a unitary tax on corporations as a highlight of their two-year budget proposal and one means of addressing the gaping budget deficit.
There are a lot of rumors about what taxes the Democrats want to raise or what tax exemptions they want to eliminate.
Senate President Donald Williams, D-Brooklyn, managed to attend yesterday’s legislative breakfast of the Business Council of Fairfield County WITHOUT being pinned down on any changes to business taxes.
Other decision-makers say they are still putting the revenue portion of the budget together.
Sen. Eileen Daily, D-Westbrook, a co-chairman of the Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee, joked “anything is likely, not likely, or maybe.”
But she added: “A unitary tax is something we have looked at and considered in the past … What we said at the beginning of this year is everything’s on the table and there are no sacred cows.”
Daily did say she thought the sales tax exemption for manufacturing equipment was pretty safe.
I put in calls to the Connecticut Business and Industry Association to see if members had heard anything about a unitary tax getting some traction.
Nancy Andrews, a CBIA spokesman, noted there was a bill introduced earlier this year for a unitary tax, so it would not be completely out of the blue if it showed up in the Dem budget.
