Earlier today, members of the State Senate approved a package of needed revenue enhancements to help ease the recession's impact on our state budget.  The latest Senate revenue proposal would generate about $800 million in new resources to help maintain vital supports for working families like child care support, worker retraining programs, health care, K-12 and higher education, along with other basic services.

On March 9th, the House approved a package of revenue enhancements needed to maintain core public services like health care and education.  The House package includes a measure that would broaden the sales tax to include purchases of customized software. Like many of the other tax increases proposed by state policymakers, this has already been done in other states; according to CCH Incorporated, 11 states and the District of Columbia currently levy sales taxes on custom software.

Lawmakers in Olympia are considering placing a limit on a B&O tax preference that primarily benefits large banks headquartered outside of Washington State.*  Capping the “first mortgage deduction” would generate about $67 million in badly needed new resources, while leaving in place a sizable tax benefit for smaller local banks and mortgage lenders.