this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2023

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1943

Massachusetts passed a 4% millionaire's tax last year. Now every public school student is going to get free lunch (www.businessinsider.com)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

154 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Students in Massachusetts will get free lunch and breakfast at school thanks to a new 4% tax put on people who earn more than $1 million.

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[–] Kage520@lemmy.world 165 points 2 years ago (4 children)

We need different terms for people who HAVE a million dollars and people who MAKE a million per year. Lots of people will read this millionaire's tax and think it will apply to them when they are nearing retirement since they finally have a million dollars after saving all their life.

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[–] Gsus4@feddit.nl 110 points 2 years ago (1 children)

It's easier to sell a tax hike if you know exactly where it's going :)

[–] theragu40@lemmy.world 92 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Unless you're Waukesha, Wisconsin, where they specifically voted to stop giving kids handouts (i.e. free lunch). Because, you know, kids should work for their food or something instead of using their energy to learn.

[–] Gsus4@feddit.nl 42 points 2 years ago (3 children)

probably the same people that say abortion is murdering kids...

[–] richieadler@lemmy.myserv.one 15 points 2 years ago (4 children)

I mean, cheap labor has to come from somewhere... Where do you find empoverished people to exploit if you don't force births?

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[–] affiliate@lemmy.world 27 points 2 years ago (1 children)

kids just don’t want to work anymore these days. they’re too busy with their avocados and ipad games. meanwhile the child unemployment rates are at historical highs. won’t someone think of the economy?

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[–] jumperalex@lemmy.world 15 points 2 years ago

"It's about time these kids had some skin in the game!"

-Some Republican Somewhere I'm sure.

[–] TeoTwawki@lemmy.world 104 points 2 years ago (2 children)

The descriptor "free" misleads - this is exactly the type of thing taxes were always meant to pay for.

[–] HawlSera@lemm.ee 36 points 2 years ago

This I have always hated the "FREE STUFF!" talking point and how the mainstream bought it.

I'm not talking about demanding some middle class guy be forced to buy me an Xbox, but rather I'm asking multiple billionaires start paying just a little more in taxes (instead of ya know.. constant rebates for "cReAtInG JoBs") so that little Timmy doesn't die of untreated pediatric cancer.

[–] hglman@lemmy.world 24 points 2 years ago (1 children)

It's mad that children could some how not deserve or accumulate debt to eat. It's even more mad that its exactly what happens.

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[–] sQuirrel21@lemmy.world 91 points 2 years ago (14 children)

Free school meals should be a given since our taxes should go to what our elected officials have so thoughtfully decided where to apply them. What no one rarely brings up let alone tries to solve is the disgusting and unsafe food that the local, state and fed officials decide to make available. There's too much politics in cafeteria food. They should focus there budget in getting healthy food not the cheapest, uncles cousins or corporate friend contract.

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[–] Sir_Kevin@discuss.online 65 points 2 years ago (16 children)

It's not a free lunch. It's just your taxes going to something you actually benefit from.

[–] prole@sh.itjust.works 27 points 2 years ago (2 children)

No shit. It literally says where the money that pays for it comes from right in the headline.

[–] Hacksaw@lemmy.ca 19 points 2 years ago

I think the point of the comment was that in the last few decades the rhetoric has been: "Taxes bad" "Government provides free bus passes to underprivileged people" Always divorcing taxes from their positive effects on society. Maybe they were trying to fight that by directly uniting the fact that the government is just a coordinator, collecting taxes and using it to buy lunches for kids.

"4% tax on millionaires pays for breakfasts and lunches for all school children" unlike the above example, is a sentence that reminds people that taxes are what provides these many positive social benefits they recieve, not "the government", not "for free", and that taxes aren't always "bad".

Or maybe I'm projecting!

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[–] Sternout@feddit.de 17 points 2 years ago

Of course it is free for the children.

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[–] TruTollTroll@lemmy.world 64 points 2 years ago (1 children)

That's great news! No kid should ever be hungry at school, especially when they really are legally forced to be there!

[–] Ragdoll_X@lemmy.world 23 points 2 years ago

But that will teach them that free stuff is good which will make them communists who love big government!!1! I want children to hunt for their own food like in the good old days. Didn't catch anything? Too bad little Timmy, guess you won't eat tonight because we don't got no welfare state!

Also I believe in protecting the children and am pro-life.

[–] goforliftoff@lemm.ee 35 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Cool, but you know who isn’t getting a free lunch now? Those millionaires who worked so hard for that money. What have those kids done to earn theirs?

/s, to be clear. I wish these cool places to live (e.g, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Michigan) weren’t so fucking cold. Why can’t there be a nice liberal southern state?

[–] zdrvr@lemm.ee 18 points 2 years ago

There is. It is California and a 500sqft house cost $1000000000

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[–] DerArzt@lemmy.world 28 points 2 years ago

But but that's socialism

[–] Hnazant@lemmy.world 20 points 2 years ago (8 children)

Indiana did free meals, then announced kids had to get approved nicknames like Florida...

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[–] MNByChoice@midwest.social 20 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

[https://www.investmentnews.com/welcome-to-the-millionaires-tax-240997](An overview for those that don't know anything about this.)

Edit: fixed the link An overview for those that don't know anything about this.

a 4% surtax on individual earnings above $1 million. This new provision, which comes into effect from Jan. 1, 2023, will be layered over the preexisting 5% state income tax rate.

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[–] fne8w2ah@lemmy.world 19 points 2 years ago

Common sense rules in these blue areas.

[–] just_the_ticket@sh.itjust.works 19 points 2 years ago (1 children)

It's like the us is always 20 years behind the rest of the world when it comes to things that actually matter.

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[–] FrankLaskey@lemmy.world 14 points 2 years ago

Colorado did something similar last year as well.

https://www.npr.org/2022/11/09/1134832752/colorado-free-school-lunch-results-measure-midterms

[–] Etterra@lemmy.world 13 points 2 years ago (18 children)

Good. Now slap a 0 to the end of that 4, and then double it.

[–] wrath-sedan@kbin.social 13 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Made me curious what the total tax rate would be in Mass. Apparently it has a flat 5% income tax, plus 4% millionaires tax, plus federal rate for income over about 578k is 37%, so altogether it’s 46% for income over a mil in Mass.

Definitely think it should be higher for such wildly high income. Also disappointed to see for being a relatively progressive state Mass has a flat rather than progressive income tax.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 12 points 2 years ago (15 children)

Definitely think it should be higher for such wildly high income.

Higher, nothing. There should be a rate above which it's taxed at 100%. No one needs to be as rich as Musk or Zuckerberg or Bezos.

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