Wanted: the political courage to raise revenues!

California advocates for children should take some inspiration from Illinois, where the governor and the teachers’ union are now fighting for a new tax on business transactions to fund a new $10 billion investment in schools.

The funds would boost school spending by 23% in the next year, increase the amount spent on each student, and expand preschool programs.

The new tax would raise money from the service sector -- the only part of the economy that’s expanding. One of the reasons California is in a constant budget crisis is that the sales tax, a major source of revenue, only applies to sales of goods, stuff, while a larger and larger part of our economy is services. A sales tax on some services is only one of many practical, good ideas for raising revenue from the people who can afford to pay. For more ideas, see http://www.caltaxreform.org

Of course businesses in Illinois are claiming, as they always do when asked to carry some of the weight, that the new tax would drive businesses out of the state. Governor Blagojevich says that the business lobbyists are really interested in convincing legislators ''to get off of tax fairness and go back to taxing people.''

''It will be Armageddon, but we are on the side of the Lord and we will prevail,'' Blagojevich told a cheering audience of 1,200 teachers.

Advocates for children, whatever their personal theology, have an obligation to reject the current bad political choices and change the political balance--with a powerful campaign demanding that the state raise enough revenue to meet kids’ needs.

You can read about the Illinois effort at:
http://www.suntimes.com/news/education/292664,031107blago.article