Florida Government Test 3 Final Tax Policy say Evaluation both for the nation as a whole and Florida in general Evaluative criteria efficiency raising a lot of money minimizing cost of administration for government making it easier for citizens certainty predict with accuracy the money generated fairness should not fall disproportionately on any group or person people with similar financial conditions should pay the same amount Property Tax used by local governments and counties state itself does not have one per o Efficiency varies from county to county but in general it does the job Relatively easy for government and citizens to handle it Appraisal process can be a problem however though there are general rules there is subjectivity and it will differ from place to place also depends on the financial setting of the county o Certainty for the most part property values are relatively stable o Fairness troubling aspect due mostly to the appraisal process often hear complaints about how fair the process is Income Tax Florida doesn t have a base income tax but this applies to the tax in general o Efficiency can raise A LOT of money will vary state by state due to wealth and income generating base of citizens Hard for citizens to calculate taxes especially if its more complex Government has a hard time tracking accuracy can audit you if they believe its necessary o Certainty general salaries of the taxpayer base don t change much only for people in more speculative business overall this factor is strong and makes it a popular tax o Fairness graduated tax vs flat tax the former is fairer depends on the type uses Sales Tax viability of this changes in relation to the type of economy o Efficiency Florida is a customer oriented tourist economy which is very conducive tp raising money in this fashion Easy for the citizen because it is paid immediately upon purchase Companies collect it and then self report to the government so it is easy for the government to collect BUT it s a slight danger for the business which acts as a middleman because if they fail to report it its very bad for them burden falls on them o Certainty flows with the economy so it is harder to predict the tax outcome in a place like Florida due to potential external factors Weather and Tourist Patterns create an unpredictability factor o Fairness some counties have the ability to add up to 1 5 to the state base rate but it is pretty flat in Florida around 7 This makes it into a regressive tax Another criticism of Florida is that we do not have a balanced tax system revenue should not primarily come from one source but it does in this state Based on all of this the sales tax in Florida is considered unfair Overall Florida tax system is heavily based on the sales tax no income tax though we do have a corporate income tax and there is no state wide property tax there is one by county o As a result the Florida system overall is regressive based on sales tax o Florida has the 2nd most regressive tax in the nation next to Washington Sin taxes are used to gain money as well as reduce consumption they are more predictable than sales tax because the need for the things taxed is pretty consistent so the economy doesn t really affect it relatively inelastic Environmental Policy Sunshine State Movie Florida has a pretty unique environment all of the differing aspects and the environment is part of the economy part of why people want to be here o this makes us different because we exploit it for money unlike in other states where they may just consider it a burden o Constant pressure on the environment in other states it is almost 2nd nature to deal In the film who benefitted from development outside developers and some locals even Development needs to occur in a way that allows for future maintenance of the land and with it property o How do we do this understand that it is a local issue and a state issue it is two pronged the former because of the immediate effect within the county and the latter because of potential effects of these projects across county lines water flow quality of air water etc o There needs to be some sort of state oversight since some projects are too important to the state to allow local government to have free reign It used to be up to localities entirely but they were more susceptible to developers than the state as a whole 1985 Growth Management Act created state county and local plans for urban development and sprawl to control and reduce respectively o Very forward looking environmental legislation gave oversight to the state through the Department of Community Affairs Bad for developers who now have to go through stages of review with different perception of development at each of the stages what s good for one county may not be good for the state overall Developers also claimed it was bad for job production and the Scott Administration was very receptive he called the Department job killers o The Department was abolished in 2012 and we went back to the regional standards discussed above localities have control There has always been a fight between local and state government over environmental policy in Florida Public Education and Education Policy Seen for a long time as the major function of state and local government resulting in different systems across the nation states differ not much of a national standard o 2 dimensions of debate what is wrong with public education and how do we fix it Almost immediately when public education was introduced people started to complain and look for ways to measure the quality of education o Specific Measures of Quality and where Florida ranks Percent of high school population completing college 35th Graduation rates of public high schools 43rd Student Teacher Ratio 43rd Money Spent on Education various factors 38th on per student spending 45th on education expenditures as percent of income 50th on percent of state budget for education o These measures aren t perfect but in the absence of testimony or other aspects there is something to be said about state education policy in Florida So if by these measures we are mediocre at best what is the problem Why is our education system so weak o Possible reasons schools are too crowded includes class size money bad management of the education system diverse student body hard to deal with all aspects of every student different from a state with a homogenous student body teacher quality curriculum testing o 2 elements of