Hi everyone,
My name is Mitch Chanin, and I'm a community organizer in
Philadelphia. I've been hoping to find someone who could help me
with some research for an organizing effort
I'm writing to ask whether or not you might be able to help with
some research for an important community organizing effort that
I've been participating in for the past few
months.
For several years, activists in Philadelphia and around the state
have been working to change the way the Pennsylvania state
government funds public education. PA has one of the most
inequitable approaches to funding public schools of any state in
the country -- it pays only about 35% of public school expenses,
leaving local governments and school districts to depend on local
property taxes for much of their funding. Districts with large
tax bases are able to provide adequate funding for their schools,
and other districts are not--some affluent suburbans districts
near Philadelphia spend close to twice per pupil what the Philly
school district is able to spend each year. Year after year,
districts like Philadelphia's, including school districts in poor
towns, suburbs, and rural areas throughout the state, are are
desperately short of resources. Community groups and education
advocates have been working through law suits and through
legislative action to get the state to change its funding
formula, and recently a new statewide, grassroots network called
Good Schools Pennsylvania has come together to take on this
campaign. I've been volunteering with Good Schools PA for several
months, and I feel like there's real potential for a major change
in policy over the next couple of years.
The reform that's been discussed the most often involved
increasing the state income tax, reducing local property taxes,
and through a somewhat complicated formula, redistributing the
increased state revenue to school districts around the state so
as to insure that each school has an adequate amount of money to
spend. A Republican state legislator from the Philly suburbs has
recently introducted a proposal along these lines.
In order to for us to advocate effectively for this kind of
change, I think it would be extremely useful for us to have a
clear picture of how the tax burden would be distributed, and I
haven't so far been able to find that information. How would
people in different income brackets and different kinds of
households be affected? Who will pay more, and who will pay less?
My sense is that the largest portion of the new revenue will come
from the wealthiest people, and that at least some low-income and
middle-income people will end up paying less in taxes. I'm not
sure, though, how this kind of change would affect middle-income
people overall, low-income renters, senior
citizens living with their families or in institutions, etc.. As
far as I know, no one has done a comprehensive analysis--I've
talked with people from the Pennsylvania School Reform Network,
which is one of the main proponents of this change, and also with
a couple of local economic policy institutes. Conservative
legislators are arguing against the proposal by saying that it
would be "unfair to young workers," or that "middle class
families" will suffer. The more we know about how the benefits
and losses from this kind of bill would be distributed, the
easier it will be for us to answer these claims or to come up
with changes to the proposal to make it better.
If anyone knows of a research institute, and individual reseacher
or student, or a college class of some kind that might be able to
do an analysis of this stuff, please let me know. I'm considering
taking this on myself, and if I do, I'd be extremely grateful for
an advice or help anyone could provide.
I'm forwarding you a longer request for assistance that I wrote
up a while ago, along with some background information. If you
have any questions or need more information, please feel free to
call me at 215-698-2422.
Thanks very much, and I hope everyone is doing well. Have a great
holiday,
Mitch
--
Michael Perelman
Economics Department
California State University
Chico, CA 95929
Tel. 530-898-5321
E-Mail michael@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx