106 ADDRESSES AND STATE PAPERS

is being expressed over the plan. Here's a family of four with an in-
come of $15, 000 and a home valued at $32, 000. Under the Agnew-
Hughes plan with the Lee amendment the income tax would be in-
creased $134. 00 but the property tax would be lessened to the equiva-
lent of $102. 00, making the total additional tax paid only $26. 00. Now,
these property tax deductions, as I explained to you, all assume that
there is absolutely no new spending desired by the subdivision.

Now, let's look at some of these letters that I mentioned earlier in
the evening. These letters exhibit how mistaken the people are about
this tax increase. Here's a section of a letter: "If your proposal to build
three new bridges across the Bay is the start of spending the additional
revenues received from the increased taxes, I say your proposal is in
no way justified. " Now this gentleman obviously has no conception of
the fact that the money that is used to build bridges and other capital
improvements supported with toll facilities is not in any way affected
by property taxes, incomes taxes or anything else. Toll facilities must
liquidate themselves from tolls.

Here's another one: "If we have to increase taxes, what is more fair
than a 1 percent increase in the sales tax?" Well, my answer to that
is that the sales tax is really not a fair tax. It gives the illusion of
being one but it isn't. It's a fact that low income groups pay 1 1/2
percent of their income in sales taxes, whereas higher income groups
who can afford it more pay 1 percent or less in sales tax. So you can
see that the sales tax is regressive and it's certainly not the type tax
that we want to use. The graduated income tax relates to ability to
pay and it's the fairer system.

Here's another letter: "I'm retired, and I'm too old to work and
the taxes keep going up. What's going to happen to me?" This pro-
gram is devised to help that type of person. It provides tax relief for
the elderly. It's one of the features of the program, but more than that,
it holds down the property taxes on the home of that person, so that
his diminution of income doesn't make him sell his own house. An-
other one: "I'm not working to support the bums in Baltimore. " The
money coming from this tax proposal is not going into welfare, al-
though welfare is needed and certainly must be something that we
consider, and it is being considered in the supplemental budget. But
every penny of the money going to the subdivisions in this $95 million
must be spent for either education or police protection.

These are some of the letters that we've been getting. Here's an-
other one: "Having been squeezed by inflation on the one hand and