Arkansas’s state government is once again facing a large budget surplus, and once again the legislature is planning to use this surplus as a down payment on further reductions in income and other taxes. A special legislative session begins this week, and several proposed bills will reduce personal income taxes by 0.5 percentage points, corporate […]
Taxation
Arkansas’s 2023 Special Session Is Over
As I mentioned in the newsletter we sent out at the beginning of this week, the Extraordinary Session of the Arkansas General Assembly would likely happen very quickly. It did move quickly, though it lasted about one day longer than most legislators expected. And that’s where it got interesting. The newsletter from Monday also talked […]
More Tax Relief Could be On the Way in Arkansas’s Special Session
By Jeremy Horpedahl, ACRE Director and UCA Associate Professor of Economics The first “Extraordinary Session,” or special session, of the 2023 Arkansas General Assembly will once again take up the important issue of tax reform. The proposed bill HB1007 (and the companion bill SB8) makes three changes to Arkansas tax law. First, the top personal income tax rate […]
Legislative Session Wrap-Up: ACRE’s Top 10 Revisited
By Jeremy Horpedahl, ACRE Director and UCA Associate Professor of Economics The Arkansas General Assembly has informally adjourned, meaning that the time to pass new bills is over. They will reconvene in May to formally wrap up the session, but the major action is now concluded. Prior to the session, ACRE put together a Top […]
A Taxpayer Bill of Rights in Arkansas?
By Jeremy Horpedahl, ACRE Director and UCA Associate Professor of Economics Every session the Arkansas legislature considers many major and minor changes to both tax and budget policy. But it’s much rarer to see proposals to dramatically reform the entire fiscal process in Arkansas. As state legislators have begun to debate potential constitutional amendments to […]
What’s Happening with Corporate Taxes in Arkansas?
As the legislative session continues, one major topic that has still not been addressed is tax reform. While the personal income tax will likely get some attention this year, changes to corporate taxation are just as important and several bills may be considered. Despite the progress made in reducing the state’s corporate income tax from […]
ACRE’s Mid-Session Legislative Update
By Dr. Jeremy Horpedahl, ACRE Director and UCA Associate Professor of Economics The Arkansas General Assembly has now completed 7 weeks of its 2023 Regular Session. While there is still a lot more work to be done this year, we’ve already seen some major developments, and at ACRE we are closely watching several pieces of […]
State Solutions to Local Tax Burdens
By Joseph Johns, ACRE Policy Analyst Arkansas has reduced its state income tax in recent years. However, Arkansans still face considerable tax burdens at the local level. Taxpayers face multiple local tax burdens that chip into their earnings and reduce the overall well-being of Arkansas’s citizens. Currently, there are two bills before the Arkansas legislature […]
Taxes and Inflation in Arkansas
by Joseph Johns, ACRE Policy Analyst Consumer price inflation hit 40-year highs in 2022. The rapid increase in prices has already hit households hard in their wallets as they buy everyday goods and services. But for taxpayers in Arkansas, there could be another hidden cost of inflation: your taxes could be going up in real […]
Recent Tax Cuts in Arkansas Haven’t Cut Into the State Budget
By Jeremy Horpedahl, ACRE Director Beginning in 2015, Arkansas has been making gradual reductions in both personal and corporate income tax rates. The cumulative personal income tax reductions could be saving middle-income families in Arkansas $2,000-$5,000 every year, as an analysis by ACRE Policy Analyst Joseph Johns shows. Not only has the top income tax […]