New tax cut bill passes Senate; doesn’t fully eliminate state income tax

PINE BELT, Miss. (WDAM) - A new tax cut bill is on its way to Gov. Tate Reeves’ desk. The largest tax bill cut in the state’s history passed the state senate on Sunday.

House Bill 531 passed with a vote of 39-10, giving the green light for the $524.1-million-dollar tax cut.

“It doesn’t do away totally with the state income tax which was the stated goal of some folks like the Speaker of the House,” said State Sen. Joey Fillingane, R-District 41. “But it certainly goes a long way toward meeting that goal in the future.”

Under its amendments, the tax cut completely eliminates the four percent tax bracket, leaving just the five percent bracket for now, which we’re told will eventually turn into the four percent bracket.

“At the end of four years, you will only have one tax bracket and it’ll only be four percent,” Fillingane said. “So, that’s very low compared to most other states.”

We’re told the bill was originally intended to eliminate the state income tax altogether.

However, some state leaders say they weren’t ready to go full throttle.

“We in the Senate didn’t feel comfortable at the present time of going ‘whole hog’ and cutting it completely out stretched out over like a 17-year period,” Fillingane said. “I mean, that’s really far out into the future that you’re trying to predict the future and what the state revenues will or won’t be.”

But Fillingane says he hopes a complete elimination isn’t far off.

“So by doing away with it in this measure... incremental approach, we feel like we’ll do away with this four percent bracket, we’ll cut the five percent down to four percent in four years, and then if we’ve still got huge revenue growth which we hope we will... and then, of course, we can pass a bill next term to do away with the rest of the state income tax and we hope and pray that that will be where we are,” Fillingane said.

Fillingane says he expects the governor to sign the bill within the next week or two.

Copyright 2022 WDAM. All rights reserved.

Want more WDAM 7 news in your inbox? Click here to subscribe to our newsletter.