A new report by the Utah Foundation has found that changes to Utah's tax policy have cost public schools $1.2 billion annually.
According to the report, the amount of school-supporting taxes Utah residents paid for each $1,000 of personal income fell from $39 to $28 between 1995 and 2014.
“Tuition is having to cover more and more of the cost,” said Utah Foundation Research Director Shawn Teigen. “Tuition used to cover about a quarter and now it covers about half just because there is not enough money to go around either for K-12 or for our colleges and universities in the state."
Utah Foundation researchers looked at changes to Utah's tax code like the Truth in Taxation process and a 1996 constitutional amendment that allowed income tax revenue to be diverted from K-12 schools to support higher education and how those effected school funding.
“You can say o.k., we are going to fund more of higher education with the income tax and that will free up some sales tax for other things,” said Teigen. “It’s not like higher education is getting rich off this or anything it’s just that there is not enough money to go around.”
Teigen says despite lawmakers adding hundreds of millions of dollars to the education budget in recent years, inflation and enrollment growth have effectively absorbed those dollars, leaving little for school investment.
“Maybe we as Utahn’s are content with the amount of money we are putting into K-12 and into higher education,” he said. “Increases in taxes can have potentially negative effects on the economy, so it can have positive effects on the economy and negative effects. It is a balancing act. We have to decide.”
In 1995 Utah ranked seventh in the nation for K-12 education funding. More than twenty years later, Utah is ranked 37th in the nation.
