{"id":15369,"date":"2025-02-18T18:38:33","date_gmt":"2025-02-18T19:38:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=15369"},"modified":"2025-02-18T19:59:21","modified_gmt":"2025-02-18T19:59:21","slug":"analysis-act-10-repeal-what-it-will-cost-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=15369","title":{"rendered":"Analysis Act 10 Repeal: What It Will Cost You"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/will-law.org\/analysis-act-10-repeal-what-it-will-cost-you\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n
As the state Supreme Court considers the future of Act 10, WILL<\/span> has <\/span>provided estimates o<\/span>n<\/span> the potential cost<\/span>s<\/span> of repealing the law <\/span>for <\/span><\/span>school districts<\/span><\/span><\/a> and <\/span><\/span>local governments<\/span><\/span><\/a>. <\/span>W<\/span>hat is <\/span>likely even more<\/span> relevant to Wisconsinites as they evaluate the potential end of Act 10 is what <\/span>the local impact <\/span>would b<\/span>e<\/span> and how it could <\/span>impact<\/span> their pocketbook.<\/span> In this policy brief, we<\/span> use publicly<\/span> available data from DPI to answer that question.\u00a0<\/span><\/span> \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Methodology:\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/h4>\n

Results:\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/h4>\n
\n

\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n

\n
After inflation adjustment, the numbers look like this, and we can find the difference per employee:<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span> <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\n

\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n

\n
In this district, we would be expected to be spending $22,014 more per employee on average. Multiply that by the number of employees in the district, and we\u2019d estimate $2.2 million in new costs for the district in this hypothetical:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

$22,014*100FTEs=$2,201,400<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We treat this additional cost as if it were added to the district levy and calculate a new mill rate for the district. Mill rates are calculated by taking the total levy in the district and dividing it by the total property value of the district (excluding TIFs).<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> \u00a0For the average home in Wisconsin<\/span>,<\/span> which costs <\/span>approximately $300,000<\/span><\/a>, this would mean a tax increase of $624 annually.\u00a0 Results at the district level for each school district are found in the tool below.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n .tableau-container {
\n position: relative;
\n width: 100%;
\n height: 0;
\n padding-bottom: 56.25%; \/* 16:9 aspect ratio, adjust if needed *\/
\n overflow: hidden;
\n }
\n .tableau-container iframe {
\n position: absolute;
\n top: 0;
\n left: 0;
\n width: 100%;
\n height: 100%;
\n border: none;
\n }<\/p>\n
\n allowfullscreen>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n
\n
Below are the districts with the 10 largest projected increases in property taxes<\/span> on a $300,00 home<\/span>. <\/span>These run the gamut from large, urban districts like Beloit<\/span> (enrollment: 5,098)<\/span> to small, rural ones like <\/span>Plum City (enrollment: 209).<\/span> The districts that suffer the most, in general, are those that have made extensive changes in response to Act 10 and those that have had spending constrained by <\/span>relatively low<\/span> revenue limits.<\/span><\/span> <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\n

\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n

\n
A few caveats are needed on this data. Approximately 21 school districts are actually spending <\/span>more <\/span><\/i>per employee than they were in 2009 after adjusting for inflation, and a few other districts have consolidated and thus don\u2019t have numbers available for both years. All of these districts were also excluded from the analysis as no estimate was possible under this methodology.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> Also, note that Wisconsin has revenue limits for public schools that might make many of these increases illegal without voter approval or a legislative change eliminating them. Thus, it is unlikely that all of these new costs would be put on the levy. Thus, t<\/span>he options for districts would be limited to increasing revenue limits through state legislation, allocating more state aid through legislation\u2014ultimately shifting the tax burden to state taxpayers\u2014or requiring school districts statewide to implement significant spending cuts in areas they still control.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> Act 10 was an important legislative victory for Wisconsin taxpayers. As Americans embrace belt-tightening at the federal level through the Department of Government Efficiency, we can ill afford to see the state move in the complete opposite direction by re-empowering public sector unions to waste taxpayer money.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\"Dashboard<\/a><\/object><\/div>\n

var divElement = document.getElementById(‘viz1739864187861’); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName(‘object’)[0]; if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 800 ) { vizElement.style.width=’500px’;vizElement.style.height=’627px’;} else if ( divElement.offsetWidth > 500 ) { vizElement.style.width=’500px’;vizElement.style.height=’627px’;} else { vizElement.style.width=’100%’;vizElement.style.height=’727px’;} var scriptElement = document.createElement(‘script’); scriptElement.src = ‘https:\/\/public.tableau.com\/javascripts\/api\/viz_v1.js’; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); <\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

The post Analysis Act 10 Repeal: What It Will Cost You<\/a> appeared first on Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/will-law.org\/analysis-act-10-repeal-what-it-will-cost-you\/ As the state Supreme Court considers the future of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":15371,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-will"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15369"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15376,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15369\/revisions\/15376"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}

Looking at the aggregate results, we estimate $1.788 billion in new expenses for school districts across the state. This is very close to the $1.6 billion we estimated using an entirely different methodology in our previous work, which supports the notion that the methodology is sound. That work utilized aggregated data from DPI\u2019s <\/span>financial reports<\/span><\/a> to estimate the change in costs. This work uses data at from <\/span>DPI\u2019s All Staff file<\/span><\/a> that allows for a more granular look within districts.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

DPI produces an \u201c<\/span>All Staff<\/span><\/a>\u201d file that provides salary and fringe benefit information for school district employees over time. The key \u201cfringe benefits\u201d that were affected by Act 10 were healthcare and retirement. The law mandated that employees contribute 50% to their pension benefit and 12.6%<\/span> to the cost of th<\/span>eir health insurance.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> To estimate what would have happened to dis<\/span>trict costs without <\/span>Act 10, we take salary and fringe benefits from 2009 per employee and inflation-adjust them to 2024 dollars. The total inflation-adjusted salary and fringe is compared to actual salary and fringe benefits in 2024 to see how much additional costs taxpayers would <\/span>likely b<\/span>e on the hook for.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n