This email greeted me the first thing at work this morning:
“FYI – it appears that the new tax bill is taking away the tax free benefit of transit fares.
Beginning with the January 5, 2018 payroll, the transit fares paid by the company, and withheld from the employees paychecks will no longer be tax free. They will no longer be deducted from the employees’ paycheck before taxes, they will become an after-tax deduction.
Please provide the February transit pass expenses (paid in January) in time for inclusion on the January 5, 2018 payroll (must have by January 3 in order to process payroll on time).
You may wish to notify those employees who are utilizing the transit benefit of this taxability change.”
So the little break workers got to commute and not drive — “poof.” Of course, who uses this kind of pre-tax discount? Urban areas with trains and buses. And how do urban areas generally vote? Of course we are in blue Chicago. No surprise here.
And, then this, yesterday, on a local blog site: “pre-pay your mortgage in 2017 before you lose it.”
illinoisestateplanning.blogspot.com/…
The 10k cap (only there due to a “Collins compromise” otherwise it would be 0) includes everything we pay in city, state and property taxes combined. It hits people with more expensive housing than mine, but again, where is housing most expensive? Local taxes the highest? Where the elite urbanite pinkos live, that’s where. We knew this one was coming, but the paltry little commuting tax break? Didn’t hear about that one.
DKos should keep some kind of running daily tally somewhere of this chipping away, as it happens. There was no way, when this thing was jammed through, to know what it would mean in the real world, especially in the targeted blue states.
I guess this is how we find out, one email at a time. Drip. Drip. Drip.
