Study Predicts Tax Hit in 24th District

Constituents of Rep. Anthony C. Beilenson (D-Woodland Hills), who supports President Clinton’s five-year economic plan, will be much more severely affected by the plan’s tax increases than constituents of Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley), who opposed it.

A recent study by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think tank, found that Beilenson’s 24th District will be the ninth-hardest hit nationwide by the tax increases on affluent Americans imposed by Clinton’s deficit-reduction plan. A total of 12,749 individuals will pay more in income taxes in the district, which includes most of Thousand Oaks.

Gallegly’s 23rd District, which is not as well-to-do, ranked 128th out of 435. A total of 3,304 people will pay higher income taxes in the district, which includes all of Ventura County except for most of Thousand Oaks.

The Heritage Foundation also calculated the cumulative cost to higher-income constituents in increased income and Medicare taxes for the five years. The figure for Beilenson’s district is $1.3 billion and for Gallegly’s district, nearly $340 million. The impact of the tax increase on Beilenson’s district will be 594% of the national median; on Gallegly’s district, 154%.

Beilenson said he backed the plan because it will reduce the federal deficit by nearly $500 billion over five years. He also supported higher taxes on high income-earners.

Gallegly said he opposes the Clinton budget because it would harm the economy and does not reduce the deficit enough.

The Treasury Department supplied the figures to illustrate how few individuals would pay higher taxes compared to the far higher number who would be unaffected or would benefit from expansion of earned income tax credits for the working poor.

Heritage extrapolated from Treasury’s numbers to compute the total tax impact.

At the same time, Heritage did not cite the number of low-income constituents who will gain from Clinton’s expansion of the earned income tax credit.

The figure in Beilenson’s district is 23,270 people; in Gallegly’s it is 24,464 people.