Raising Taxes: One policy course for Tennessee would be to raise the money to finance current spending patterns. That policy works this way.

Maintain Current Services: For example, provide schools and teachers to handle added public school and university students and provide teachers raises just large enough to keep up with the average wage and salary increases in the private sector.

Do Not Increase Any Services Or Adopt New Programs: For example, do not make classes smaller, nor raise teacher salaries relative to those of private sector workers, or buy lots of new equipment and supplies, like computers, except through savings from buying less of something else, like textbooks.

Do Not Cut Any Existing Taxes

Raise State And Local Taxes By About 2% A Year: Revenue will automatically grow with the Tennessee economy. As more houses and offices are built there will be more property to tax. As inflation increases prices of houses, the property tax base and thus revenues from existing property taxes will rise. Growing personal incomes and inflation will cause sales tax revenues to increase. This revenue is already in the projections. The extra 2% has to come from increasing rates of sales, property and other taxes or adding to the tax base by such actions as ending exemptions of various kinds or taxing something new like wage and salary income or sales of services.