{"id":17184,"date":"2011-01-11T11:03:53","date_gmt":"2011-01-11T15:03:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/?p=17184"},"modified":"2013-01-21T15:18:33","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T20:18:33","slug":"property-tax-freeze-tax-cut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/","title":{"rendered":"Property tax &#8220;freeze&#8221; = tax cut"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4068\/4448781901_1b8f066547_z.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"399\" \/><\/p>\n<p>With the City of Toronto introducing a budget with a property tax &#8220;freeze,&#8221; it&#8217;s worth remembering that when it comes to property taxes, a tax freeze really means a tax cut.<\/p>\n<p>Property taxes are set as a specific dollar amount of revenue to be raised, which is then divided up among properties (by contrast to income or sales taxes, which are set as a percentage and rise automatically with wage increases and inflation). If the city doesn&#8217;t &#8220;raise&#8221; property taxes, then it gets exactly the same number of dollars as the year before from them &#8212; which means in effect a tax cut, since inflation has eroded the value of those dollars. I used to find this very confusing, so a couple of years ago <a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2008\/03\/28\/property-taxes-are-weird\/\" target=\"_blank\">I wrote a long post<\/a> investigating how the property tax system worked and why, which explores this whole question in depth.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>So, effectively, the City is proposing to cut property taxes by the rate of inflation (probably about 1.8%). The strange thing is, Rob Ford is certainly aware that property taxes need to be raised every year just to keep real municipal revenue steady &#8212; when George Smitherman promised a one-year property tax freeze during the election, Ford replied that it was a bad idea and that the City should raise property taxes by the rate of inflation to maintain its revenue. Why he suddenly proposed a tax freeze after becoming Mayor when he hadn&#8217;t even promised one in the campaign remains a mystery. Possibly once he was Mayor he became informed of the full size of the surplus left by the previous administration&#8217;s budgeting and decided to use it to budget more aggressively.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/32175940@N06\/4448781901\/\"><em>photo by Patrick Cummings<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With the City of Toronto introducing a budget with a property tax &#8220;freeze,&#8221; it&#8217;s worth remembering that when it comes to property taxes, a tax freeze really means a tax cut. Property taxes are set as a specific dollar amount of revenue to be raised, which is then divided up among properties (by contrast to<a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"sr-only\">&#8220;Property tax &#8220;freeze&#8221; = tax cut&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4006,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1174,45,6245,593,426,16864,46,19],"class_list":["post-17184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-ford","tag-funding-cities","tag-george-smitherman","tag-location","tag-mayor","tag-patrick-cummings","tag-taxes","tag-toronto"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Property tax &quot;freeze&quot; = tax cut - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Property tax &quot;freeze&quot; = tax cut - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"With the City of Toronto introducing a budget with a property tax &#8220;freeze,&#8221; it&#8217;s worth remembering that when it comes to property taxes, a tax freeze really means a tax cut. Property taxes are set as a specific dollar amount of revenue to be raised, which is then divided up among properties (by contrast toContinue reading &quot;Property tax &#8220;freeze&#8221; = tax cut&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-01-11T15:03:53+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-01-21T20:18:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4068\/4448781901_1b8f066547_z.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dylan Reid\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dylan Reid\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/\",\"name\":\"Property tax \\\"freeze\\\" = tax cut - Spacing Toronto\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4068\/4448781901_1b8f066547_z.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-01-11T15:03:53+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-01-21T20:18:33+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/5db677dc17e5329d01b88dfb319d259b\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4068\/4448781901_1b8f066547_z.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4068\/4448781901_1b8f066547_z.jpg\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2011\/01\/11\/property-tax-freeze-tax-cut\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Property tax &#8220;freeze&#8221; = tax cut\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/\",\"name\":\"Spacing Toronto\",\"description\":\"Canadian Urbanism Uncovered  |  Toronto Architecture, Urban Design, Public Transit, City Hall, Parks, Walking, Bikes, Streetscape, History, Waterfront, Maps, Public Spaces\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/5db677dc17e5329d01b88dfb319d259b\",\"name\":\"Dylan Reid\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/196165a3da8aa047d1d3816d24de1d3a?s=96&d=blank&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/196165a3da8aa047d1d3816d24de1d3a?s=96&d=blank&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Dylan Reid\"},\"description\":\"Dylan Reid is a senior editor at Spacing Magazine. He has also written articles for NOW magazine and the uTOpia books. He was co-chair of the Toronto Pedestrian Committee 2007-2010, was one of the founders of the Toronto Coalition (now Centre) for Active Transportation, and is a co-founder of Walk Toronto. 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