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The Minnesota AFL-CIO is calling on state lawmakers to reverse several tax cuts, which they say benefit upper-income Minnesotans and businesses at the expense of working people. The state's largest labor coalition says sweeping changes in Minnesota's tax system in the past few years turned surpluses into shortfalls. The AFl-CIO says unless the tax cuts are undone, more programs will have to be cut. But supporters of the tax changes, including Gov. Ventura and the state Chamber of Commerce, say rolling them back would be foolish and would prolong economic weakness.

	Minnesota AFL-CIO President Ray Waldron, right, says many of the changes, celebrated by business as long overdue, have come at the expense of working Minnesotans and their families.    Wayne Cox, left, the executive director of Minnesota Citizens for Tax Justice, accuses the Ventura administration and members of the Legislature of using a suspect and rosy surplus projection to make last year's major tax overhaul more palatable. (MPR Photo/Mark Zdechlik)

Over the past few years labor has been on the losing side of tax reform in Minnesota. Business interests have made significant inroads in cutting commercial-industrial property taxes and individual income tax rates.

Minnesota AFL-CIO President Ray Waldron says many of the changes, celebrated by business as long overdue, have come at the expense of working Minnesotans and their families. Waldron says the state is facing a budget shortfall approaching $2 billion, largely because of changes in tax collections.

"When we taxed on our ability to pay, we had a surplus. We changed the tax structure and we don't have a surplus, we have a recession," he said.

Waldron says to balance the budget and ensure appropriate spending for everything from education to programs which help people who've lost their jobs, the Legislature should take back business' gains.

"This is what government is for. We're in a time of crisis. We're in a recession and this is what people expect government to do; to come forward and help them. They don't want to be unemployed," Waldron said.

To help people who have lost their jobs, Waldron wants jobless benefits extended and a prescription drug program for the uninsured.

Wayne Cox, the executive director of Minnesota Citizens for Tax Justice, a research wing of the state AFL-CIO, accuses the Ventura administration and members of the Legislature of using a suspect and rosy surplus projection to make last year's major tax overhaul more palatable.

"They brought this problem on themselves and we don't think the solution ought to be to go ahead and cut education for the smallest kids in the state, and cut the access to the university by raising tuition. We think they ought to step up and go back and undo some of the tax cuts they've been financing and that they now know we don't have the revenue to pay for," he said.

"It's an absolute myth that the tax reform package passed last year has anything to do with this recession." - John Wodele, spokesman for Gov. Ventura

Minnesota Chamber of Commerce Senior Vice President Bill Blazar, who lobbied in favor of many of the business tax cuts, says raising taxes now, during an economic downturn, would be foolish.

"That's the last thing that anybody in Minnesota should want to have happen," he said. "We've got people losing their jobs. We need to strengthen the state's economy by having its businesses be more competitive. We don't need to go the opposite direction."

Gov. Ventura agrees, according to spokesman John Wodele. Ventura said during his State of the State address that he would adamantly oppose any effort to undo last year's property-tax reform. Wodele says the economy is slowing because of national economic trends and fallout from Sept. 11, not because of tax cuts.

"It's an absolute myth that the tax reform package passed last year has anything to do with this recession and the shortfall, and the governor will not and does not want to revisit the tax bill passed last year," according to Wodele.

In addition to revisiting property and income tax cuts, labor leaders want funding increased for the state's dislocated workers program.

Wodele says the governor is open to doing something about that.