Committee reviews package of Vermont income tax exclusions and credits including veteran credit and military-pension exemption

The House Ways & Means Committee on April 29 reviewed a package of proposed changes to Vermont income tax exclusions and credits that committee staff said would fit within the House budget’s $13.5 million allocation for tax measures.

Legislative counsel Kirby Keaton presented draft language and said the package includes an expansion of the Vermont child tax credit, a larger state earned-income tax credit (EITC) for filers without dependents, $5,000 increases to Social Security and civil-service retirement exemptions, a new exemption for military retirement and survivor benefits, and a $250 refundable Vermont veteran tax credit.

Keaton said the child tax credit change is the administration’s suggested language to raise the upper age from 5 to 6 for the state refundable child tax credit and to add clarifying “guardrail” language about administration of the credit. “This does not change current practice at all,” Keaton said. Pat Titterton of the Joint Fiscal Office said staff estimate the child credit expansion would raise the state tax expenditure from about $24 million to $28.5 million…