Rethinking Property Taxation

Abstract

This report looks at local governments’ biggest source of revenue: property taxes. The authors provide a primer on how the taxes are calculated, and new formulas for understanding an individual’s tax share. The authors also propose an alternative format for local property tax statements that can be used to better communicate answers to taxpayers who wonder why their property tax liability has changed. Local governments in Illinois rely heavily on property taxes as a source of revenue—governments collected approximately $23.4 billion in property taxes. Illinois has the fourth highest property tax burden in the United States. The property tax base in Illinois is determined using a four-step process based on the property’s fair cash value. The sum of the tax bases of all individual properties within a taxing district creates the total tax base. The tax share is the ratio of a property’s taxable equalized assessed value to the total tax base in the taxpayer’s jurisdiction. The authors present a new property tax statement that conveys the changes in tax liability by including information on the jurisdictions’ revenue and tax bases and the taxpayer’s tax shares.