Otter calls for tax cuts

Idaho Gov. Butch Otter long has favored tax cuts; now, he’s calling for cutting the personal and corporate income tax rates for Idaho’s highest earners each year for the next five years, to drop them from the current 7.4 percent to 6.9 percent. In the first year, Otter’s proposal would drop the tax rate to 7.3 percent, at a cost to the state general fund of $17.8 million.

“This effort will provide relief to 44 percent of taxpayers this year and up to 51 percent of taxpayers by 2018,” the governor told lawmakers.