An article in the Inquirer this morning notes that the city’s business privilege tax hurts self-employed people — many of them artists. Like duh. But now Gary Steuer, our art czar, is trying to change the provisions in the law to create a deduction for the self-employed who make less than $100,000. Steuer notes that most artists’ income fall below that. Also, like duh.
In the article Steuer says the business privilege tax “is clearly an adversity to the creative sector. We have good training grounds here. When they (artists) come here to study, we want them to fall in love with the city and make their lives here.”
Apparently this issue was discussed last year in City Council and it will come up again during the next year. Contact your City Council person and the City Council at-large members to express your enthusiasm for the change in this tax. If all the artists in West Philadelphia, South Philadelphia and Kensington voted with their telephones and emails, that might help City Council get enthusiastic too.
