N.C. schools head suggests exempting teachers from income taxes

The elected supervisor of North Carolina’s public school system said teachers should be given an exemption from personal income taxes.

June Atkinson, the state superintendent of public instruction, said she suggested the exemption in lieu of pay increases for teachers, which didn’t make the budget presented in legislative chambers, The Daily Caller reported.

The tax exemption would cost the state between $250 million and $300 million, The Daily Caller reported.

“Let’s keep our competent teachers in North Carolina classrooms,” she said in The Daily Caller. “Let’s position North Carolina to be a more attractive state for new teachers. Exempt them from paying personal state income taxes.”

The proposal isn’t likely to go far. One lawmaker who helped write the budget said her idea wasn’t “as well thought out as it should have been,” The Daily Caller reported. The measure could cause chaos among home-schoolers, private-school teachers and a host of others who could make the same claim — they’re important enough to benefit from tax exemptions, too.