But to fund fully the property tax relief program in the new budget, the state will need to increase the allocation over the 1996-97 budget by 4.7 percent. So the property tax relief requirements are growing almost a third faster than state tax revenues. It doesn't take a mathematical genius to figure out that if those rates, or something close to them, continue, sooner or later, it will take all of the state's annual growth in new revenue, and more, to fund the property tax relief program. Of course, these are numbers for only a single year. But there are good and sound reasons to expect that the value of owner-occupied residential property will grow indefinitely faster than the growth in state revenues.
People tend to increase the proportion of their incomes they spend on homes as their incomes rise.
So the average value of owner-occupied housing increases faster than incomes. But the state tax system is, at best, proportional, and perhaps mildly regressive. That means state tax revenues are not likely to grow any faster than income in the state, and perhaps a bit slower. Reasonable people can argue over whether we spend enough on schools in South Carolina and whether we spend it well. But many school buildings are in bad repair and money must be found to fix them.