Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan is proposing a new tax on millionaires.
The plan would earmark the money for schools. Under the proposed change to the Illinois Constitution, any income over a million dollars a year would be subject to an extra three-percent tax. That's on top of the current five percent income tax rate.
Madigan himself is a wealthy lawyer who says there are some years in which he too would have to pay the tax: "We've done this because we feel that the millionaires in Illinois are the ones that are better-equipped to support education than others."
Illinois has struggled to fund elementary and high schools in recent years. Madigan says it'd be distributed evenly, about $500 per student, given to rich and poor districts alike. The move comes as others in Illinois want to change the state's flat income tax to a graduated one, so wealthier individuals pay a higher rate.
If approved by the General Assembly this spring, the constitutional amendment would be subject to a statewide vote at the November election.