AUSTIN, Texas (AP) _ Some small businesses operators in Texas say the new business tax has been unfairly burdensome.
The tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee on Wednesday took up more than one dozen bills that would tweak the two-year old tax.
Most would increase the exemption to include businesses making $1 million or less.
Rep. Dennis Bonnen of Angleton has proposed a bill that would raise the exemption to $5 million.
The Legislature adopted the business tax under court order in 2006 to help cover the $14 billion cost of buying down school property tax rates.
But revenue from the so-called margins tax has fallen more than $1.5 billion short of projections.
By making the tax apply only to companies making at least $1 million, more than 130,000 small businesses would be exempt. But it would cost the state an estimated $85 million in the first year.