The Rise And Fall Of The Millionaire Tax In Massachusetts

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The Rise And Fall Of The Millionaire Tax In Massachusetts
By David Nagle and Joseph Donovan (July 11, 2018, 2:00 PM EDT)

In a decision released June 20, 2018, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial
Court ended a three-year effort to amend the Massachusetts Constitution and
impose an additional tax on individuals with income exceeding $1 million.[1] The
court’s opinion addresses the procedure for amending the constitution via
initiative petition, as opposed to the merits of a graduated income tax.[2] In
analyzing the “related subjects” requirement for such initiatives, and concluding
that this initiative failed to contain subjects “which are related or which are
mutually dependent,”[3] the court’s opinion strikes a balance between direct and
representative democracy, while providing a roadmap for future initiatives and
highlighting their importance in lawmaking.
                                                                                            David Nagle
Background

The Massachusetts Constitution has authorized the legislature to levy a personal
income tax since 1915 but requires that rates be uniform “upon incomes derived
from the same class of property.”[4] “Whatever may be the merits of the system
commonly described as the graduated income tax, it is prohibited by article 44” of
the amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution.[5]

Massachusetts currently taxes ordinary income and long-term capital gains at 5.1
percent, and short-term gains and gains from the sale or exchange of collectibles
at 12 percent. While these rates are flat, “the effect of the tax is progressive”       Joe Donovan
because other features offset the regressive effect of local property and state
sales taxes, including substantial personal income tax exemptions, deductions and credits for
low-income taxpayers.[6] Proponents seeking greater progressivity have proposed a series of
constitutional amendments to authorize graduated income tax rates, but voters rejected such proposals
in 1962, 1968, 1972, 1976 and 1994.[7]

Initiative Petition 15-17

In 2015, a coalition of community organizations, religious groups and labor unions adopted a new
playbook. Instead of authorizing the legislature to set rates and brackets, their initiative petition would
have imposed within the Constitution itself an additional 4 percent tax on personal income in excess of
$1 million.[8] Massachusetts’ current 5.1 percent rate on most income would have increased by

approximately 80 percent to 9.1 percent, and the 12 percent rate on short-term gains would have
increased by a third to 16 percent.

The Massachusetts Department of Revenue estimated that the additional tax would raise approximately
$1.9 billion per year.[9] The DOR cautioned that the number of high-income earners and their income
could “fluctuate considerably from year to year” and that such earners might “respond to the additional
tax by changing decisions on migration, consumption, investment, business location, etc.”[10]
Proponents within and outside the legislature nevertheless supported the initiative, regarding it as an
expedient means to raise approximately $2 billion per year, which represents approximately 5 percent
of the commonwealth’s annual $40 billion budget.

Some supporters characterized the surtax as “money for nothing,” at least for most taxpayers. The DOR
estimated that the additional tax — variously referred to as the Fair Share Amendment, the Millionaire’s
Tax or Prop 80 — would affect approximately 19,500 personal income returns, or 0.5 percent of all
Massachusetts filers.[11] Harris Gruman, executive director of the Service Employees International
Union, explained that “[w]e are strategic about these things. ... When you get to a million you get to this
inflection point that drives up popular support. And that is why we went for incomes over $1 million.
That’s still kind of a magic number to people. That’s Thurston Howell III. They’re like, ‘Yes. They should
pay more.’”[12] Some legislative leaders were comparably candid. At the constitutional convention in
June 2017, Rep. Jay Kaufman argued for the initiative partly on the basis that “99.5 percent of us in this
commonwealth will not be impacted by this in the least save for the better services that we will get in
exchange for the revenue that comes. So this is a tax that will only apply to one half of one percent of
the tax filers in the commonwealth, those with the highest income.”[13]

The drafters sweetened the initiative petition by earmarking the additional revenue for education and
transportation spending, which in hindsight was too much of a good thing. The initiative required
revenues to be expended, subject to appropriation, “for quality public education and affordable public
colleges and universities and for the repair and maintenance of roads, bridges and public
transportation.”[14] The court’s opinion notes that in 2015, then Senate President Stanley Rosenberg
observed that past “constitutional amendments have been very differently constructed,” whereas this
one “will stand a better chance of being approved” because “it is focused specifically on money for
education and transportation,” and because it affects only “people who make more than $1 million in
taxable income.”[15]

The legislative oddmakers would probably have been correct, if the court had approved the initiative
petition. By the end of May, polls showed strong support for the initiative, which was attractively titled
an “Initiative Petition for An Amendment to the Constitution of the Commonwealth to Provide
Resources for Education and Transportation through an additional tax on Incomes in excess of One
Million Dollars.”[16]

Procedural History

The Massachusetts attorney general certified the initiative petition in September 2015, after which
proponents needed to gather approximately 65,000 additional signatures. The initiative petition then
needed at least 25 percent of the votes of the Massachusetts House of Representatives and Senate
jointly assembled in constitutional convention in two successive biennial legislative sessions. The
Legislature obliged, approving the amendment by a vote of 135-57 in May 2016 and by a vote of 134-55
in June 2017. If the court had concluded that certification was proper, then the initiative petition would
have appeared on the ballot this coming November and needed a simple majority of the votes cast to

become effective, assuming approval by at least 30 percent of all ballots cast.

Opponents initiated their legal challenge last fall. Leaders of the Massachusetts High Technology
Council, Associated Industries of Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, the
Massachusetts Competitive Partnership and the National Federation of Independent Business raised
three arguments against the initiative’s certification.

First, opponents argued that the initiative petition violated the constitutional requirement that ballot
initiatives contain “only subjects ... which are related or which are mutually dependent.”[17] Opponents
argued that the initiative petition combined “three very different subject matters: whether to impose a
graduated income tax, and whether to give preferential treatment in state spending to two unrelated
subject matters — education and transportation.”[18]

Second, opponents argued that earmarking the tax revenue for education and transportation would
violate a prohibition against making a “specific appropriation of money from the treasury of the
commonwealth.”[19] Finally, opponents argued that specifying a tax and tax rate within the constitution
would impair the legislature’s general supervision and control over taxing and spending in a manner
inconsistent with the constitution.[20]

The Court’s Opinion

In an opinion authored by Justice Frank Gaziano, the court concluded that “the initiative petition should
not have been certified ... because ... the petition does not contain only subjects ‘which are related or
which are mutually dependent.’”[21] Under this “related subjects” or “relatedness” requirement, the
similarities among an initiative’s provisions must “dominate what each segment provides separately so
that the petition is sufficiently coherent to be voted on ‘yes’ or ‘no’ by the voters.”[22] An initiative’s
subjects, the court explained, “must embody one purpose, and ‘must express an operational relatedness
among its substantive parts that would permit a reasonable voter to affirm or reject the entire petition
as a unified statement of public policy.”[23]

The court explained that the related subjects requirement was intended to prevent voter confusion and
“logrolling,” which is the “practice of including several propositions in one ... proposed constitutional
amendment so that the ... voters will pass all of them, even though these propositions might not have
passed if they had been submitted separately.”[24] While there is “no single ‘bright-line’ test for
determining whether an initiative meets the related subjects requirement,”[25] “‘the general subject of
an initiative petition cannot be so broad as to render the “related subjects”’ limitation meaningless.”[26]

Significantly, in analyzing the requirement that the petition contain only subjects “which are related or
which are mutually dependent,” the court reasoned that the phrase “or which are mutually dependent”
does not “impose a separate requirement that may be satisfied even if the subjects of a petition are not
related.”[27] In other words, the word “or” essentially means “to wit,” such that “or which are mutually
dependent” rephrases “which are related.” According to the court, treating “or which are mutually
dependent” as a sufficient, standalone test could “vitiate the purpose” of the relatedness
requirement.[28]

The court then analyzed the initiative petition by carving it up at its logical joints, treating it as
containing “three provisions on three distinct subjects,”[29] namely, imposing a graduated income tax
on certain high-income taxpayers and prioritizing spending for public education and transportation by
earmarking revenues raised by the new tax for such purposes. These three subjects, the court reasoned,

are “not mutually dependent” because they could “exist independently.”[30] A graduated income tax
could be (and has been) the subject of a standalone initiative. Similarly, an initiative could raise and
spend funds for education without doing so for transportation, or vice versa. In sum, “the proposed tax
can stand on its own, and neither spending provision depends upon the other.”[31]

Simply being “broad areas of public concern” does not make education and transportation one unified
issue of public policy. Observing that “[i]t is not enough that the provisions in an initiative petition all
‘relate’ to some same broad topic at some conceivable level of abstraction,”[32] the court found no
“operational relatedness among [the initiative’s] substantive parts”[33] and no “common purpose or
unified public policy that the voters fairly could vote up or down as a whole.”[34] A contrary conclusion,
the court explained:[35]

would leave a voter who favored a graduated income tax but disfavored earmarking any funds for a
specific purpose, for example, in the untenable position of choosing which issue to support and which
must be disregarded. A voter who favored designating specific state funds for schools and
transportation (subject to legislative appropriation), but not a graduated income tax, would be
confronted with the same conundrum. A voter who commuted to work on an unreliable subway line,
but who did not have school-aged children and was unconcerned about public education, might want to
prioritize spending for public transportation, without devoting additional resources to public education,
but would be unable to vote for that single purpose. A parent of young children, who lived in a rural part
of the commonwealth and did not own a motor vehicle, would be unable to vote in favor of prioritizing
funding for early childhood education without supporting spending for transportation.

The court also acknowledged the logrolling concern, noting that it was “not entirely unaware of the
possibility that, as the plaintiffs argue, these ‘broad areas of public concern’ were added to the initiative
petition as a means to ‘sweeten the pot’ for voters.”[36] Coupling the imposition of a graduated income
tax with spending on education and transportation to give the initiative petition “a better chance of
being approved” was, the court stated, “the precise type of wheedling and deceiving that the delegates
had in mind when they adopted the relatedness requirement.”[37]

Because the court found that the initiative petition violated the related subjects requirement, it never
addressed the opponents’ argument that the initiative violated the prohibition against specific
appropriations or the argument that initiative petitions may not set tax rates within the constitution.[38]
Consequently, the court never reached the attorney general’s intriguing assertion that the constitutional
amendment, which was specifically pitched as addressing chronically underfunded education and
transportation needs, would not necessarily provide any incremental increase in such spending.
According to the attorney general, “[b]ecause the proposed amendment does not require otherwise,
the legislature could [simply] choose to reduce funding in specified budget categories from other
sources and replace it with the new surtax.”[39] In addition, the court never addressed whether an
initiative petition may bind future legislatures to spend revenue from a graduated income tax solely on
education and transportation.[40]

Concurrence and Dissent

In a concurring opinion, Justice Barbara Lenk argued that that the constitution’s reference to “subjects
... which are related or which are mutually dependent” is “disjunctive in nature.”[41] The concurrence
nevertheless concludes that the subjects of the initiative petition are neither related nor mutually
dependent. A two-subject initiative that provided for taxing and one type of spending might have
satisfied the mutual-dependence test, because they could not each stand independently, but the

three-subject initiative providing for taxing and two distinct categories of spending does not.[42]

In a dissenting opinion joined by Chief Justice Ralph Gants, Justice Kimberly Budd argued that “mutual
dependency” is a standalone test having its “roots in the doctrine of severability.”[43] “Mutually
dependent” subjects, the dissent argues, are “those that, if separated from one another, would no
longer convey the meaning or purpose of the proposition.”[44] Applying this test, the subjects of the
initiative petition are mutually dependent because they “cannot be severed without changing the
meaning of the petition,” and because “[s]tanding alone, each provision means something different
from the provisions together.”[45] From this perspective, it appears that any initiative that “grants the
legislature with power to assess a particular tax and limits the areas where the revenue from that tax
can be spent” might satisfy the requirement that its subjects be mutually dependent.[46]

In arguing for a disjunctive interpretation of “or” and a less strict interpretation of “mutually” in the
requirement that subjects be “related or ... mutually dependent,” the dissent relies partly on tenets of
statutory interpretation and a treatise co-authored by Antonin Scalia.[47] Interestingly, however, in
other recent tax jurisprudence the court has gone out of its way to distinguish between strict statutory
interpretation and the principles governing constitutional interpretation.[48] In addition, the dissent’s
conclusion that the initiative’s subjects are mutually dependent because not severable may misjudge
the initiative’s real object. Observers may regard the initiative as severable in fact if its proponents
promptly propose some variation, such as a standalone tax on the commonwealth’s wealthiest
residents.

What Happens Next

Business organizations concerned that Massachusetts remain competitive must contend not only with
legislative proposals but also with initiatives that originate directly with voters.[49] Questions that might
once have been the focus of union bargaining may now appear on the ballot or be resolved in
compromise legislation. For example, soon after the court’s decision discussed here, legislators
approved a “grand bargain” to address paid family and medical leave, the minimum wage and the state
sales tax rate, all of which were subjects of proposed initiative petitions for the November 2018
ballot.[50] Business groups preferred a negotiated compromise to fighting for or against this series of
winner-take-all, nonnegotiable ballot questions.[51]

Massachusetts will likely see another graduated income tax proposal before long.[52] A practically
verbatim initiative could originate in the legislature rather than with voters, for example. Such a
legislative amendment would require majority support within the legislature but not be subject to the
related subjects requirement or the prohibition against specific appropriations.[53] Alternatively,
proponents of a graduated income tax could use the court’s opinion as a guide for drafting an initiative
petition that would satisfy the constitution. Either type of amendment could reach voters by 2022.

Anyone whom a graduated income tax might adversely affect, either directly or indirectly, will
appreciate the benefits of deferral. In the meantime, the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation has
suggested forming a new tax commission to examine the interplay between the state’s economy, its
revenues and its budget.[54] If the court’s decision and the “grand bargain” are reliable guides, the
prospect of yet more initiative petitions will continue to play a critical role in motivating such
discussions, if not also in determining outcomes.

David Nagle is partner at Sullivan & Worcester LLP.

Joseph Donovan is counsel at the firm.

The opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the firm, its
clients, or Portfolio Media Inc., or any of its or their respective affiliates. This article is for general
informational purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal advice.

[1] Anderson v. Att’y Gen., 479 Mass. 780 (2018).

[2] See Anderson, 479 Mass. at 784-86.

[3] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 789-95.

[4] Mass. Const. art. XLIV.

[5] Massachusetts Taxpayers Found., Inc. v. Sec’y of Admin., 398 Mass. 40, 48 (1986).

[6] Special Commission on Tax Fairness, Report of the Tax Fairness Commission at 8-9 (Mar. 1,
2014), https://malegislature.gov/Content/Documents/Events/TaxFairnessReport.pdf. The
Commonwealth’s spending priorities provide additional support for the less wealthy, including Medicaid
expenses accounting for approximately 30 percent of the Commonwealth’s governmental activities
expenses, and additional non-Medicaid health and human services costs accounting for approximately
15 percent of governmental expenses.

[7] See Amendments Rejected by the People, Commonwealth of Massachusetts
(2018), https://malegislature.gov/Laws/Constitution.

[8] See An Initiative Petition for An Amendment to the Constitution of the Commonwealth to Provide
Resources for Education and Transportation through an additional tax on Incomes in excess of One
Million Dollars (2016), https://www.mass.gov/files/documents/2016/08/xc/15-17.pdf [hereinafter
Initiative Petition]; see also Initiative Petition of Marven-Rhode Hyppolite & Others, S. 10, 190th Gen. Ct.
(Mass. 2017), https://malegislature.gov/Bills/190/S10; Initiative Petition of Marven-Rhode Hyppolite &
Others, H.R. 3933, 189th Gen. Ct. (Mass. 2016), https://malegislature.gov/Bills/189/H3933.

[9] See Rise Up Massachusetts Impact Memo, available
at https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2839106-Raise-Up-Mass-Impact-Memo-
FINAL.html (apparently authored by Kazim P. Ozyurt, Director of DOR’s Office of Tax Policy Analysis).

[10] See id. at 2.

[11] See id. at 1.

[12] Andy Metzger, Polling Drove Activists to Draw Line on Tax Plan at $1 Million, State House News
Service (Sept. 17, 2015), https://statehousenews.com/news/20151817. “Polling data Gruman showed
the room demonstrated that 71 percent of people support a higher tax for incomes over $1 million,
while only 49 percent supported a higher rate for incomes over $300,000.” Id.

[13] Constitutional Convention – Wednesday, June 14, 2017, State House News Service, [audio starting
at 19:10] (June 14, 2017) (authors’ transcription on file with

authors), https://statehousenews.com/news/20171217 (link to digital audio recording available from
main page). Not all legislators agreed with this approach. Rep. Peter Durant argued that “our democracy
has often been described as two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner. It’s one of the
reasons that we don’t have a democracy here in the United States or here in Massachusetts. We have a
republic and a representative democracy, because it’s our job, the job of this Legislature, to make these
decisions, to represent the minority. . . . What we’re doing here, is really we’re shirking our
responsibilities. We’re abdicating our responsibilities in this Legislature to make these decisions and
make these policies. ... I don’t think anybody has any doubt that the 99.5 percent of the people in
Massachusetts that this doesn’t affect, we’re going to be able to find at least 51 percent of them to vote
in the affirmative for this particular action. ... The reality . . . is that we are asking the public to make
complex decisions, complex tax policy decisions because we won’t do it here.” Id. [audio starting at
1:19:15]. Other critics included Rep. Randy Hunt, who argued that “[c]orrecting a tax rate via
constitutional amendment is cumbersome and time-consuming – four years in our state. This
amendment abandons the fundamental intent of our Constitution to provide the framework for our
government and to specify and segregate its powers. The Constitution is not the appropriate place to
memorialize tax brackets and rates. The proper way to create a graduated income tax is to give the
Legislature the constitutional power to do so.” Id. [audio starting at 1:14:50].

[14] Initiative Petition, supra note 8.

[15] Anderson v. Att’y Gen., 479 Mass. 780, 799 n.10 (2018) (“Thus, the focus of legislators, like
Rosenberg, was specifically on proposals to appropriate funds for education and transportation, because
those proposals would stand a better chance of being approved by voters who would be forced to
disregard the elimination of the flat tax in order to approve publicly beneficial funding initiatives.”).

[16] See, e.g., Steve Brown, WBUR Poll: Ballot Questions On Sales Tax Rollback And ‘Millionaire’s Tax’
Maintain High Support, WBUR News (May 31, 2018, 9:48
AM), http://www.wbur.org/news/2018/05/31/sales-tax-millionaires-tax-ballot-poll.

[17] Mass. Const. art. XLVIII, pt. II, § 3.

[18] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 785.

[19] Mass. Const. art. XLVIII, pt. II, § 2.

[20] Cf. Mass. Const. art. LXIII, § 3.

[21] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 782.

[22] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 786 (quoting Carney v. Attorney Gen., 447 Mass. 218, 226 (2006)).

[23] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 786 (quoting Carney, 447 Mass. at 230-31).

[24] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 787 n.5.

[25] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 796 (quoting Dunn v. Attorney Gen., 474 Mass. 675, 680 (2016)).

[26] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 788 (alteration in original) (quoting Massachusetts Teachers Ass’n v.
Secretary of the Commonwealth, 384 Mass. 209, 291-220 (1981)) (citation omitted).

[27] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 791.

[28] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 794.

[29] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 794.

[30] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 794.

[31] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 795 n.8.

[32] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 796 (quoting Carney v. Attorney Gen., 447 Mass. 218, 230 (2006)).

[33] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 798 (quoting Dunn v. Attorney Gen., 474 Mass. 675, 680 (2016)).

[34] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 798.

[35] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 799.

[36] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 799 n.10.

[37] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 802.

[38] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 798 n.9.

[39] Br. of Appellees Maura Healey as Att’y Gen. and William F. Galvin, as Sec’y of Commonwealth, at
26, Anderson, 479 Mass. 780 (2018) (No. SJC-12422).

[40] See Associated Indus. of Massachusetts v. Sec’y of the Commonwealth, 413 Mass. 1, 9 (1992) (“Due
to its constitutional nature, the measure [at issue in In re Opinion of Justices, 297 Mass. 577 (1937)]
would have left the Legislature with no choice but continually to expend the monies for the designated
purposes, unless and until the amendment was repealed. That measure effectively would have bypassed
the Legislature’s power and discretion under art. 63. . . . The Legislature cannot, through enactment of
an act or statute, bind itself or its successors to make a particular appropriation.”).

[41] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 802 (Lenk, J., concurring).

[42] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 803-04 (Lenk, J., concurring).

[43] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 806 (Budd, J., dissenting).

[44] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 807 (Budd, J., dissenting).

[45] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 810 (Budd, J., dissenting).

[46] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 813 (Budd, J., dissenting).

[47] Anderson, 479 Mass. at 813 n.8 (Budd, J., dissenting).

[48] See Verizon New England Inc. v. Bd. of Assessors of Bos., 475 Mass. 826, 836-37 (2016) (citation
omitted) (rejecting taxpayers’ text-based interpretation of the constitution, while acknowledging that
“[t]heir argument might have more force if it were directed at the language of a statute rather than a
constitutional amendment” and asserting that “a constitutional amendment ‘is a statement of general
principles and not a specification of details. . . . It is to be interpreted as the Constitution of a State and
not as a statute or an ordinary piece of legislation. Its words must be given a construction adapted to
carry into effect its purpose.”).

[49] The voter initiative process is shorter for legislation than for constitutional amendments, and the
Legislature may amend or repeal legislation enacted pursuant to voter initiatives.

[50] H.R. 4640, 190th Gen. Ct. (Mass. 2018).

[51] See Compromise Legislation on 2018 Ballot Questions, Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce (June
20, 2018), https://bostonchamber.com/media/policy/2018-Ballot-Compromise-Legislation-
Summary.pdf; see also Colin A. Young, Baker Signs Law Raising Minimum Wage, Creating Paid Leave
Program, State House News Service (June 28,
2018), https://statehousenews.com/news/20181256 (“Legislators scrambled to assemble the so-called
grand bargain bill after interest groups, fed up with inaction on Beacon Hill, initiated ballot drives and
forced legislative leaders to engage with them at the negotiating table, or risk having major policies
written into law by voters. Under the law, the hourly minimum wage will rise from $11 to $15 over a
five-year period. . . . An $800 million paid family and medical leave program overseen by the state
government and backed by a payroll tax will be launched so workers can more easily take care of
themselves and their families without facing fiscal crises.”); Press Release, Greater Boston Chamber of
Commerce, Policy Update, Here’s What’s In the Ballot Compromise (June 28, 2018) (“This ‘grand
bargain’ legislation is a compromise that replaces ballot initiative proposals that would have
implemented a state-run paid family and medical leave program, increased the minimum wage, and
reduced the sales tax. All three ballot questions were polling favorably and would have had even greater
impacts on the business community and the state if certain elements had not been addressed through
negotiations.”).

[52] See Press Release, Raise Up Massachusetts, Raise Up Massachusetts to Drop Minimum Wage, Paid
Leave Ballot Questions After Historic Win for Working People (June 26,
2018), https://www.raiseupma.org/raise-up-massachusetts-to-drop-minimum-wage-paid-leave-ballot-
questions-after-historic-win-for-working-people (“We will continue to do this work until every worker in
Massachusetts has a livable wage, family-supporting benefits, and a transportation and education
system that lifts people up, funded by the wealthy paying their fair share. . . . We are only getting
started.”).

[53] See Mass. Const. art. XLVIII, pt. IV, § 4; see also Andy Metzger, Winchester Senator Hopes to Revive
Income Surtax on Wealthy, State House News Service (June 19,
2018), https://www.statehousenews.com/?login=yes&trial=yes&path=cms/news.aspx&yr=2018&select
=20181191; cf. Mass. Const. art. XLVIII, pt. II §§ 2-3.

[54] Branner Stewart, Current Issues in Massachusetts Taxation Policy: An Interview with Noah Berger of
the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center and Eileen McAnneny of the Massachusetts Taxpayers
[Foundation], 20 MassBenchmarks 18, 19 (2018).