TALKING RICHMOND: Virginia’s Legislative Session Raises Real Affordability Concerns
Any discussion of affordability must begin with maintaining or strengthening the standard deduction.
By Sen. Tara Durant
SENATE DISTRICT 27
The 2026 General Assembly session is moving quickly, with more than 1,700 bills already introduced and many already advancing through committee. But speed is not the concern — affordability is.
Virginia families are facing higher grocery bills, rising energy costs, and tighter household budgets. At the same time, the General Assembly is debating more than $2 billion in potential tax increases, including higher income and investment taxes, expanded local sales taxes, new taxes on digital services, and additional sales taxes on deliveries, lodging, and admissions. Other proposals would impose new personal property taxes on small-business and landscaping equipment.
Each proposal may be framed as modest or targeted, but together they mean Virginians paying more on almost everything.
That is why the standard deduction must be the centerpiece of any serious affordability discussion.
The standard deduction determines how much of a family’s income is protected from taxation before the state takes a dollar. When the standard deduction is higher, families keep more of what they earn every single year. When it expires or is reduced, families face an automatic tax increase — even if tax rates never change.
Extending and strengthening the higher standard deduction is the most direct and reliable way to provide relief. It keeps thousands of dollars of income tax-free for working families, retirees, and young Virginians just starting out. This is not a complicated credit or a temporary rebate. Every Virginian who pays income tax benefits, and the savings show up year after year.
In contrast, many proposals this session move in the opposite direction — raising taxes and fees while offering little meaningful relief to household budgets. Layering new taxes on services, deliveries, and small businesses ultimately drives prices higher for consumers and makes everyday life more expensive.
Affordability and opportunity are also tied directly to Virginia’s strong business climate — and under Governor Youngkin, Virginia became a strong, pro-growth state, a place where businesses wanted to invest and families chose to stay. After years of population loss and slower job growth, the Commonwealth began adding jobs, attracting new investment, and showing real signs of economic momentum.
That progress did not happen by accident. It came from policies that prioritized affordability, predictable regulations, and common-sense governance.
That is why the agenda now moving through the General Assembly is so concerning. Repealing Right-to-Work, expanding mandatory collective bargaining, raising taxes, and layering on burdensome regulations would quickly put this progress at risk. These costs do not disappear — they show up as higher prices, fewer job Opportunities, and slower wage growth.
We have seen this before. When costs rise and regulations pile up, investment slows, jobs leave, and families follow. The outmigration we finally reversed will return — and it will return with a vengeance.
Republicans have advanced an Affordable Virginia Agenda that starts with protecting the standard deduction and builds outward: lowering energy bills by repealing the Virginia Clean Economy Act, eliminating taxes on tips and overtime so workers keep more of what they earn, and repealing the car and grocery taxes. Together, these policies focus on permanent, year-after-year savings, not short-term fixes.
Affordability is not about expanding government or creating new programs. It is about letting Virginians keep more of what they earn, keeping everyday costs down, and making sure Virginia remains a leader for jobs and economic growth — a place where businesses want to invest and families want to stay.
As the session continues, I remain focused on defending the standard deduction, opposing policies that raise costs, and advancing solutions that keep Virginia affordable for families, strong for workers, and secure for the future.
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Thank you, Senator Durant, for focusing attention on affordability — a concern every Virginia family feels right now. I appreciate your service and your willingness to put concrete ideas on the table.
• Affordability is broader than income taxes
o A higher standard deduction can help, but it does nothing for Virginians with little or no income‑tax liability, who are hit hardest by rising rent, childcare, health care, and transportation costs.
o By design, bigger standard deductions deliver the largest dollar benefits to higher‑income taxpayers, even as schools, infrastructure, and services that actually reduce costs are strained.
o Focusing narrowly on the deduction risks sounding pro‑family while avoiding deeper fixes to wages, housing, and public investment.
• Your “Virginia turnaround” story omits important context
o Virginia was already a nationally recognized pro‑business state before Governor Youngkin, with strong fundamentals built over many years by both parties.
o Job gains during his term largely track the national post‑pandemic recovery, while many communities have simultaneously absorbed federal job cuts, tariffs, and higher housing and energy costs.
o Describing “years of population loss and slower job growth” suddenly reversed by one administration reads more like campaign messaging than full economic analysis.
• The tax and regulation arguments feel one‑sided
o Updating how we tax digital services, sales, or local options can be about fairness and long‑term stability, not simply “raising costs.” The real question is who pays and what we fund.
o Labeling any new or rebalanced revenue as an attack on families overlooks the cost of underfunded schools, transit, public safety, and health systems that households rely on every day.
• The “Affordable Virginia Agenda” risks shifting costs, not reducing them
o Repealing clean‑energy standards may look like relief now but risks higher, more volatile fossil‑fuel costs later, especially for lower‑income households.
o Weakening workers’ bargaining power and protections tends to hold down wages and benefits, undercutting the very families struggling to keep up.
We share the goal of making Virginia affordable; where we differ is in believing that real, lasting relief requires targeted support for low‑ and middle‑income Virginians, strong wages, and sustained investment in the public goods that keep long‑term costs down.