in regards to the writing off of new purchases of equipment.  don't believe this provision will have much impact on Hawaii as we don't have businesses that have huge investments in equipment, most of our businesses are service oriented.  remember, you provide a tax benefit then you need to offset it with something else - would that be raising the tax rates?   the government needs a certain amount of revenues to operate, if it does not have enough, it cannot simply cut expenditures, another revenue source has to be tapped.  increasing the standard deduction and exemption  are  good ideas, this will reduce the need for lower income people to file tax returns and pay tax.  again, though, this reduction in revenue will likely have to be made up from other sources and the only other source is the rich as our middle class is taxed to the max.  the question is - how to balance the revenue sources to make it equitable?  and what is equitable?  the rich pay more and poorer pay less or none?