On March 10, 2010, Governor Pat Quinn announced plans to increase Illinois’s state income tax by 33 percent. Illinoisans would be forced to send a greater share of their earnings to state coffers.

By asking Illinois taxpayers to send more of their money to government, Governor Quinn is implying that there’s room to cut from family budgets.

According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, the average Midwestern household is made up of 2.4 persons and has before-tax income of $61,063. Let’s say they have taxable income of $50,000. They’d pay an additional $500 in taxes under Governor Quinn’s plan, on top of the $1,500 they’re already paying in state income taxes, for a total of $2,000.

Here is a chart that breaks down household spending of the average Midwestern household by category. We ask Governor Quinn and would-be tax hike supporters: What should families cut from their household budgets to make room for higher tax bills?

Should Illinoisans buy less food? Cut back on insurance coverage? Move into cheaper housing? Buy fewer books? Forgo the next haircut? Cancel the upcoming road trip to grandma’s house? Save less for retirement?

It doesn’t have to be this way. Illinois can still take concrete steps to control costs and enact proactive reforms to ensure that future budgets stay better in hand.

Here are 15 policy steps to put Illinois’s budget on firmer footing:

1. Adopting the cost-cutting suggestions of Governor Pat Quinn’s own Taxpayer Action Board.
2. Passing the Illinois Efficient Government Act.
3. Developing a comprehensive inventory of state assets that can be sold or leased.
4. Reviewing public employee compensation.
5. Advancing Medicaid delivery reform.
6. Reviewing local revenue sharing.
7. Empowering a Sunshine Commission to evaluate existing government programs.
8. Avoiding new spending boondoggles.
9. Reforming Illinois’s public pension system.
10. Do away with barriers to business.
11. Protecting taxpayers with a supermajority requirement vote for higher taxes and fees.
12. Implementing spending prioritization.
13. Promoting choice in education.
14. Putting an expenditure limit in place.
15. Stop thinking that more government is always the solution.