In an interview Friday, the Republican governor called the tax credit a “redistribution program” that involves “taking money from other taxpayers and giving it to individuals who have a limited tax liability.”

“This is reducing how much money other taxpayers have to give to those individuals,” Walker said.

The governor also proposes cutting $9 million in tax rebates to low-income homeowners under the Homestead Tax Credit. That credit is designed to offset the cost of property taxes for residents earning no more than $24,500 a year, many of them elderly.

The budget proposal would freeze the Homestead credit at the current level rather than allowing it to rise with inflation. Last year, 247,011 taxpayers claimed the credit, costing the state $128 million, according to the Department of Revenue.

Revenue Secretary Rick Chandler said about half of the states do not have an earned-income tax credit, and among those that do, Wisconsin’s is one of the most generous. Chandler said the proposed changes to the Homestead credit would return Wisconsin to the system it had before 2009, when the tax credit remained unchanged for 20 years.