I have a solution for companies confused by the New Massachusetts State Software services Tax that just went into effect. Move to New Hampshire.
Miami Herald – According to the state revenue department, the state’s 6.25 percent sales tax now applies to “certain services relating to computer system design and to modification, integration, enhancement, installation, or configuration of standardized or prewritten software.”
Gloucester Times- “Even the Department of Revenue doesn’t know exactly how this is going to work and what services it’s going to effect,” Rep. Randy Hunt, an East Sandwich Republican and certified public accountant, told the News Service. A former computer programmer, Hunt said, “I can guarantee there will be companies that don’t collect it that later find out that they should have.”
Nothing says “confidence like the phrase “I can guarantee there will be companies that don’t collect it that later find out that they should have.”
Maybe this will make those Massachusetts business owners feel better.
After overriding a veto from Gov. Deval Patrick and in the face of criticism of the tax, Democratic House and Senate leaders wrote to the Department of Revenue, saying they “will not hesitate” to change the new law if the “revenue or job impacts” are “greater than anticipated.”
Kudos to Deval, but shiver me timbers, did Massachusetts Democrat State house and Senate Leaders just deliver the holy grail of admissions about increasing taxes? “...they “will not hesitate” to change the new law if the “revenue or job impacts” are “greater than anticipated.””
Did you catch that? They are telling us that they not only know that raising taxes has an impact on revenue and jobs, they anticipate it. And they promise…if the impacts are greater than anticipated, they will change the law. What does that mean? Coming from a Democrat it means they’ll need more taxes, of course, to replace the revenue they scared off with the previous tax. Never occurred to them not to pass it in the first place though. That’s a Democrat for you. “We’re gonna chop of your finger but don’t worry. If it starts to bleed too much, we’ll chop off another one.”
That kind of forethought–the anticipation of job or revenue loss as a result of Liberal tax policy–is something of an outlier, an admission destined to be an unsuccessful mutation in the evolution of the left wing economic narrative. Can’t go about letting people know that you know that you are probably killing jobs with your tax policy. You wouldn’t catch a New Hampshire Democrat being that honest. They’d just lie.
Sucking millions out of the economy to fund (insert name of thing here) will create good job for Middle class Americans. Sure it will. Is NH Democrat Kathy Sullivan printing money on her kitchen table too or is that just where her and Maggie plot attacks on free speech and health care? (She can’t use her basement; that’s where the out-of-state sign-burgling campaign worker “lives” so they can fraudulantly declare domicile from her NH home for vote-stealing purposes before going back to their own state.)
And, of course it, never occurs to any of them that real, sustainable, and truly reliable revenue growth can only come from allowing business to breathe and grow with as little bureaucratic interference as possible. This allows them to seek out products and services people want and need, increasing commerce, jobs needed to meet demand, and by extension more commerce and jobs, all without the government having to do much of anything at all.
There’s no reliable growth in raising taxes that drive off businesses who will lose at the margins or just can’t afford to divert pay to the non-productive expense of translating Democrat legislation to ensure that you are collecting the right taxes on the proper services, and on and on. There’s no real reliable revenue in sales taxes or even income taxes either. Wages are dependent on employers being able to hire and pay, and that is dependent on commerce and when commence dips, and job loss starts, the cascade by design decreases state revenues right when you’d think they needed them most.
All that aside, hey Massachusetts Tech firms! Move. To. New Hampshire. Lower crime, better standard of living, lower overall tax burden, Healthier outcomes, lowest welfare rates in the country, one of the best average annual incomes, and no Massachusetts legislature. And I promise, despite the fact that the Democrats keep finding a way to warp the law and use out of state voters to stuff the ballot boxes for them, the rest of us will work as hard as we can to keep them from turning our state into another Massachusetts. But you have to promise to stop voting for Democrats once you get here, or you’re just poisoning our water hole.
