I just through that last word in – after all, it seems that the Obama covering press always seems to present bad news modified by that word ("Today, the Labor Department reported another unexpected rise in the unemployment rate…").
Well, it applies to forecasts as well, as the clueless Oregonian politicians and class envy voters are now finding out. Just as the Democrats in DC wanted to do, these folks did – put in place higher taxes on millionaires. Did they get their desired results? Er, not so much:
The most noteworthy result is that about one-fourth of rich taxpayers have disappeared. Does the name John Galt ring a bell?
And as most of us would expect, it failed. Most Progressives seem to think that they can snap their fingers and "their sheeple" will just obey because they have decided they know better. Problem is, many of the targeted sheeple are generally smarter than the Progressives and can avoid paying the tax. Thus, instead of raising overall revenues, can you guess what actually happened? Dan Mitchell brings in the WSJ:
In 2009 the state legislature raised the tax rate to 10.8% on joint-filer income of between $250,000 and $500,000, and to 11% on income above $500,000. Only New York City’s rate is higher. Oregon’s liberal voters ratified the tax increase on individuals and another on businesses in January of this year, no doubt feeling good about their “shared sacrifice.”
Congratulations. Instead of $180 million collected last year from the new tax, the state received $130 million. The Eugene Register-Guard newspaper reports that after the tax was raised “income tax and other revenue collections began plunging so steeply that any gains from the two measures seemed trivial.” One reason revenues are so low is that about one-quarter of the rich tax filers seem to have gone missing.
…All of this is an instant replay of what happened in Maryland in 2008 when the legislature in Annapolis instituted a millionaire tax. There roughly one-third of the state’s millionaire households vanished from the tax rolls after rates went up. If Salem officials want to find where the millionaires went, they might start the search in Texas, the state that leads the nation in job creation—and has a top income and capital gains tax rate 11 percentage points lower than Oregon’s.
Indeed – now that the Census numbers are in, those States that have no or low income taxes and more limited governments had population growths – like Texas. Those that placed a higher burden on their subjects citizens by taxation and a more onerous government lost their Representatives to Congress (think California, NY, MA, NJ).
