Republican Governors: Take from the Poor, Give to the Rich, and Suck the Federal Teat
These local stories in Louisiana, Kansas, Nebraska, and North Carolina speak quite eloquently for themselves.
Gov. Bobby Jindal is proposing to eliminate Louisiana’s income and corporate taxes and pay for those cuts with increased sales taxes
http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/01/gov_bobby_jindal_calls_for_eli.html
Gov. Dave Heineman made a bold proposal … end the income tax for working Nebraskans and corporations. It would also end the taxation of small business, Social Security and retirement income. … As a means to make up for the lost revenue, Heineman’s proposal would also end $5 billion in sales tax exemptions.
http://www.dailynebraskan.com/news/article_9e1bcc1c-5fa1-11e2-ba02-0019bb30f31a.html
State personal and corporate income taxes would be eliminated, sales taxes would be charged on services, and North Carolinians would pay state sales tax on groceries under a tax reform proposal with significant support in Raleigh.
http://www.news-record.com/home/589530-63/nc-tax-reform-plan-is
Brownback: Keep full sales tax, cut income taxes further
http://www.kansascity.com/2013/01/15/4012878/brownback-keep-full-sales-tax.html
These proposals all lower revenues collected. This will give these red states more bargaining power when they run into the inevitable fiscal crisis, so they can suck the Federal government teat even more effectively than they do now.
Fiendishly clever.
Cross-posted at Asymptosis.
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care to make a friendly wager on which member of a group of states first requires Federal assistance “when they run into the inevitable fiscal crisis” – you take the four you listed and I’ll take California, New York and Illinois.
Related, I’m not sure if this relates to you specifically, but can you help me understand why liberals who support progressive taxation at an individual level, and who are quick to point out that blue states are wealthier and have higher per capita income, have such a problem when the logical outcome of higher per capita state income manifests itself as “suck[ing] at the Federal government teat” for lower income generating red states?
It is not that liberals are against the richer states supporting the poorer ones, it is part of the progressive ideal that those who gain more from society owe more to society. It is just a way of pointing out the hypocrisy of conservatives who believe that the ones who need the help should be the ones that are taxed to provide it on the individual level and just the opposite on the state suck at the Fed’s tit level.