I guess it’s go Galt or move to Washington:
Two ballot measures that would raise taxes on businesses and higher-income residents in Oregon appeared headed for approval late Tuesday.
The tax increases, which would raise about $727 million largely for public education and social services, were approved last year by the Legislature, but later put to a public referendum after opponents gathered signatures in a petition campaign.
The Legislature, controlled by Democrats, has already put the $727 million into the current budget. So if the ballot items, known as Measures 66 and 67, had been rejected, lawmakers would have been forced to hold a special session to find other ways to reduce spending or raise revenue.
Patrick Lightbody
Very happy to see this go through, though my household was a net zero votes (my wife voted against because she can’t stand the Government waste).
I talked to some friends and it’s amazing how little understanding people have (ie: taxable income, progressive taxes, etc.)
Overall, this is a very nominal tax increase that has almost no effect on businesses and very little on the high earners.
Yutsano
Here’s hoping the neighbors to the north (Washington) follows their lead and grows some huevos on this. Although I’d be happier with a CRE increase up here rather than the sales tax increase they’ve been rumbling about.
Delia
Yup, no spending freeze here. You can bet the local wingnuts were out in force for the past couple of months predicting dire consequences and we got the usual run of teevee ads, but we just don’t believe them anymore.
Wile E. Quixote
@Yutsano:
Or they could close some of the loopholes in the state tax code.
moe99
Gee and WA bidness is touting what a great place OR is for workers’ comp premiums:
http://www.seattleweekly.com/2010-01-20/news/take-an-ax-to-it/1
The author of this piece really only gets it about half right.
Linkmeister
Gosh, those poor businesses at the low end:
Er, how much of a free ride can one have? A $10 annual tax? I assume that’s just a “Yes, I’m doing business in Oregon” kind of thing.
Amanda
Finally some good news! Kudos to the activists in Oregon who worked so hard for this!
robertdsc-PowerBook & 27 titles
I really wish governments nationwide would stop doing stupid shit like this.
Angry Space Cadet
People voting for tax increases? What sort of wonderful drug are they putting in the water there?
Martin
@robertdsc-PowerBook & 27 titles:
If the problems in OR are anything like the problems in CA, they may not have had any other choice. Hell, $727M would barely cover the CalState cut this year, let alone the UC, community college, and K-12 cuts.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@Patrick Lightbody:
That’s ok, our household put in three solid yes votes (twice) to make up the difference. ;)
@Linkmeister:
That’s what we were saying here. If you can’t afford $150.00 a year to do business in the state then you aren’t in business, you’re unemployed.
Mac from Oregon
Very glad to see this pass. Here is a tip for you folks that rant that an increase to 150 bucks will ruin a corporation, If you can’t pay 150 bucks in corporate taxes, you were going out of business anyway!
Platonicspoof
From a Freeper thread tonight (not linking, SOP, but also a boring thread).
The Oregonian’s (Portland’s daily paper) measure 66 personal tax calculator:
Step one:
“Is your income from all sources less than $125,000 if you file individually, or less than $250,000 if you file jointly or as head of household?”
(Yes or No are the two choices.)
Step two, if you answered yes:
“You will pay no additional taxes if Measure 66 passes.”
The ad campaigns were more the story (some links at the above link).
Mark Centz
Will Wolf Blitzer & Tweety spend any time on this tomorrow? Does it drive a truck or have a sassy wink? No? Doesn’t count, the spending freeze* and the unelected program cutting commission are still on, hippies.
*Not valid for defense-industrial complex
16 shells from a thirty aught six
One more yes vote from me!
Chris Andersen
@robertdsc-PowerBook & 27 titles:
No no no. This is the way I wish more governments would work. (1) Figure out what kind of services you want to provide, (2) figure out how much it will cost to pay for those services, (3) raise the taxes to meet those costs. Which leaves, (4) if you want to change it you have to either change the legislators or convince the voters that the taxes and programs were a bad idea.
This puts the onus on the anti-tax crowd to prove their beliefs.
Chuck Butcher
Two votes from my house though my Corp taxes go up from $10-150. Pay no attention, it’s hippie land and no good lefties. Doubt me? Check our delegation other than Walden R
Batocchio
Good news. Thanks. (Obviously it proves we’re a center-right nation.)
El Cid
This proves that Oregonians are just unserious about cutting the deficit and listening to the budget hawks, like I just saw David Gergen and ERCK ERCKKSSSON on the Campbell Brown TV show saying, because you do that mainly by cutting taxes and vowing to cut back on social services.
beltane
I wonder what the IQ spread is between Oregon and California. It’s amazing there is at least one state in the country where people are capable of putting their own self-interest over the great American tradition of obeying and serving the rich.
beltane
@Mac from Oregon: If they are willing to pay more to register their car than to register their corporation, maybe they’re not very committed business people.
Marcus
@beltane:
CA needs a supermajority in the legislature to make changes to the tax code, there are enough (R)’s not to get one, and the Terminator is all about cutting taxes and services to solve the problem. Education spending went from something like 4th in the 70’s to 40-something now (and dropping) compared to other states, and it’s really starting to show. So I’d say it’s more about educating than IQ.
CADoc
An organization I work with here in CA is circulating a letter signed by health and human services groups advocating raising tax on sugared beverages and alcohol by a nickel a drink and raising tobacco tax (ours started high but is now 31st in the nation). Raise money and put a mild brake on bad health habits, a win-win, right? The Governator and the Republicans will put it straight in the round file. But at least we feel like we’re doing something while everything crumbles around us.
West of the Cascades
We Oregonians just struck a blow for common sense and the very fundamental principle that if you want basic government services like public schools and other social services, you have to pay for them. We had several days last year where government agencies (including the courts) were closed because of budget shortfalls. Apparently enough people noticed this was not a desirable thing that they stepped up and provided what I hope will be a useful example to the rest of the country.
Plus, the “no taxes” crowd was disingenuous and untruthful (surprise!) in its advertising, and didn’t offer any proposal that would have raised the revenue to avoid budget cuts — just went on about how “government should have to tighten its belt like the rest of us.” Oregonians figured out that when government has to tighten its belt, it’s people who rely on government (i.e. ALL of us) that get squeezed …
Napoleon
@robertdsc-PowerBook & 27 titles:
Why? I understand the point if you don’t expect them to go back and be able to make the cuts but there is a reason that the Republicans have made it high art to divorce any talk of what is effected by tax decreases by refusing to bring up tax deceases even remotely in conjunction with budget cuts. I think that Dems should make it clear that failures to raise taxes or tax cuts have a direct bearing on specific programs. If that is what people want then fine, but at least they know what the effect is and that tax cuts or failure to raise taxes is completely cost free.
Justin
Phil Knight the owner of Nike and the University of Oregon threatened to move if Oregon passed this measure. It’ll be interesting to see what he does. I’m betting he stays put.
DZ
@Patrick Lightbody:
I voted FOR both of these measues (yes, I am a Portlander), but I will pay about $2,000 in increased taxes next year because of the tax on high earners. remember, Oregon has a 9% income tax before this measure. So, the impact is not trivial or nominal. It was necessary, but that’s a lot of new money out of my pocket.
DZ
@beltane:
There’s an old joke – as pioneers were going west in their wagons, they eventually came across a small sign saying Oregon Trail. Everyone who could read went that way
dr. bloor
@robertdsc-PowerBook & 27 titles:
Stop doing what? Exercise their constitutional authority to craft and implement fiscally responsible budgets on the assumption that a bunch of right-wing lunatics won’t be able to overturn their decisions?
lol
@Napoleon:
The other problem in California is that districts have been heavily gerrymandered for one party control. The other problem is that they’ve also got term limits. So you have districts always electing one party or the other who pretty much don’t have to worry about what the voters think after they get elected.
The good thing is I believe California passed some new redistricting rules which may pay off but not until 2012.
Patrick Lightbody
@DZ
I dunno… I’m around the same place you are in terms of taxes due. Considering that I’m probably going to plunk down $1000 on whatever Steve Jobs announces in two hours, it’s hard for me to look in the mirror and act like $2000 is really breaking the bank. I mean, $350K of taxable income was $31.5K in taxes and is now $33.3K, or roughly 6% more in taxes owed.
Likewise, on 67, if my business (just hired my 4th employee last week!) gets hurt on a 0.1% loss in revenue, I doubt I ever had a successful business from the start. I understand some businesses run extremely tight margins and very high revenues, but it’s hard for me to comprehend 0.1% being make-or-break.
Though I concede that every family and business situation is different and I only have my own perspective to go off of.
Cain
My wife and I voted for it. My buddy voted against it because he believes that we are spending way too much on education already and he wanted them to find more efficient ways to fund it. I used to think like that as well. There was a precedent though because Portland raised taxes to pay for portland schools and there was a lot of weeping and happiness when it passed, but a year later they were back asking for more money.
What I realized now though is if you didn’t raise taxes or fund the schools, you’ll just get crappy schools, you’re not going to change the behavior. Instead, you need find smarter administrators. Sound familiar right? Better leaders please? We already seem to be paying a premium and for shittier people for leadership these days. I have no idea where the talented people have gone.
cain
Patrick Lightbody
@Cain
Agreed. My wife didn’t vote for it for the same reason: she wanted to make a statement that she feels the money isn’t being spent wisely.
And I agree, it probably isn’t. But how do you get out of this? Obviously I won’t vote for raising taxes indefinitely, but I still hope we can find a decent leader who can do something useful with what we’re giving them.
b-psycho
@Angry Space Cadet:
This gets at the unspoken part of the opposition to taxes from the average (read: not rich) person: “Tax THEM all you want, not US!”. The taxation of Them was explained, so it passed, because there’s more of Us than Them.
This is why every chance I get I argue for radical tax reform along neo-Georgist (natural resources + financial transactions) means. The overwhelming majority of benefit to government goes to Them anyway, let Them pay for it. The liberals would get their revenue, the average anti-taxer gets the Mother of all Tax Cuts, it’d be win-win far as I can tell.
Ty Lookwell
@DZ
Thank you. I voted for both 66 & 67, but it didn’t affect my tax status; it was easy vote for me (and the right vote, IMHO). Thanks for your vote on this, despite the personal price.
Tim Cooper
The problem is the “No” campaign never really got past Teabagger narratives.
Gar…. Taxes Bad….Urrrg…. Tighten Belt…..Ugg…. Obey out of state corporations……
Really, those of you from elsewhere in the country try and youtube some of the ads against. Here was my favorite.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WyiZVWnFJQ
It was probably a great ad for the choir, but once word got out that the tax increase only affected those making more than 125k, I think it backfired.
Grover Gardner
Patrick, maybe your wife is right and they aren’t spending the money wisely. We’ve only been in Medford three years and I have yet to figure it all out, but my first-grade daughter brings home photocopied, hand-stapled workbooks and handouts. They do the trick, but I marvel at the extra time the teachers have to put in because of the lack of materials.
I know I pay for things here I never paid for back East. An ambulance ride cost me $600 out of pocket. I pay for garbage pick-up and a lot of other things that were considered city services where I used to live. In a way I see the point–you can opt out of a lot of things here if you want to, which is okay by me.
But it’s a puzzle to me how people here think they’re going to attract businesses to an area that keeps whittling down its public schools, closing its libraries, and reducing law enforcement and infrastructure. The HS grad rate is miserable and the college rate even worse. They complain about the low wages and lack of jobs, but never seem to connect that with an under-skilled work-force and dicey public services. I’m paying about $500 more in child care this year because of the school cuts so my wife can keep her own job. I’d rather see that go to the schools. I can handle it, but I wonder how other people here do.
We moved here for a job I like very much, but it’s questionable how long we can stay. It’s beautiful, it’s safe by any current standard, and folks are friendly enough. But it’s hard to think of our daughter reaching high-school age in a culture that’s so permeated with dead-end thinking.
DZ
@Patrick Lightbody;
You’re not wrong. I wear $5,000 Italian suits. Is an extra $2000 in taxes going to hurt me? No. But it’s still not trivial.
BTW, how does somone only pay $31.5 K on $350,000 in taxable income. My income is $70K short of that and my tax bill was $60K
Patrick Lightbody
@DZ
I wear hoodies and jeans myself :)
I was just talking about state income taxes. Not federal, payroll, property, etc.
Before: 9% of $350K taxable income is $31.5K
After: 9% of $250K taxable income is $22.5K + 11% of $100K is $11K, so total is $33.5K
Delia
Hoodies and jeans sounds way more like an Oregonian than $5,000 Italian suits. DZ must be a spoof.
tootiredoftheright
@West of the Cascades:
And the no tax crowd spent in one week on the ads what the tax increase would have cost over several centuries.
Honestly I have to laugh at the people who say businesses are going to move out of Oregon over a 140 dollar per tax increase. Yeah they are going to have to pay tens of thousands or more likely hundreds of thousands to move staff or rehire people in another state as well as pay the hundreds of thousands to millions for property in another state along with other added costs to avoid 140 dollars a year?
Funny how it never occurs to people that the business opposing these small tax increases loses what the tax would have cost in a century. So it logically doesn’t make sense to oppose the tax increase when opposing it and carrying out your whine you are going to leave the state costs you far more then you would have seen in a lifetime of the tax at work.
tootiredoftheright
@Cain:
Apparently you don’t realize a lot of schools have crappy buildings that should have gotten the contractor thrown in jail. Also how do you explain the lack of music instruments, school textbooks, and other basic materials? Those things all cost money including the building of schools that actually meet the building requirements they should have been built with in the first place.
John
I’m way late on commenting on this, since I was out earning my apparently massive paycheck last week.
My girlfriend and I are planning a move to the west coast. We had narrowed it down to Seattle or Portland. Guess what? This high income earner is moving to Seattle. According to that fancy calculator on the Oregonlive website, Measure 66 would have cost us an additional $9000 a year.
Not trivial. Oregon can stick it!
dcdl
I’m supposing the people on here who said they voted no to take a stand don’t have children in public school or your school is really well funded. I’ve already given 5 reams of paper and will give my children’s elementary school more since they are almost out of paper for the school year. They’ve already cut down and barely do any art, cost to much. They’ve also asked for donations and/or more school supplies. Have unpaid cut school days and increased the size of the classroom. I’m trying to figure out what else they can cut. They are asking heavily for volunteers to help with anything.
Yes, Oregon’s tax structure isn’t the greatest, but until then…
Grover Gardner
I’m curious–if you cited an extra $9K for Oregon based on that tax calculator, you’re earning about $590K a year, is that right? Of course, WA has NO personal income tax, so moving to Portland would *automatically* cost you more in state income taxes, regardless of the current increase.
Now, did you figure in sales tax, gas tax, property taxes, excise taxes and other goodies? Because that $9000 you saved might be eaten up pretty fast in Seattle, assuming your life-style matches your income. Oregon, of course has NO sales tax and lower gas taxes.
But hey, Seattle’s a great place to live. Then again, so is Portland. Let’s see, median home prices in Portland are about $90K less than they are in Seattle. That’s 10 times the 9K you’re saving in state income tax. Oh well, what’s a little money when you’ve got so much? ;-)
Grover Gardner
And let’s not forget higher homeowner’s insurance, health insurance, car insurance, public transportation (it’s free in downtown Portland), general prices for goods and services, etc. The overall cost of living is about 7% higher in Seattle.
Honestly, if the recent tax increase was your only criterion for choosing, at least assure me that you’re not a highly paid financial advisor.