At least one Virginia opinion writer has taken notice of the legislative agenda that tea party activists and like-minded groups unveiled at the Tea Party Convention held in Richmond earlier in the month. Regrettably, the review, from Virginian-Pilot columnist Christina Nuckols, is an terrible embarrassment. For Nuckols.
Ms. Nuckols savaged the proposed elimination of Virginia’s corporate and personal income taxes. Her conclusion: without these taxes, criminals would run lose in the streets where they would prey upon the jobless, uneducated masses (think “Escape from New York,” but without Ernest Borgnine). After spinning a hair-rasing tale of how nasty and brutish life would be without state income taxes, Nuckols concludes:
That’ll learn ’em!
But if Ms. Nuckols had invested only a moment or two of her time, she might have typed a few terms into the search engine of her choice and quickly discovered that there are a few states that do not levy either personal or corporate income taxes.
According to the Tax Foundation…
Seven states have no personal income tax.
Five states have no corporate income tax.
Nevada, Texas, South Dakota, Washington and Wyoming impose neither tax.
Sadly, the good folks at the Tax Foundation don’t tell us whether those income tax-free states are populated with “Road Warrior” extras. Or even Kurt Russell.
Make no mistake, though: these states have other means of extracting revenue from people and companies, so — despite the odds — they manage to find ways to keep both the lights on, the furnaces lit and the benefit checks rolling. And in Washington, a fierce ballot initiative fight is underway over a measure that would impose a personal income tax on the wealthy (or at least the wealthy as defined nowadays, namely those making more than $200,000 per year). According to William McGurn, the pro-income tax side is largely financed by public employee and teacher unions.
What a shock.
But back here in Virginia, Ms. Nuckols is concerned not just that the state’s revenues might take a hit, but wonders about what spending cuts will be made. While we can, perhaps, forgive her for taking a tragically static view of tax revenue, we cannot excuse her lack of historical reference.
Consider…in the last General Assembly session, legislators cut more than $4 billion from the state budget. As I’ve noted, the Governor had an additional $1 billion in cuts ready to go. Even without the extra billion, Virginia’s spending levels were rolled back to levels last seen in 2006. If memory serves, there were neither food riots in Norfolk, gas lines in Arlington, nor any storming of the General Assembly Building as a result of these reductions.
Yes, Uncle Sam papered-over some of the cuts. And indeed, there were fee increases (just don’t call them tax hikes) and pilfering from the Virginia Retirement System (but they promise to pay it all back. Really they do).
And in spite of all this…the sun still rose in the east and the rains finally came and the work houses remain shuttered.
The General Assembly managed to find substantial cuts and the Governor was prepared do do even more out of necessity. Imagine what they could cut if necessity became the rule rather than the exception…
