Taxes

Miss this when it was first reported? What if, instead of persistently undercutting each other, states banded together in interstate agreements? What if they agreed on a common floor for environmental or business regulations? What if states agreed not to fish for jobs in their neighbor’s pond, or sought region-wide revenue increases that would eliminate the fear of being left behind or outgunned?

The "curse" of state reliance on high earners to pay a big share of taxes leaves states "starved for revenue in a bust.” The "root" of California’s woes is "its reliance on taxing the wealthy.” Claims like these mean that a recent Wall Street Journal article will undoubtedly be brandished in tax fights. But the story doesn't add up. And, interestingly, one needn’t go beyond the four corners of the Journal’s “Saturday Essay” feature to figure that out.

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) is seeking to change a deficit dialogue that focuses on cutting programs with a new bill that would raise $78 billion to preserve them by increasing tax rates on the wealthy.

At a time when President Obama and others in Washington are calling for the top corporate tax rate to be reduced, David Kocieniewski's New York Times piece explains how "fierce lobbying for tax breaks" and "innovative accounting" have already helped companies bring the corporate share of tax receipts down to less than a quarter of what it was in the mid-1950s.

Next month, voters in some New Jersey towns will decide whether to raise their own property taxes beyond a state-mandated two percent cap or to continue to cut services. But are those really the only two choices?

What if, instead of persistently undercutting each other, states banded together in interstate agreements?

It’s hard to find a big-state governor who is not sounding a call for “shared sacrifice.” It’s even harder to find one who really means it. At the same time we’re told that real sacrifice requires real pain, we also have to accept that businesses must be exempt from any pain. Instead, states must compete to beg for their favors.

In offering a set of “common sense proposals,” New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has sent a clear message to national policy makers: when it comes to business, tread lightly.

One of the striking things about the package is an approach to stimulus that wasn't even part of the talks: aid to strapped states.