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Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Oregon Voters Want Someone Else to Pay

Via The Atlantic:
Oregon voters approved by a wide margin new taxes on wealthy families and corporations. For two decades, Oregon voters had mimicked California, freezing property taxes, rejecting sales taxes and demanding that any surpluses go back to the people in the form of rebates. No more! The two measures will raise income taxes for households making more than $250,000 a year and raise the state's corporate income tax.
On the one hand, it could be that these changes are overdue and a necessary modernization of an outdated tax code. The fact that many corporations are still subject to a tax enacted in 1931 argues for such an interpretation.

On the other hand, this could be the latest manifestation of the dangerous disconnect between the level of services Americans expect to receive from their governments and the amount of taxes they are willing to pay.

Draw your own conclusion. As you do, please keep this quote from Benjamin Franklin in mind:
When the people find they can vote themselves money,
that will herald the end of the republic.

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