Meet the New Tax Reform…Same as the Old Tax Reform

Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber, fresh off his early October special legislative session “Grand Bargain” success, says he will now turn his attention to tax reform. He has plenty of company in Oregon’s recent history…

Ask the average Oregonian what “tax reform” means, and they are likely to say it means “more taxes.” And, so far they’d be correct.

Before Governor Kitzhaber has even hinted at specifics of his upcoming tax reform plan, several state legislators are fleshing out their own version of “more taxes” which includes a five percent sales tax coupled with property and income tax reductions. This time, they have in hand a Legislative Revenue Office analysis that says it will create 55,405 new jobs and raise $488 million a year in net tax revenue.

Steve Buckstein, Cascade Policy Review, December 9, 2009

“I’m stunned that we could not only produce more money for education, stabilize our tax code and produce more jobs for our economy,” said Hass, a Beaverton Democrat and a chief architect of the tax reform proposal.” – Mark Hass, Oregon Senator, District 14, quoted in The Oregonian.

Our Response & Leave Your Comments

We’re plenty stunned ourselves! It came as an utter shock to us that the wizards in Salem could remove $488 million from the private sector and it would result in 55,405 new jobs in the same sector you just took the money from.

We have a better idea – How about if 2,500 Lane Solutions readers each sent your humble but grasping editors $2,000? We could create 100 jobs paying “living wages” (whatever that means). But our generous 2,500 readers wouldn’t have the money to create jobs of any kind, would they?

It works exactly the same when the Salem geniuses take your money. The only difference is that we’d have to ask you for it. Government doesn’t. All they have to do is take it.

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