SFBG Radio: Abolish the sales tax?

10.07.11 - 10:13 am | Tim Redmond |

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Today Johnny offers a remarkable sensible economic proposal: What if California got rid of sales taxes entirely -- putting almost 10 percent more money in the pockets of consumers -- and replaced that revenue with higher income taxes on the wealthy? Now, why do you suppose this isn't going to happen? Listen after the break.

AbolishTheSalesTax by endorsements2011

SFBG Radio

Comments

Several States have no sales tax, like Oregon, Alaska

Montana, New Hampshire and Delaware. And they manage that without having excessive taxes on high producers either. Indeed, of those, Alaska and NH have no State income tax either.

It's nice to see SFBG advocating lower taxes, but it seems unlikely that you could replace the revenue merely by chasing after rich people - they can relocate a little too easily if you start persecuting them. They already pay up to 11% State income tax - the highest in the nation.

Posted by Anonymous on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 10:45 am

Err, Anon...

Mississippi and Alabama have way lower taxes than CA and you'll note than no one is leaving Malibu for Biloxi or Mobile.

Raising taxes on them when they get a third of them written off for starters makes sense to me.

Posted by Perkins on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 11:57 am

hmmm

http://thebusinessrelocationcoach.blogspot.com/

Posted by meatlock on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 12:43 pm

Out Of The Closet At Last

Meatlock, you must be so relieved that you no longer have to hide your membership in the Republican party.

The article you posted lists a lot of businesses leaving the state and one of the main reasons is, real estate is expensive here. As property taxes are frozen at 1% of value, that would mean that a factor that has nothing to do with taxes is the main motivator.

Also, unemployment is high. Taxes haven't been raised in this state in years. When unemployment was low, businesses weren't leaving. Again...

Much like your fellow arse-licker PaulT, you are nothing more than a talking point parrot and as he's on the Net all day, we must conclude that both of you are unemployed yourselves, that is until butthole-mouthing becomes profitable.

Posted by guest on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 1:06 pm

make sense

Your free association's are so interesting and out of context, the straw man quality is also very interesting.

http://www.ccsf.edu/Schedule/Fall/philosophy.shtml

phil 40 looks like what you need.

Posted by meatlock on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 1:20 pm

Perk, CA has lost more jobs than any other State

Even more than Michigan.

Clearly having BOTH the highest state income taxes AND the highest state sales tax in the nation isn't helping us.

I agree with SFBG that we should lower or abolish taxes. But the fact that MN and AK manage that without having a state income tax tells us that the real solution for abolishing sales tax isn't raising what is already the highest rate of state income tax in the nation.

Posted by Anonymous on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 12:57 pm

California was led by

California was led by Republican governors for the majority of the past 30 years and has had exclusively Democrats and Republicans with a rare independent elected to public office.

Clearly the same old same old rotation of political hacks is not helping us.

Californians demand high levels of service upon which our highly productive economy is based. And there ain't no free lunch on that score.

Posted by marcos on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 1:12 pm

It's not a Dem vs. GOP issue so much as

how can we in this State align tax policy with a pro-business climate?

It's not obvious that tax hikes are appealing to companies when there are adjacent States that either don't have a state income tax (Nevada) or don't have a state sales tax (Oregon) or have much less regulation (Arizona).

Marcos, what are your best three ideas for helping private business prosper and thrive in CA?

Posted by Anonymous on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 1:30 pm

Don't fall into Troll PaulT's trap.

PaulT just wants to waste your time and energy in a debate he will wage completely without facts, and will finish up by declaring himself the "winner" no matter how wrong he is proven.
Then he'll change his screen name and start all over again with his shilling for Ed Lee, PG&E, BARt, the Subway to Nowhere, etc.

Posted by Guest on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 2:20 pm

If you can't answer his question honestly then

just say so. Because it's obvious anyway.

Posted by Anonymous on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 2:43 pm

Not worth the effort, PaulT.

Why are you referring to yourself in the third person now?
Do you really think that fools anyone, Toilet Paper Boy?

Posted by Anonymous on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 8:43 pm

You're not smart enough and

well informed enough to pound out some thing in a few minutes to prove your point?

Posted by meatlock on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 9:14 pm

Alaska

65% of the state is owned by the Federal government. About 34% is owned by the state and cities. Therefore, the issue of taxes there is irrelevant. Much like Arizona where a quarter of the population is retired, many of whom are taken care of by Medicare and SS and so the state doesn't need a large tax base.

Still has 11% unemployment though.

Businesses didn't leave the state of CA until their clients lost their jobs. What that says is that the recession and real estate market crash and not taxes are the issue, no matter what the Republican Meatlock thinks.

As per taxes, California is 46th in property taxes and 6th in income tax. End that disparity first.

Posted by guest on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 2:16 pm

Overall, CA is the most taxed State in the Union and yet

it figures last in educational achievement. Clearly high taxes isn't sufficient, and it's not even clear it's necessary. Even so, SFBG are on the right track here in seeking lower and simpler taxes.

Posted by Anonymous on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 2:44 pm

Your example illustrates the case for taxes

Once upon a time, California was first in education. Then prop 13 came along and eviscerated funding for the schools, because the way California funds the schools is through property taxes. Doesn't matter how much income is taxed; that funding still doesn't go to schools.

Posted by Greg on Oct. 07, 2011 @ 3:29 pm

Prop 13 is a red herring here because

although prop tax rates are limited in CA, those rates apply to typically much higher values than in other States. And again, prop taxes get reset upon every sale, so prop taxes in CA have actually been increasing at a rate higher than inflation since it's introduction.

Prop 13 had massive voter support, and every serious politician understans that the public need to feel protected from the kind of annual increases that were being seen in the 1970's.

CA taxes are very high by almost any standard. There isn't a revenue problem. The problem is that too much money is being wasted and squandered.

Posted by Anonymous on Oct. 08, 2011 @ 9:03 am

Corporate Property Taxes Not So

No. Corporate property taxes exploit loopholes in Prop 13 and are effectively held low as a result.

Your contention that California is overtaxed is simply absurd.

Posted by Eric Brooks on Oct. 09, 2011 @ 10:54 pm

If corporations couldn't hold RE at cost then

they'd be more likely to sell their CA RE at a loss for a tax writeoff, and then relocate to another State. that would further erode the tax base, and force individual taxes to be even higher than they already are.

Posted by Guest on Oct. 10, 2011 @ 7:05 am

"it figures last in educational achievement."

Right, CA ranks below Mississippi, Louisiana or Texas.

In reality, via SAT scores, CA ranks around 30th.

And higher taxes aren't sufficient? State about to have another shortfall which means lots and lots of cuts. Not to anyone in Marin or Malibu though, which for some reason, is your concern, arse-lick.

Posted by guest on Oct. 10, 2011 @ 6:41 am

Where's the evidence that higher taxes leads to smarter kids?

The fact that CA has super high taxes and lousy schools seems clearly to show that it's entirely possible to waste gobloads of money on education and still perform badly. In that case, why throw even more money at it, especially when we don't have it and won't pay it?

It's our system that is flawed, not the funding. We need to see schools freed from the current obsession with parity and diversity, and allow parents and teachers more say in the running of each school. Give them bloack grants and otherwise keep out of their way.

Maybe then, affluent folks would stop sending their kids to private school, and put them back in the public system, which is another huge problem right now.

Posted by Guest on Oct. 10, 2011 @ 4:23 pm

Taxes

Alaska and Texas and North Dakota have meaty severance taxes on oil production. Severance taxes are not a tax on work, they're a tax on the windfall income from merely owning nature.

California doesn't have a severance tax on oil extraction.

As a culture we need to get very clear that taxing the value of nature doesn't impede production because nature is not produced. Public collection of the annual value of nature reduces and eliminates the need to tax work--either directly through income taxes or indirectly through sales and excise taxes.

Posted by Guest on Oct. 09, 2011 @ 10:20 pm