Maryland shoots self in foot
I know I’ve written about this before, but it bears repeating. In today’s Wall Street Journal, the editorial board warns Illinois governor, Pat Quinn, against raising taxes with a piece entitled Maryland’s Mobile Millionaires.
Thanks in part to its soak-the-rich theology, Maryland still has a $2 billion deficit and Montgomery County is $760 million in the red. Governor Martin O’Malley’s office tells us he wants the higher rates to expire “as scheduled at the end of 2010.” But there are bills in both chambers of the legislature to extend the surcharge. The state’s best hope is that politicians in other states are as self-destructive as those in Annapolis.
According to the Wall Street Journal, 2300 millionaires fled Maryland between 2007 and 2008 when Governor O’Malley hiked taxes on millionaires from 4.75% to 9.3%. Now, I’m no millionaire, but my new job is a stone’s throw from Maryland, so I could choose either Maryland or West Virginia for my new home. I chose West Virginia and my income tax withholding tumbled $1800/year. Since I’m not a millionaire, to me that’s a lot of money. I could go on about the savings that resulted from my choice to move to West Virginia, but you probably wouldn’t believe it.
So if thousands of millionaires left, how many non-millionaires left, I wonder, and how much additional income taxes went with them?. Did I mention that the Republican governor, Robert Erlich left O’Malley almost a billion dollar surplus in 2007 and by the end of the year O’Malley was raising taxes? So when will liberals learn about tax hikes?
Category: Liberals suck
When will they learn? Maybe when they start paying them themselves?
West Virginia, excellent choice of residence, highest percentage of private gun ownership in the U.S.
Well, Jonn. Maybe they went to Nebraska…I heard that they had a balanced budget…or was it that they had someone take bribes? haha. Gee, I’m guessing that not too many liberals get it because they live in la-la land.
Jonn, you ask the question of “when will they learn” and direct it at the politicians. That question lies squarely with the voters, who happen to be the ones who voted in the tax happy leftists.
Why can’t Barack Obama make up the difference “from his stash”?
Everyone here is right. Politicuans never learn from others’ experience. They have to hit their own thumb with the hammer to find out about pain.
The example I’m thinking of is when New York (City? state?) imposed a hefty tax hike on those making over $$XXX (lots of) dollars. Rush Limbaugh said, “Screw you. I’m moving.” And thereby the (city? state?) lost not only Limbaugh’s income revenue, but also the income revenue from the jobs he generated with his radio program.
Real intelligent, eh?
Woodman–and to make matters worse, Patterson was all smug about having “driven” Limbaugh out of the state. What even a blind man (well, all but Patterson and the rest of the dolts in Albany) could see is that for every person who vocally packs up and leaves, many more do so without a word, leaving the state high and dry. Witness the $70 BILLION in lost wealth in New Jersey during the past five years alone.
Yep here in New Jersey that was Jim McGreavey, who started the “millionaire” tax. Incidentally he’s also the governor who fell in a hole on the beach and broke his leg.