Gov. Walker wants to eliminate state income tax and/or property taxes (Waukesha: movers, home)
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Walker is a dangerous politician who has done nothing for the state of Wisconsin. Be careful what you endorse: he may look like he is doing the right thing, but always has tricks up his sleeve. Sleazy governor.
Wisconsin doesn't really have much choice, IMHO. Its clear that low tax/no income tax states are doing well, and states with high taxes or states that are raising taxes are losing population as people leave to look for jobs and seeking relief from high taxes. Ca. and NY. are among these. You may have noticed that Florida recently passed NY state in overall population. Fortunately for Wis. residents, Walker is leading the state in the right direction. I'm very happy for all my family that lives there.
Where do you get your data that low tax/no income tax states are doing well?
Location: RI, MA, VT, WI, IL, CA, IN (that one sucked), KY
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I would hate Wisconsin to keep trying to be like the South with the reduced investment in education and focus on low paying jobs. The exact opposite direction the State should be going in.
The new mindset of the Republican party is to serve those who are affluent, and forget about the rest. If you wanted to eliminate state income tax, you would HAVE to implement another source of state income. A sales tax is regressive, unless it exempts the necessities that all people must buy regardless of income. That's why many states exempt: food, medicine, utilities, fuel, and other items that everyone must buy. The base amount of money to pay necessities is the same, whether you are "rich" or "poor."
Walker is insanely anti-union. While I agree many unions exist only to make their union leaders rich, but, unions do serve a purpose. Unions help to set a base level of pay that is expected to perform a job. If you hate the minimum wage, then of course you wouldn't like unions. As Walked basically castrated the unions in Wisconsin, you can expect, over the long run, for wages to become stagnated even more than they have been for the last 30 years. I was a government employee in a right to work state. I wished that at times we had been a "closed shop" state. Right to work states have usually been in the south, and if you see the demographics, you see that the south has a much higher percentage of people who live below the poverty line. You see that more people in those states have no health insurance. Generally they have a shorter life span, and a higher infant mortality rate that other states. Walker represents the mindset of the south. He hates the government, he hates people that need assistance, and he hates poor people in general, and considers them worthless. You can't eliminate poverty by reducing taxes. In fact, social programs are the first ones to be cut under these people. Yes, I am a social liberal, but a fiscal conservative. Walker has the right idea, but he is operating under the old Reagan trickle down economics. While that might have worked 50 years ago, it just doesn't anymore. When corporations get tax breaks, they aren't hiring new employees, they are simply sitting on huge cash reserves. They are doing this because the average working man is losing the ability to purchase. More and more of his income is going to provide the basics, and eliminate purchases that are not needed. This becomes a vicious circle. While I didn't agree with the corporate bailouts, I wonder what would have happened without them.
We have exported our manufacturing jobs, we are no longer the worlds leader in research, and our schools are no longer the best. I don't agree that just throwing money at them makes them better, but we have never listened to the people who work in these fields.
I can promise you that if you eliminate income tax, your state will make up for the shortfall in revenue. You can pay them now, or later, but you will pay them. Just be careful for what you ask for.
Teachable moment.
The south was low-income and low-education long before it went republican. Was it the democrat's fault way back when? No. It's just a cultural thing.
See, to many northerners (mostly the liberal ones), everything is a result of politics. They can't seem to get that not everyone uses politics to change and affect every aspect of life. They have a really hard time understanding that some things transcend politics. I feel sorry for those people who think they have no personal control over their own fate and sit around waiting for some president or congressman to make their lives better. As if that ever really happens anyway.
The hilarious thing is, the south has been gradually becoming more affluent, educated, and solidly middle-class as it has turned republican during the last few decades. Utterly fascinating.
The rust-belt, which has clung longer to democrats who nowadays only seem to pretend to care about the middle class and merely give lip-service to their plight, struggles greatly.
But, are political leanings solely to blame or credit in either scenario? I don't think so.
Making accusations of who Walker loves and hates is pointless and destructive. It's the kind of thing that's terribly wrong with this country. I know I've participated in it, and am trying to back off from the childish silliness the comes from the likes of Obama and Limbaugh.
Whether I agree with him or not doesn't matter, but I do believe that Walker does what he does because he thinks it's the right thing to do to fix the state, not out of spite for anyone. Perhaps he's doing it all wrong. Perhaps none of it is working, at least in the minds of those determined to disagree no matter what.
To say someone hates certain people without personally knowing the accused hater is reckless.
I've said it many times, and I'll say it again: I like Wisconsin and it's weather, but I'm not typical. Want to know why the state struggles to grow and attract and retain business? Sure taxes are absurdly high, but look at the map. Look at who's growing more than others. See a pattern? With few exceptions, most are south of a certain point, or they have lots of big mountains for people to look at.
Air conditioning. Minimal snow. Scenery. Modern folks are a bit spoiled.
Back to the recent fortunes of the south, air conditioning might have had a bigger impact than politics itself. Example cited.
As for why the south still struggles with some stereotypical things, that old culture is still there, but a bit less so than in the past. No political intervention can change that. Same goes for up north, which might be Walker's biggest problem.
Last edited by northbound74; 01-26-2014 at 07:08 AM..
The new mindset of the Republican party is to serve those who are affluent, and forget about the rest. If you wanted to eliminate state income tax, you would HAVE to implement another source of state income. A sales tax is regressive, unless it exempts the necessities that all people must buy regardless of income. That's why many states exempt: food, medicine, utilities, fuel, and other items that everyone must buy. The base amount of money to pay necessities is the same, whether you are "rich" or "poor."
Walker is insanely anti-union. While I agree many unions exist only to make their union leaders rich, but, unions do serve a purpose. Unions help to set a base level of pay that is expected to perform a job. If you hate the minimum wage, then of course you wouldn't like unions. As Walked basically castrated the unions in Wisconsin, you can expect, over the long run, for wages to become stagnated even more than they have been for the last 30 years. I was a government employee in a right to work state. I wished that at times we had been a "closed shop" state. Right to work states have usually been in the south, and if you see the demographics, you see that the south has a much higher percentage of people who live below the poverty line. You see that more people in those states have no health insurance. Generally they have a shorter life span, and a higher infant mortality rate that other states. Walker represents the mindset of the south. He hates the government, he hates people that need assistance, and he hates poor people in general, and considers them worthless. You can't eliminate poverty by reducing taxes. In fact, social programs are the first ones to be cut under these people. Yes, I am a social liberal, but a fiscal conservative. Walker has the right idea, but he is operating under the old Reagan trickle down economics. While that might have worked 50 years ago, it just doesn't anymore. When corporations get tax breaks, they aren't hiring new employees, they are simply sitting on huge cash reserves. They are doing this because the average working man is losing the ability to purchase. More and more of his income is going to provide the basics, and eliminate purchases that are not needed. This becomes a vicious circle. While I didn't agree with the corporate bailouts, I wonder what would have happened without them.
We have exported our manufacturing jobs, we are no longer the worlds leader in research, and our schools are no longer the best. I don't agree that just throwing money at them makes them better, but we have never listened to the people who work in these fields.
I can promise you that if you eliminate income tax, your state will make up for the shortfall in revenue. You can pay them now, or later, but you will pay them. Just be careful for what you ask for.
Excellent and very well thought out post. I agree 100%.
The hilarious thing is, the south has been gradually becoming more affluent, educated, and solidly middle-class as it has turned republican during the last few decades. Utterly fascinating.
.
The South has only become more affluent mainly as a result of attracting TRANSPLANTS from around the country and world to many of the new economy cities that it has. Such examples include: Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Austin, Raleigh/Durham Research Triangle, Charlotte, Northern Virginia, etc. White collar job growth has been greater than the national average, but population growth in these same areas has often outpaced job growth. This is a fact that often goes under the radar. The rural and smaller cities of the South, on the other hand, have severe economic problems- more than just about any other region of the country outside of the reservations, particularly rural Appalachia. You have two different realities of the South. Also, with extreme population growth in the New South regions, cost of living and other taxes will inevitably increase over time as more and more services are demanded, infrastructure improved, schools built, etc. Look at the extreme property taxes in most urban areas of Texas now. Residents are paying 2-3% of their assessed value in taxes, yet people still claim that is super cheap to live there.
The South has only become more affluent mainly as a result of attracting TRANSPLANTS from around the country and world to many of the new economy cities that it has. Such examples include: Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Austin, Raleigh/Durham Research Triangle, Charlotte, Northern Virginia, etc. White collar job growth has been greater than the national average, but population growth in these same areas has often outpaced job growth. This is a fact that often goes under the radar. The rural and smaller cities of the South, on the other hand, have severe economic problems- more than just about any other region of the country outside of the reservations, particularly rural Appalachia. You have two different realities of the South. Also, with extreme population growth in the New South regions, cost of living and other taxes will inevitably increase over time as more and more services are demanded, infrastructure improved, schools built, etc. Look at the extreme property taxes in most urban areas of Texas now. Residents are paying 2-3% of their assessed value in taxes, yet people still claim that is super cheap to live there.
Funny thing is, most of those transplants come from high-tax, liberal-leaning states like Wisconsin, Illinois, California, New York, etc. So the south can't be that bad. Also, southern culture is increasingly embracing the importance of education, so give it time.
Also, that deeply ingrained southern culture that I keep mentioning can't be fixed with the simpleton ideas of unions, high taxes, and Obama-votes. On the same token, Wisconsin WILL NOT be ruined by a term or two of Scott Walker like scare-monger alarmists continually claim. I personally don't think he's terribly detrimental if at all, but if he were, he could never do anything to override Wisconsin's culture anymore than liberal politician "x" can turn around Arkansas. It will never ever be that simple, like so many on here foolishly try to make it sound.
Another thing, intangibles like quality of life perceptions vary greatly from the upper midwest to the south. People up north don't always mind the high taxes because they think the services are worth it. No matter how hard you try, you'll never convince the average southerner of the same thing no matter how much money they make or how good the services rendered by government may seem. There are a LOT of people down south that are content with their quality of life (which is still extremely high on a global scale), and can do little more than scratch their heads (and rightfully so) when clueless people from other parts of the country continually berate everything about the south.
They simply don't put that kind of trust in government nor do they deem many of those more elaborate services necessary. I tend to agree.
Even having grown up down south, I used to have a very negative opinion of it. After living up north, I now realize that no place is perfect or drastically better than another. On the surface, Wisconsin would appear to have a higher standard of living and better quality of life than most any southern state. But that's only on paper. In reality, quality of life depends far more on individual experiences, perceptions, and expectations. Wisconsin, as nice as it is, never felt any better than any other place to me personally when all things are considered. Yes, it is cleaner and generally safer, but oddly enough not any better in spite of those things.
I still like Wisconsin and would recommend it to any hardy soul willing to try to blend in to that quirky culture.
All that being said, this country's big enough for both viewpoints and many in between, so I say let's truly respect diversity and let people govern themselves on the state level (or even more local) however they see fit. The problems only come into play when authoritarian types want to force everyone on the same page. That's a sure-fire way to split this union up because we never have agreed on every single issue and never will. We can only respect each other's opinions and defend the right to differ, from those who want to deny us that freedom.
The new mindset of the Republican party is to serve those who are affluent, and forget about the rest. If you wanted to eliminate state income tax, you would HAVE to implement another source of state income.
Washington state has no income tax and is doing well.
The rural and smaller cities of the South, on the other hand, have severe economic problems- more than just about any other region of the country outside of the reservations, particularly rural Appalachia.
Many rural areas of northern Michigan have severe economic problems. Many who live in this area live off welfare 6 months of the year and tourism dollars the other half the year. Living in a higher-taxed state does not guarantee prosperity.
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