Justice for Seniors

Posted on by Maurice Harris

In a Daily Dunklin Democrat article (via Combest), seniors cheer the Senior Tax Justice Act, recently signed into law by Gov. Matt Blunt. This legislation removes Missouri from the list of states that taxed non-private retirement benefits. A senior named Betty Bradley comments:

"The state taxes were just eating us alive," she said. "We are really
thankful for what the state has done regarding this matter."

This act will help to keep people in Missouri, now that their retirement funds are exempt from taxation. It’s a great first step to protect workers’ retirement funds from being raided for government coffers. A good next step would be to save other citizens’ retirement funds from taxation as well — for instance, the state taxes my father’s pension check every month.

Hopefully, this is the first step of many in protecting older Missourians from the grabbing hands of government.

Waiting for Their Handout

Posted on by Maurice Harris

David Nicklaus reports in the St. Louis Post Dispatch the angst that some companies have about setting up shop in Missouri after Matt Blunt vetoed HB 327:

A lot of jobs are at stake — (Steve) Johnson says a couple of prospects are in
the 1,000-employee range — and Missouri isn’t exactly putting its best
foot forward. "If they called and said we have to make the final choice
tomorrow, then we’re in trouble," Johnson said. "They will not decide
on something based on uncertainty."

Businesses like Advantage Capital are now said to be looking in other places, like Mississippi, because Missouri does not have any incentives in place to match federal tax credits and other credits for businesses to move here. Now, of course, I do not like to see jobs redirected elsewhere, but rather than reauthorizing tax credits every two years there should be a push for broad-based reform that will attract all kinds of businesses. Maybe that should be the major discussion in the next session, rather than picking tax credit recipients.

Sen. Matt Bartle – A Legislator With Common Sense

Posted on by Maurice Harris

In the Springfield News-Leader today, Sen. Matt Bartle discusses in an op-ed piece the veto of HB 327 (aka The Quality Jobs Act). He mentions the effects of tax credits on the legislative process in Jefferson City:

Time and again the lobbyists for special interest groups tell the
legislature that if only their particular industry could be granted an
exemption from state taxes that it would be a great boon to Missouri’s
public coffers — a few dollars investment up front and there will be
light at the end of the economic tunnel. This sales pitch is repeated
so often that it is almost a cliché in Jefferson City.

It has become such a cliché that there are now over $500 million worth of tax credits in the Missouri statutes. If HB 327 had been signed into law, it would have added an extra $100 million in tax credits. This bill would have been akin to spending like a drunken sailor, for all the increased marginal tax rates that other taxpayers would have had to cover in the name of economic development. True economic development, as I, and many others, have stated in the past, is about having lower taxes and fewer regulations. Sen. Bartle also says it well:

Are you the recipient of a Missouri tax credit? If not, you are
actually paying for someone else’s tax credit. Wouldn’t it be better to
reduce the number of tax credits so we could lower everyone’s taxes?
Tax credits have the state picking winners and losers in the
marketplace — something government is ill-equipped to do.

The U.S Postal Service is Privatizing

Posted on by Maurice Harris

An article in the Kansas City Star today discusses the move by the U.S Postal Service to privatize some of it’s mail routes in the KC area:

They are contract mail carriers, a phenomenon that is starting to take
root in the Kansas City area. It has union members and politicians
squawking, but Postal Service accountants are smiling.

Because of rising costs and lower revenues at the U.S. Postal Service, the move toward private mail carriers is a great way to reduce costs, especially for a government-run service that hasn’t produced a profit in the past few years. Yet, as always, unions and politicians see a problem in saving taxpayers some money:

Sen. Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat, has introduced a bill to stop
contracting mail carriers except in the most sparsely populated rural
areas. Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat, is a co-sponsor.

The primary complaint that the politicians and unions have made is that mail carriers handle sensitive documents that should only be delivered by postal employees. Well, last time I checked, many delivery services other than the USPS handle sensitive documents, and they deliver them to their destinations on time. It’s not like the USPS delivers classified documents from CIA headquarters to the White House.

Overall, what the USPS is doing is the first smart move in ages that will facilitate cutting costs and saveing money for millions of Americans. Maybe, for once, I will receive the mail I really need on time — if it ever gets to St. Louis.

Veto, Don’t Fail Me Now

Posted on by Eric D. Dixon

There were plenty of good reasons for Gov. Blunt to veto HB 327, as he did on Friday. As Show-Me Institute scholars Joe Haslag and Mike Podgursky, and intern Steve Bernstetter, wrote in their June 14 op-ed critizing the bill:

Government economic planners do not know what the next “big idea” will be, and any effort to find that idea through central intervention is likely to fail. The best way for Missouri to ensure future economic prosperity is to provide businesses with a climate favorable to developing those ideas, whatever they may be. State officials should step back from the belief that they can fix weak economic growth through central planning. Creating another layer of bureaucracy, no matter how well-intentioned, will only obstruct those developments and, like kudzu to southeast horticulture, choke off Missouri’s economic growth.

It’s also worth noting that the governor’s office issued a press release quoting several prominent Missouri residents’ opinions about the veto. One of the quotes is from Show-Me Institute President Rex Sinquefield:

“House Bill 327 gets in the way of keeping Missouri on a pro-growth path.”
Rex Sinquefield
President, Show-Me Institute

Gov. Blunt has said that he wants to call a special session for legislators “to pass a more restrained bill,” but picking economic favorites even on a smaller scale would be a mistake. If the Legislature wants to make a real stand in favor of economic growth, it would do well to heed the advice of Show-Me Institute scholars:

A better economic development bill would reduce these corporate giveaways, simplify the tax system, and reduce marginal tax rates. Missouri households and businesses can create their own “quality jobs” without the help of state government.

Stuff Happens; Fix It and Move On …

Posted on by David Stokes

The Post-Dispatch is reporting that Metro is facing repair issues with the original leg of the MetroLink system because of the use of lower quality material in constructing the first line:

"And the hand-me-down rail has worn down on curves."

It was probably thought to be a smart decision to buy used rail in order to save money at the time and, you know what, it was a good decision. Too often, people without any institutional memory find it easy to criticize, but I’d bet the use of more affordable ties was a selling point back in the debate and construction period of the first line. Governments have to live within budgets, at least in theory, and if everything they built had to be done perfectly nothing would ever get done.

Metro, or Bi-State as it was known at the time, clearly cut some corners on cost, not safety, in order to bring the project in on budget. Once you promise the public something will be done within a budget, and then the public passes a tax increase to pay for it, it is important to do all you can to stay to that budget. I look forward to Metro making the necessary fixes to the system, and I see nothing wrong with the decisions made long ago, as reported in this article. 

It’s True, Ethanol Is Exaggerated

Posted on by Maurice Harris

A letter to the editor in the Jefferson City News-Tribune discusses corn ethanol, pointing out that it’s not a cure-all for our energy problems, because the United States can’t produce enough of it to match our current oil usage:

Therefore, all our corn equals about 34 billion gallons (gasoline
equivalent) of the 150 billion gallons we consume each year.

Also, there’s the fact that we use corn for other uses besides fuel. The letter continues:

But, if we convert all our corn
to fuel what happens to the poultry and livestock industries that
require the carbohydrate removed from corn when it’s converted to
ethanol?

In the rush to make ethanol the solution to our energy problems, with all the subsidies and tax breaks that includes, many officials are ignoring the market system that would determine the true value of ethanol. If ethanol is actually a cost-effective replacement for oil, there would be little need for subsidies to produce it.

Blunt Vetoes Quality Jobs Act

Posted on by Maurice Harris

On KY3’s Political Notebook blog, a post discusses Gov. Matt Blunt vetoing the Quality Jobs Act. The main reason for this is that the bill became overbloated with excess spending through tax credits:

The vetoed bill would have spent an estimated $200 million in excess of
Quality Jobs reauthorization, and there were unknown expenses
associated with the legislation that could cost Missourians even more, according to a release from the Governor’s office.

The extra tax credits included the “eminent domain train,” tax breaks for “phantom flights” to Europe and
a provision that would harm many existing Missouri employers by putting
them at a competitive disadvantage, as Show-Me Institute scholars have pointed out. It’s great that the governor sees the harm that some tax credits can do to the economy and the state treasury, but in hopes of calling a special session to slim down the bill, he still misses the point. Lowering taxes across the board and instituting more responsible tax policy is what wlil spur strong economic growth across the board.

English MacGuffins

Posted on by Eric D. Dixon

In an op-ed released yesterday (also reprinted by the Missouri Political News Service and quoted by the Post-Dispatch‘s Political Fix blog), Sarah Brodsky argued that the proposed English-language amendment to Missouri’s constitution is unnecessary:

Although official state business is not always understandable to ordinary Missourians, the reason probably has more to do with bureaucratic rules and jargon than with any language barrier. Nevertheless, the possibility that official state business will someday be conducted in a foreign language concerns legislators so much that they’re trying to prevent it. In November 2008, Missouri voters will decide whether to tack an English-language amendment onto the state Constitution.

The proposed amendment is a bad idea. We needn’t work to prevent this hypothetical problem, which will almost certainly never materialize on its own. Missourians will continue to speak English long into the future, both in official business and in their daily lives.

It’s possible to make a case for official English legislation that would persuade many lovers of free markets and liberty, simply on fiscal grounds; eliminating some forms of multilingual paperwork and bureaucracy can definitely save a few taxpayer dollars here and there. But that argument is essentially about administrative policy, and doesn’t rise to the level of constitutional importance.

Other arguments for official English have more to do with government using language to promote a more cohesive culture — which I find entirely unpersuasive. This legislation is about the use of language in official government business, and has nothing to do with the many languages people use in their homes and private lives. Culture isn’t a real issue here.

Language legislation isn’t something the Show-Me Institute would normally cover as a matter of course, although Sarah has blogged about it a few times. She comes down on the side of eliminating regulation when it’s unnecessary and overreaching, and while she applies it here to an issue that doesn’t fit neatly into any of our policy areas, it does fit with our general approach of advocating less bureaucratic regulation where possible.

Ultimately, a think tank like this one has no official opinions outside of the research and conclusions of its scholars — and Sarah has made a good case for hers.

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