A few years ago Oregon raised taxes on businesses and high-income individuals. Tax-hating conservatives screamed warnings about how bad this would be for the state's economy, and how the "job creators" would be moving out.
Not happening. Here's a couple of recent headlines from the Oregonian.
Oregon economy growing at nation's second fastest rate
"Oregon's economic growth outpaced all but one state in 2011, driven largely by double-digit manufacturing gains."
Oregon payrolls continue to grow in May, but monthly figures cloud hiring picture
"Oregon employers added 6,900 jobs last month, according to the state's monthly report. That's equal to 10 percent of all jobs added in the U.S. in May, when hiring nationwide slumped to a pace less than one-third that of the first three months of the year."
“Hmmmm….” you seem to be confused and scratching your head, Brian. Let me make some sense of this for you.
Three paragraphs after your first excerpted headline came this not so minor tidbit: “But take durable-goods manufacturing out of the equation and Oregon's GDP grew just 0.8 percent. And if the past two years are any indication, high-tech players such as Intel likely contributed to almost all of the growth.”
Two paragraphs after your second headline came this hard to miss analysis: “Yet several economists say the state's economy hasn't veered on a separate path than the rest of the nation. Instead, they say, changes in the way jobs are now tracked makes the monthly data especially volatile.”
And what about Intel, the largest contributor and the state’s largest private employer? Are they expanding in spite of the increase in taxes you cite? Hell no, quite the opposite. They are expanding in Hillsboro thanks in large part to a $12.5B 1999 Washington County/State of Oregon tax incentive that was subsequently revised to $25B in 2005. Much to chagrin of Oregon tax hike activists like Chuck Sheketoff who seem to think Intel didn’t have the option to place this activity instead in Silicon Valley, Arizona, New Mexico, Ireland, or Israel.
That’s right – LOWER TAXES created these jobs.
http://www.oregonlive.com/silicon-forest/index.ssf/2011/10/intel_report_pegs_its_oregon_p.html
http://www.bizjournals.com/portland/print-edition/2010/10/22/intel-tax-breaks-critical.html?page=all
Sorry, Brian, but tax hikes on business and high income individuals have no relation to the headlines you cite. And given that no one is crediting entrepreneurs, venture capital and small business for this growth – 6,900 jobs is probably lower than what it would have been without those hikes.
Sincerely,
Big Oil
Posted by: DJ | June 13, 2012 at 07:23 PM