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Millionaires Go Missing To Flee High Maryland Income
Taxes
Maryland's fleeced taxpayers fight back.
The Wall Street
Journal,
May 27, 2009. Here's a two-minute drill in soak-the-rich economics:
Maryland
couldn't balance its budget last year, so the state tried to close the
shortfall by fleecing the wealthy. Politicians in Annapolis created a
millionaire tax bracket, raising the top marginal income-tax rate to
6.25%. And because cities such as Baltimore and Bethesda also impose
income taxes, the state-local tax rate can go as high as 9.45%. Governor
Martin O'Malley, a dedicated class warrior, declared that these richest
0.3% of filers were "willing and able to pay their fair share." The
Baltimore Sun predicted the rich would "grin and bear it."
One year
later, nobody's grinning. One-third of the millionaires have disappeared
from Maryland tax rolls. In 2008 roughly 3,000 million-dollar income tax
returns were filed by the end of April. This year there were 2,000, which
the state comptroller's office concedes is a "substantial decline." On
those missing returns, the government collects 6.25% of nothing. Instead
of the state coffers gaining the extra $106 million the politicians
predicted, millionaires paid $100 million less
in taxes than they did last year -- even at higher rates.
No doubt the
majority of that loss in millionaire filings results from the recession.
However, this is one reason that depending on the rich to finance
government is so ill-advised: Progressive tax rates create mountains of
cash during good times that vanish during recessions. For evidence,
consult California, New York and New Jersey.
The Maryland
state revenue office says it's "way too early" to tell how many
millionaires moved out of the state when the tax rates rose. But no one
disputes that some rich filers did leave. It's easier than the
redistributionists think. Christopher Summers, president of the Maryland
Public Policy Institute, notes: "Marylanders with high incomes typically
own second homes in tax friendlier states like Florida, Delaware, South
Carolina and Virginia. So it's easy for them to change their residency."
All of this
means that the burden of paying for bloated government in Annapolis will
fall on the middle class. Thanks to the futility of soaking the rich,
these working families will now pay Mr. O'Malley's "fair share."
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