RealClearPolitics editor Steven Malanga has an article yesterday noting the revenue declines in states that have gone after the rich with higher taxes as a way to stabilize budgets, rather than cutting spending. And it’s not going so well for states, as New York Governor Patterson notes:
Speaking to reporters recently in Albany, Paterson noted that revenue from tax increases was running 20 percent below projections and that, in particular, the wealthy were not paying up. So far, the state had only collected about half of an expected $1 billion in income tax revenues from the state’s wealthiest residents. “You heard the mantra, ‘Tax the rich, tax the rich,”‘ Paterson said. “We’ve done that. We’ve probably lost jobs and driven people out of the state.”
Read Malanga’s whole piece here.