Between last July and July 2016, Virginia’s government will spend $96 billion, yet there are already politicians who are insisting it isn’t enough.
Walter Stosch and Terry McAuliffe are already talking about “eliminating tax relief programs” (Virginian-Pilot), and while much of the focus has been on the car tax (Brian Kirwin and Shaun Kenney eloquently blast the attempts at its repeal), Richmond is clearly looking at anything that gets between them and more revenue.
Of course, the usual combination of Democrats and revenue-addicted Republicans will insist it’s all about “fairness” and “cleaning up the tax code.” I can even predict with confidence that Reagan himself will be unearthed to defend the latest attempt to raise taxes. Never mind that “closing loopholes” as a means of raising both revenue and economic activity at once have failed spectacularly in both the United States and Europe for decades (Greece still has yet to recover – four years later). Never mind that Reagan actually coupled removing tax discrepancies with lowering the income tax rate – thus doubling the length of the 1980s recovery. Never mind that the state budget has more than doubled in just 15 years.
Now, Richmond could follow in Reagan’s footsteps and actually do some good, but his wisdom is lost on the revenue addicts; it’s all Greek to them.
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