Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback thinks he has figured out a way to prop up dying towns: No income taxes!
Brownback wants to give people who move into shrinking counties a five-year exemption from state income taxes. Sounds great. One problem, though. There are no jobs in these places to produce the income from which taxes are withheld.
An Associated Press story points out the folly of Brownback's idea. The AP interviewed the mayor of Freeport (population: five) who grumbled that the only thing left in his town "is the government that runs it." And there was this from Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, a Topeka Democrat:
Moving back to a community where there basically are no jobs? I don't know how you are going to make a living and enjoy the benefit of that income tax exemption.Alas, the governor seems to be operating on the idea that income taxes are what's keeping Fall River from becoming Fort Lauderdale. He says he's "convinced" that Kansas is losing residents to states that have no income taxes, although, as the AP points out, he doesn't have the data to prove it.
To be sure, professional golfers and boy-band impresarios are attracted to Florida because the state doesn't tax the money they earn. But Brownback is trying to entice 25-year-old KU grads to a place where the career opportunities end at school principal and the wind smells like a corporate-owned slaughterhouse. Wish him luck.
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Alaska
Florida
Nevada
South Dakota
Texas
Washington
Wyoming ...have NO income tax at all. If you want Kansas to prosper, end yours! :)
Apparently, people with money make all their decisions based on whether they will pay tax, and they assume that everybody else makes their decisions the same way.
Incentives to downtown Wichita and KCK...now that's an intriguing idea. Especially KCK, where it could potentially influence someone to choose the Kansas side over Missouri.
I grew up near a small kansas town which had it's schools close (and consolidate with 4 other towns). Agriculture sustained the population once upon a time, but today, agriculture requires orders of magnitude less labor than it used to.
If Brownback knew what he was doing, he'd go double-or-nothing: investing in downtown KCK and downtown Wichita. Small towns are not the future; they have been declining for 100 years (except for a couple of years during the great depression). There is little that can be done to reverse such a trend.
Claiming that young people move out of rural Kansas because of income tax is silly. They leave because other places have (in alphabetical order):
1) Cities
2) Culture
3) Jobs
Tax cuts are the answer to everything. EVERYTHING! FOREVAAAAARRRR!
But seriously - communities have set aside free land all over the place in Kansas, and no one wants that either. It's hard to build a house when you don't have an income.
I get it. I've driven through countless towns in Kansas that are on life support, and it's kind of heartbreaking. The kids are bussed 20 miles away each day to the school in the county seat (where the government is the only employer), then they leave town the second they graduate. The towns are less than a generation from disappearing completely, and no realistic tax incentive is big enough to get someone to move there.
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