Taxing perceptions

I feel vindicated.

TaxProf Blog has a list ranking state and local tax burdens by state, and guess what? New Jersey just barely made the top 20 percent and is only slightly above national average.

I've long cringed at the incessant
whining about how the exorbitant New Jersey taxes are driving natives to move out of state. And I wonder, how much do these people travel, because when I do, I go through plenty of states with the same or higher sales tax. Tennessee had 7 percent sales tax I-can't-remember-how-long before New Jersey, and its hotel/motel taxes are astronomical. Many states charge sales tax on groceries and toilet paper, too, unlike New Jersey.

Complain as you will about gasoline taxes, but our gas is cheaper than in most states I've been through, too, and I don't have to get out and pump it!

And I've lived in several states, and each has its pros and cons. New Jersey's income tax at my income level isn't meaningfully more than most other states in my own experience, except for Texas, which had no state income tax but also provided relatively little in services and turned a do-nothing Gov. George Bush into a ... well, I'll leave it at that.

It takes more than one squeeze

It looks like Gov. Corzine was successful squeezing civil service unions to help patch the state deficit. Actually, the concessions seem reasonable: raise minimum retirement age to 60 for new workers, start making state workers contribute to their health insurance and pay more toward their own pensions.

But at the same time as reading this news, I was reading statistics showing New Jersey is last in the nation -- 50th -- in the return on our federal tax investment. We pay $1.79 to the federal government for every $1 worth of services here. That means we subsidize services in states such as the Carolinas and Georgia, where New Jerseyans are moving in droves in disgust of New Jersey politicians. But, it's too easy just to blame the politicians and say "throw the bums out." It doesn't solve the federal tax disparity, and we're right back to another election and "throw the bums out."

One of Corzine's selling points during the campaign for governor was that as a then-U.S. senator he might be in a better position than the others in both primary fields to find ways to get more value from our federal taxes. It has been a year and I'm growing impatient.

One place might be trying to get more federal dollars for the Abbott school districts. The belts have busted for state and local taxpayers subsidizing these bottomless pits. Poverty anywhere is a national problem for everyone, because poverty breeds crime and hides "terrorists" of all colors, religions and nationalities.

So, I'd like to ask Corzine's administration -- especially now with Dem majorities in the House and ever-so-slightly in the Senate -- when can we expect some federal rescue here to keep our best and brightest from fleeing for greener pastures in the states our tax dollars are subsidizing?