{"id":4594,"date":"2012-02-13T13:50:19","date_gmt":"2012-02-13T19:50:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=4594"},"modified":"2012-12-20T10:07:09","modified_gmt":"2012-12-20T16:07:09","slug":"in-the-income-tax-debate-growth-depends-on-how-and-what-you-count","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2012\/02\/13\/in-the-income-tax-debate-growth-depends-on-how-and-what-you-count\/","title":{"rendered":"In the Income Tax Debate, \u2018Growth\u2019 Depends on How and What You Count"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Spencer Platt \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

Hype surrounding no-income tax states like Texas is based upon misleading population data, opponents say.<\/p>\n<\/div>

The Great State Income Tax Debate<\/a> is all about economic growth, and one way to measure a state\u2019s losses and gains is to count jobs, output and people.<\/p>

Many such measurements are tied to population.<\/p>

And some opponents say Gov. Mary Fallin\u2019s income tax phase-out plan<\/a> is based on a \u201chighly misleading analysis\u201d of population data.<\/p>

<\/p>

Gov. Mary Fallin unveiled her income tax phase-out plan during last week\u2019s State of the State address. Her plan is based on<\/a> one proposed by the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs and Arthur Laffer, famed economic adviser to President Ronald Reagan.<\/p>

In a blog post<\/a>, Oklahoma Policy Institute director David Blatt criticizes Laffer\u2019s methodology and cites a report by the Institute for Taxation and Economic Policy, a left-leaning nonprofit think tank based in Washington, D.C.:<\/p>\n

Laffer cherry-picked metrics that are all tied to population growth; 2) population is growing in the South and West, where most of the no-income tax states happen to be, for reasons of climate, demographics, and the housing market, not state tax rates<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Right-click here to download a copy of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy's Feb. 2012 report.<\/p>\n<\/div>

Demand rises with population, and larger populations bring \u201cnatural\u201d increases in economic output and total number of jobs, ITEP argues in its report, \u201cDon\u2019t Be Fooled By Junk Economics.\u201d<\/p>

The Oklahoma Policy Institute leads a coalition<\/a> that’s fighting to keep the state income tax.<\/p>

There are other reasons for population growth says Dick Lavine, a senior fiscal analyst for the Center for Public Policy Priorities, an Austin-based nonpartisan, nonprofit think tanks that focuses on improving the economic and social conditions of low\u2013 and moderate-income Texans..<\/p>

Half of Texas\u2019s recent population growth is \u201cnatural growth,\u201d he told us<\/a>. Basically: a bigger ratio of deaths minus births.<\/p>

There are more accurate ways to measure economic growth, ITEP says: per-capita gross state product, median household income and average unemployment.<\/p>

Blatt blogs:<\/p>\n

On all three measures, most non-income tax states are faring worse than the average state. And on all three measures, Oklahoma is doing better than six of the nine non-income tax states.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Great State Income Tax Debate is all about economic growth, and one way to measure a state\u2019s losses and gains is to count jobs, output and people.Many such measurements are tied to population.And some opponents say Gov. Mary Fallin\u2019s income tax phase-out plan is based on a \u201chighly misleading analysis\u201d of population data.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":4600,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[492,16],"tags":[226,118,53,73,97],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4594"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4594"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4594\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4604,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4594\/revisions\/4604"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}