When will death-spiral states start imposing taxes on fleeing citizens?
Government debts are accrued on your behalf by elected officials for whom you had a chance to vote, all supposedly representing your interests. In a democracy, all citizens are obliged to pay the government’s bills as determined by the duly empowered taxing authorities – regardless of whether they voted for a particular officeholder or not. What’s to stop legislators from passing laws that make debt obligations due and payable by any citizen who decides to leave for another jurisdiction? After all, they don’t hesitate to take your money when you die.
Mayors and governors of most tax-and-spend, heavily unionized, low-growth cities and states are both desperate for revenue and tired of watching disgruntled citizens vote with their feet. Think how politically attractive it would be for them to make “economic deserters” pay their “fair share” of old debts. I can see the arguments already: “You can’t move away from credit card debt or commercial debt, so why should government debt be so easy to dodge?” Politicians could easily win kudos from both public employee unions and the overtaxed residents left behind, for the mere cost of enraging emigrants who won’t be around to exact retribution at the next election.
Blowback
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Well, I’m sure not counting on the courts stopping it.
forest on December 19, 2012 at 7:18 PM
That was a really funny read. Some politician is certainly reading that and thinking: “this can work”.
cozmo on December 19, 2012 at 7:21 PM
How long before they start building walls like the commies did?
Mark1971 on December 19, 2012 at 7:21 PM
“Ayn Rand, please pick up the white courtesy phone. Ms. Rand, the white phone please.”
Lost in Jersey on December 19, 2012 at 7:22 PM
Start by imposing “Cost of Living Adjustments” on retired state employees taking their pensions to states with lower taxes.
malclave on December 19, 2012 at 7:23 PM
just starve and imprison them you godless stalinists.
tom daschle concerned on December 19, 2012 at 7:24 PM
Sad thing is, regardless the cost, it would ultimately be cheaper to pay the “deserters” tax and leave than to remain in a liberal cesspool like California.
Lost in Jersey on December 19, 2012 at 7:26 PM
It’s really simple why this shouldn’t be done: It’s unconstitutional.
NotCoach on December 19, 2012 at 7:26 PM
The stupidity of it.
NeoKong on December 19, 2012 at 7:29 PM
Neither of these things is stopping insurance mandates or death panels.
forest on December 19, 2012 at 7:32 PM
I am not too sure about your statement. The courts will have to rule on this one if it occurs.
SC.Charlie on December 19, 2012 at 7:33 PM
Since when does that make any difference?
JPeterman on December 19, 2012 at 7:35 PM
The precedent is the freedom of movement we all have which has been ruled on by SCOTUS in the past. The states cannot restrict our freedom to move about the country. A leaving the state tax would be such a restriction.
NotCoach on December 19, 2012 at 7:36 PM
A tax might be a burden on freedom of movement, but would SCOTUS actually call it a restriction? What about the Commerce Clause? Couldn’t a tax on somebody moving out-of-state be an illegal state regulation of interstate commerce?
Mark1971 on December 19, 2012 at 7:42 PM
FIFY.
There has NEVER been a Socialist country that needed to build a fence on its border to keep illegal immigrants from entering and, ultimately, the American Left’s “My Progressive Little Ponyland” will not be the first.
Res ipsa loquitur.
Resist We Much on December 19, 2012 at 7:45 PM
They’d call it a tax. States and municipalities can do that.
Not that any of these arguments will matter if any of the Republican appointees leaves the court. Then it’ll really be rubber stamp time if it’s not already.
forest on December 19, 2012 at 7:46 PM
That sounds good too. Taxing people for leaving a state flies in the face of constitutional jurisprudence even more than a mandate does. And a leaving the state tax is already a tax, so Roberts won’t have a mentally challenged out.
NotCoach on December 19, 2012 at 7:49 PM
Doing something like this violates the very essence of federalism.
Defenestratus on December 19, 2012 at 8:02 PM
California actually comes very close. When you file a nonresident partial-year return, you must pay tax on all your California income, but you only get a fraction of your deductions based on the ratio of California income to total income. So if you own a house and move out-of-state mid-year and start a new job with the same pay while renting in Texas, you only get half your mortgage deduction.
cthulhu on December 19, 2012 at 8:09 PM
When my mom moved out of NY State she was told by the State that she would have to pay taxes to them… for my father’s pension which was:
1) Not held in NY,
2) Not being paid through any part of NY,
3) Not being received in NY.
She had to write them and inform them that they couldn’t tax something that wasn’t associated with their State any longer. They finally did stop trying to tax money that wasn’t within their reach, but it didn’t stop them from trying in the first place.
ajacksonian on December 19, 2012 at 8:10 PM
Maybe they should just build walls round their states. Not let anyone leave, you know, like the other communists did over in Berlin.
JellyToast on December 19, 2012 at 8:29 PM
California is actually worse than this. In the desperate search for revenue they are assessing imputed taxes on undeclared incomes based on the industry average income of former residents.
Put more simply – if you leave the state but retain property there, you will of course have to pay property taxes on that property. BUT, you may well be hit with a state income tax assessment based in part on what you declared as instate income combined (using voodoo) with market data.
If you do not nip this imputed taxes in the bud, it can easily be removed from your bank account. And it is.
Then you and your accountant and tax lawyer get to go dancing with the CA government.
CorporatePiggy on December 19, 2012 at 8:31 PM
A tax on leaving would almost certainly be unconstitutional, but they might try charging a fled resident on an annual basis for his share of the debt that ‘he’ contracted for while he was a resident. So long as the amount was the same as that paid for debt service by a current resident of similar income, there wouldn’t be an equal protection problem.
PersonFromPorlock on December 19, 2012 at 8:34 PM
The Commies only ever built a wall in one part of one city. There are more effective ways to keep people in than literally walling off your entire national borders.
MelonCollie on December 19, 2012 at 8:45 PM
EXACTLY.
It doesn’t & it hasn’t.
The Federal Govt has been doing just about anything it wants & to hell with the Constitution.
See OBAMA.
Badger40 on December 19, 2012 at 8:53 PM
This would be fascist states like California or Illinois attempting to charge exit fees, not the federal government.
NotCoach on December 19, 2012 at 9:02 PM
Haven’t read Shapiro v. Thompson in an eternity, but it might have something to do with it. It was the opposite situation — states trying to keep migrant welfare seekers out.
Attila (Pillage Idiot) on December 19, 2012 at 9:11 PM
I’m not stupid.I understand that.
The Feds are a heartbeat away from this, I am sure.
Badger40 on December 19, 2012 at 9:52 PM