“Durkan proposed about $20 million in cuts to the Police Department last month, among other changes to Seattle’s 2020 budget that she said would address unexpected city spending related to COVID-19, account for diminished tax revenues during the economic shutdown and combat racial inequity”
What a joke, Seattle just passed a new tax on large Corps and high income individuals that will raise over 200 million PER YEAR. It will be interesting if leftist scumbag Bezos greases up and bends over and pays up or pulls Amazon out out of Scumattle.
More likely the state will offer a bribe...er incentive for companies to offset what the city just did. State taxpayers screwed.
In the northeast we have a situation where broke cities relied on wealth transfers from other areas that are also now broke; something has to be cut, and this reeks of the teachers’ unions trying to get out ahead of it with a preemptive strike. Here in NJ out teachers make huge sums of money for 180 days of part-time work, with no performance metrics or consequences for failure.
“...tax...that will raise over 200 million PER YEAR.”
Estimates of how much revenue will be raised by this or that tax are always wrong. The reason is, they take the existing financial picture and add a percentage to it. THAT is the new estimated income. But that financial picture is predicated on the existing taxes. Studies have shown that when taxes are low people simply pay them. However, when people no longer consider the taxes low they look for ways to avoid the tax. Ordinary wage earners who have their taxes deducted from their paycheck have little choice over whether to pay or to attempt to avoid the tax. High wage earners have more control over what their taxable income looks like. They also have the financial wherewithal to take actions like moving their home or business to a non-taxed location. They have tax accountants and loopholes.
This is one reason why lower taxes often bring in more tax revenue. When taxes fall below the pain threshold people simply pay them rather than go to great lengths to avoid them. This has been proven over and over.
The leaders in Seattle are rapidly turning the place into Detroit.