For all the tax scolds…

[wakeflood]

How many times have I read on this blog (both in the forum and in the main section) from posters complaining about Metro, or street repair, or services of any kind in this city? 462,439 is an approximate number.

Well, you get what you pay for. And you’re paying some of the lowest tax rates in the country. Right in the mix with Birmingham, AL!

Of course, the lower income you make, the harder hit you are – but hey, if you’re doing OK for income, you’re doing REALLY ok for tax burden. (Progressive city = progressive taxation = not so much)

SO…next time you’re about to get all fired up and post something about how you don’t get value for your taxes and you pay too much, yada, yada, save us all the bother of rolling our eyes at your lack of understanding of the situation and keep your ignorant grumpass comments to yourself.

Thank you.

From article:

“Like many of the other cities with low taxes, Seattle is located in a state with no income tax. Microsoft founder Bill Gates, a Washington resident, has in the past supported an income tax on the wealthiest residents in the state. While Washington lacks an income tax, its 6.5% state sales tax rate was among the highest in the U.S. in 2012. On top of the state sales tax, Seattle taxpayers paid an additional 3% in local sales taxes for a total of 9.5%, the second highest rate of any city reviewed. Despite this, Seattle families faced lower sales tax burdens than residents in many other cities, possibly due to the exemptions made for sales tax on food, medication, and other goods.”

Read more: Cities with Highest (and Lowest) Taxes – 24/7 Wall St. http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/02/14/cities-paying-the-most-and-least-in-taxes/#ixzz2tcTxPU1O

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[skeeter]

I’m one of the guys who has complained about street conditions. As WF’s article points out, we pay less taxes so we should understand that we’re going to get less service. Okay.

But lets look deeper. People in Bellevue, Kent, Redmond, Renton, Spokane, and Puyallup pay about the same amount of taxes as we do here in Seattle. The sales tax is about the same. The property tax is about the same. The real estate excise tax is about the same. Yet their streets are in much, much better condition. Which makes me think that Seattle is either inefficient in spending our tax dollars, or Seattle has different priorities with how our tax dollars should be spent.

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[wakeflood]

OK, Skeets, show me some empirical data regarding relative street condition. Is that anecdotal? It could be the case, or maybe it’s not as different as it seems? I can think of possible reasons, if it is the case. Things like age of roads, total amount of mileage – or even geologic factors: Large chunks of Seattle are on fill or close to sea level or both and suffer from underlayment degradation and high water freeze/thaw cycles. Big parts of Kent, Renton, Bellevue, Renton and Spokane are on higher elevations.

Your thought regarding priority is certainly one possible reason. Maybe it is priority spending?

Ever called in a pothole repair to the hotline? Wonder what their average response time is???

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[skeeter]

Pothole response time is pretty quick. One or two days. My wife and I have called in a lot of potholes.

The challenge is the pothole repairs have a limited life. A big rain combined with heavy traffic will tear those pothole repairs apart.

I don’t really have empirical data but I’ve got a decent amount of experience. Just drive around any of those towns I mentioned then drive around Seattle.

I asked Tom Rasmussen (chair of transportation committee) why other cities in the region had roads in better condition. He said he didn’t really have an answer but he did acknowledge Seattle has a 20+ year backlog of street maintenance.

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[wakeflood]

It wouldn’t bother me if they added a per unit infrastructure surcharge to every permit issued in this city for new construction.

Put it straight into SDOT backlog…

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[Smitty]

Does this analysis include gas and liquor taxes? Those two impact me greatly! :~0 Plus my excise tax when I sold my house was pretty darn high, iirc. Not sure it’s a fair representation to pick and choose what taxes to include in this analysis. Heck, even our high B&O can get indirectly passed down…..

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[metrognome]

simply looking at taxes paid is irrelevant; you have to look at how much citizens in a jurisdiction pay in local, state and federal taxes vs the amount said jurisdiction receives back from the taxing authorities. Very illuminating article; the data is 5 years old but I doubt it has changed much:

‘… King County, with roughly 29 percent of the state population, produced 42 percent of state tax revenues, yet it received back less than 26 percent of state benefits. That’s a return of only 62 cents on the dollar for our state’s Democratic stronghold.

‘Compare that to the generous $3.16 return on each dollar enjoyed by taxpayers in hard Republican Ferry County in deep northeastern Washington. All in all, only six counties qualified as “net donors” to the rest of the state—San Juan, King, Skagit, Kittitas, Whatcom, and Snohomish—while the remaining 33 counties enjoyed an average return on investment of over $1.40 on every tax dollar sent to Olympia.’

http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/welfare-state/Content?oid=6686284

I also disagree with the sweeping statement about road conditions; among other things, Seattle roads on average are considerably older than roads in the other cities. I grew up (ok, I guess it would be more accurate to say I spent my formative years) in Spokane; arterial road conditions there aren’t great, esp. after a bad winter.

And, sales taxes vary considerably by county as do other voter or locally approved taxes; .076 is the lowest and .095 the highest:

http://dor.wa.gov/content/FindTaxesAndRates/ (select ‘tax rate charts’)

For those of you who are truly bored …

http://dor.wa.gov/content/AboutUs/StatisticsAndReports/Default.aspx

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[mark47n]

As to Seattle; Mayor Nickels was known for deferring road maintenance and diverting those funds to pet projects. Admittedly, I don’t recall the source for this, but it’s not my steamy imagination. Steam….

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[skeeter]

I don’t think the analysis includes things like real estate excise tax that we pay here in Washington. So it is (to a certain extent at least) an apples to oranges comparison. Good point Smitty.

I wasn’t aware Washington even had a real estate excise tax until I sold my condo. Ouch, that was a bite.

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[wakeflood]

Not sure if it caught real estate excise taxes under either property or sales tax. One might assume that it didn’t unless it took some hypothetical average home sale value and amortized it across some period. Likely? Maybe not. Home sales are infrequent things. The report I referenced quoted as follows:

…”The report, released by the Office of Revenue Analysis of the government of the District of Columbia, reviewed the estimated property, sales, auto and income taxes…”

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