EDITORIAL: Blue state formula: High taxes, crummy services

A WalletHub study released this week found that heavily Democratic states impose property taxes that are almost 20 percent higher than those levied in redder enclaves. New Jersey and Illinois lead the pack with the highest real estate taxes, WalletHub reported. Connecticut and New York are also near the top.

Defenders of a muscle-bound public sector defend high taxes on the grounds that they allow the government to provide premium “services” that are unavailable in more laissez-faire climes. But many former residents of deep blue states have voted with their feet and are fleeing to jurisdictions that don’t constantly raid their wallets. Illinois is a fiscal basket case and has lost population consistently in recent years; New York has a $2.3 billion budget hole thanks to the Trump tax reform that capped the federal deduction for state and local taxes. Even California has seen an out- migration — its population is currently sustained only by new births and an influx of illegal aliens.

Nor is there any indication that these high-tax, regulatory havens actually deliver when it comes to better “services” for their residents.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed last week, Steven Malanga, a senior editor of City Journal, noted that, “People in states with high taxes are more likely to say they are eager to move elsewhere, and polls show residents increasingly questioning whether they are getting value for government ‘investment.’” Mr. Malanga highlights evidence that they are not.

For instance, he emphasizes the correlation between high-tax states and bad roads, airports and bridges. In a recent CNBC survey, he writes, “seven high-tax states were among those lowest ranked in infrastructure quality.” In addition, almost all of the lowest-ranked airports in the country in a recent JD Power survey serve heavily Democratic states.

The explanation for this is clear. All that tax money does more to pad the paychecks of government workers than to provide services for those footing the bill. “As state and local budgets have fattened,” he reports, “public employees have captured a growing share of rising revenue.”

Mr. Malanga acknowledges that many of these progressive jurisdictions spend more on public education and have consistently higher-performing students and better test scores. “But even as these states educate young people,” he observes, “they’re losing them.”

All of this is particularly relevant to Nevada, where Democrats enjoy ironclad control of the Legislature and the Governor’s Mansion for the first time in decades. Higher property taxes, a more burdensome administrative state and collective bargaining for state workers are high on their agenda. Are they paying any attention to what’s happening in other states that have followed similar paths? Do they even care?