Does that include income tax collected from nonresidents, too (Washington residents who work in Oregon)?

Good to know! Politicians, however, always want more!

You know that income tax rate would reallly drop if we would just let them have a teeny-weeny sales tax.

Then we'd be just like Cali, erm, oh, they're ahead of us?

All I know is that the first full year of residence in Nevada, we saved about $14K in taxes that we are not sending to the Oregon Department of Revenue. And I'm unaware of any government "services" we are missing - except streetcars and light rail.

But by living in Nevada you are no doubt missing out on the hordes of useless social and behavioral planners designing a "smarter" lifestyle for you.

And how much of that is going to keep the prison-industrial-complex going?

And how much of that is going to finance an unmanageable pension program?

Tax revenues are down for something like 35-straight months and unlikely to pick up any time soon.

At some point, we have to jettison the big rocks from the hot air balloon or the whole thing is going to take out an apartment bunker or two.

One more reason to move to Montana.

It would be interesting to see those figures normalized for cost of living (or maybe it is)

The most recent data says we're still #4, but we pay an average of $1,420 per person. That's a lot less than #3 Mass. and a little more than #5 Minn. (Calif. is now #6)

Adjusting for cost of living moves Oregon down one spot, from 4th highest to 5th highest per capita individual income taxes in the U.S.

If there was a sales tax of 5% then each person would have to spend an average of 26K on taxable items to realize the same revenue. Just saying....

http://www.cascadepolicy.org/pdf/fiscal/2008_23.pdf

"Adjusting for the appropriate demographic differences now finds that Oregon ranks 7th in total overspending compared to other states. Our state and local governments spend approximately 10.6 percent more than would be expected for a state with Oregon’s demographics. This overspending equaled more than $2.7 billion in the 2004-2005 fiscal year."

Alaska and Montana- selling their bodies for $$ (oil and coal/mining).

Oregon decided it didn't want to do anymore of that in the 80s and our budgets have been hurting ever since.

Delaware - home to the most citizens, *cough cough* I mean corporations, in the US.

New Hampshire- tiny state, many programs funded locally through some of the highest property taxes in the country.

Sales/consumption taxes disproportionally hurt the lower income rungs. Personally, I think income taxes are the "fairest" form of state taxation but unfortunately all states are in a race to the bottom for the lowest taxes/highest deficits and having neighbors like no income tax Washington aren't doing us any favors.

I should also add that having such a large part of our state owned by the Fed doesn't help with the budget either. Lots of land but it's not bringing in the income that it would if private (like much of the east coast). Is it worth having higher income taxes to have access to vast publicly owned beaches, forests, and mountains? Guess it is a question of values/priorities.

Interesting. I'd be more interested in the total tax burden, state by state.