Time for the public employee unions to lead the way on tax breaks.

.
Public unions seem to have this bizarre idea that they should not suffer like the rest of us.  They seem to be demanding more of our money from a shrinking pool of cash available.

Unions generally and public unions specifically have missed a golden opportunity.  They've missed the chance to show they recognize the problems confronting us, and to take actions commensurate with those conditions.  They could have been heroic, instead of selfish, self-centered, spoiled punks.

The left has been babbling about tax breaks.  But they've stunningly and surprisingly overlooked their own multi-million dollar tax break in the form of exemption from our state's B&O tax.

*I* have to pay it.  Even the daily paper has to pay it, because the deal they cut with the democrats, a deal I and hundreds of thousands are paying for, didn't entirely exempt them from a B&O tax, it just reduced it in the face of our increases, increases caused in part because of the fiscal hole left with the newspaper deal.

But according to the Freedom Foundation, unions pay no business and occupation tax at all.  And further, that exemption costs the taxpayers of this state millions.

Odd, isn't it?

They're so concerned about "loop holes" and "transparency."  But these same unions seem to have no difficulty enjoying those same loop holes while providing an opaque curtain of "transparency," not unlike the rest of the democrats in the House over the Jim Jacks situation.

Right. Shared sacrifice is only a good idea when others are forced to do the sacrificing.

Here it is. Give it a look:


May 18, 2011

ShareThis

---

Union Tax Break Hypocrisy Continues to Unravel 

Labor unions have led the fight to close tax “loopholes” this legislative session in lieu of budget cuts, but their framing of the issue has a few loopholes of its own. On May 11th the Freedom Foundation sent out a press release exposing the fact that unions themselves are the primary beneficiaries of select tax breaks.

Labor unions—which have been fighting so hard to paint beneficiaries of tax exemptions as greedy fat cats who enjoy watching small children starve—have conveniently failed to mention their special tax treatment in the myriad press releases, statements and public testimony on the state budget. We at the Freedom Foundation are not the only ones sitting up and taking notice of the issue. Following our release, Washington State Wire’s Erik Smith wrote an excellent, in-depth, story covering the murky issue of union tax breaks. Smith expands on the matter, revealing union tax breaks well in excess of many enjoyed by the labor-maligned business community:

Federal stats say Washington’s unionized workers earn an average of $1,068 a week. Union dues typically run one to two percent of gross income. If you figure it at 1.5 percent, that means Washington-state unions collect $503 million a year in dues.

So at the current services B&O rate of 1.8 percent, the tax break is worth $9 million annually. It might be off a million or so either way, but that’s about as close as anyone can come.

More:

.