The Right Tax Cuts

IN the wake of the Jarvis-Gann upheaval last year in California, efforts to limit state and local spending surfaced in numerous jurisdictions around the nation.

Among the best-conceived of these proposals—and one of the more notable successes—was the so-called “Headlee amendment” adopted in the state of Michigan. This approach was especially significant because it focused, not on a specific tax, but on the aggregate burden imposed by state and local government, and it limited this total to roughly 9.5 per cent of personal income. This aggregate limitation is the key provision, since it prevents off-loading the spending burdens from local to state government (or the reverse), or cutting back on taxes of one sort to jack up taxes of another.

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M. Stanton Evans

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IN the wake of the Jarvis-Gann upheaval last year in California, efforts to limit state and local spending surfaced in numerous jurisdictions around the nation.

Among the best-conceived of these proposals—and one of the more notable successes—was the so-called “Headlee amendment” adopted in the state of Michigan. This approach was especially significant because it focused, not on a specific tax, but on the aggregate burden imposed by state and local government, and it limited this total to roughly 9.5 per cent of personal income. This aggregate limitation is the key provision, since it prevents off-loading the spending burdens from local to state government (or the reverse), or cutting back on taxes of one sort to jack up taxes of another.