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Today's column on a swift budget resolution and on-time end to the legislative session

In my column, I speculate that the legislative session will end on time as lawmakers are very close to agreement on the basic contours of the budget. Few legislators want a repeat of last year’s marathon. A special session is unnecessary and unlikely. The side that wants the least typically prevails in these negotiations. By […]

A look at why Texas reinstated R&D tax incentives demonstrates why Washington should not let them expire

Effective January 1, 2014, Texas once again offers tax incentives for research and development. An article in Texas CEO magazine last fall celebrated their return. The R&D tax break is back in Texas. …Before passing this law, Texas was one of only a handful of states that did not offer some sort of research and […]

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray and Rep. Eric Pettigrew make the case for extending R&D tax incentives

Today’s Seattle Times carries a convincing op-ed by Seattle Mayor Ed Murray and state Rep. Eric Pettigrew arguing for an extension of a pair of R&D tax incentives scheduled to expire this year. They point out the significance of the tech sector to our state and the economic contribution of the sector. The tech industry […]

Warren Buffet says $15 minimum wage would hurt jobs, Speaker Chopp says no vote on $12 minimum this year, and more

Warren Buffett weighs in on the federal minimum wage. “If you could have a minimum wage of $15 and it didn’t hurt anything else, I would love it,” he said. “But clearly that isn’t the case.” However, he added, he wouldn’t argue with President Obama’s proposal for a more modest increase, to $10.10 an hour […]

Washington's carbon emissions in 2011 were the lowest since 1987

The U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA) posted new estimates of state carbon emissions from fossil fuel combustion earlier this week. EIA estimates that Washington state sources emitted 69.8 million metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2011. This was 2.5 percent below the 70.5 million tons emitted in 1990 and represented the lowest emissions total since […]

Putting the proposal to tax recycled refinery fuels in context – the exemption makes sense

As we have written, the governor, Senate Democrats and House Democrats have all proposed new or increased taxes (generally characterized as repealing preferences) to fund education. The House and Senate Democratic plans propose …applying the sales tax to bottled water, ending the sales tax exemption for out-of-state residents, taxing recycled fuel (“extracted” or “hog fuel”) […]

Minimum wage, the cost of living and the cost of doing business, even nonprofit businesses

As Mark Perry, AEI scholar and University of Michigan economist, points out, there’s no science to setting a minimum wage. But where does a minimum wage of $10.10 (or $9) per hour come from? Economic theory? Economic reasoning? Economic logic? Regression analysis? No. It comes from….. well it comes from….. OK, to be really honest, […]

Senate Democrats propose $100 million in new taxes for education, teacher COLAs

This morning Democrats in the state Senate laid out a plan to put another $100 million into the state budget for education, including cost-of-living adjustments for teachers. (Here’s the press release.) The new taxes, which they characterize as “closing unproductive loopholes,” are recycled from past efforts to boost revenues: applying the sales tax to bottled […]

Does CBO underestimate job losses caused by minimum wage increase? Former Labor Dept. chief economist thinks so.

People – and by people I mean pundits and economists – can’t seem to quit talking about the CBO minimum wage report. Diana Furchtgott-Roth, former chief economist of the U.S. Department of Labor, has one of the tougher takes on the analysis. In Market Watch, she suggests that CBO seriously underestimates the job losses that […]

Bipartisan supplemental budget proposal from state Senate adds $96 million, no tax hikes

Senate Ways and Means chairman Andy Hill, R-Redmond, just concluded a press conference unveiling his proposed 2014 supplemental operating budget. To underscore the bipartisan nature of the process, he was joined by the Democrats’ lead budget writer Jim Hargrove, D-Hoquiam and other Republicans and Democrats involved in developing the proposal. Although Hill had previously said […]