12:00 am
July 7, 2015
- The Department of Revenue has a list of the tax changes that went into effect July 1 (the first day of fiscal year 2016).
- Those tax changes include the extension of sales and use tax exemptions for data centers. Data centers have a significant economic impact on communities in eastern Washington, and the exemptions matter to companies deciding where to site their data centers, as Data Center Knowledge notes.
- The Tax Foundation writes about the new revenues included in the 2015-17 operating budget. The blog post opens optimistically: “With the clock ticking, Governor Jay Inslee (D) called the Washington State Legislature into its third and final special session on June 28th to determine the budget for the next biennium.” (Emphasis added.) Let’s hope it’s the final special session, but it isn’t over yet.
- Further to my post yesterday on the drought and beer prices — and specifically to the point that ingredient costs are only one factor in pricing — the Wall Street Journal reports that Starbucks is “raising prices slightly on some of its beverages to cover rising costs including wages and rent, even as prices for raw coffee have been falling.” Also, “Some other retailers have started raising prices in cities that have passed wage increases. “
- Finally, Puerto Rico’s economy is in bad shape, and the Wall Street Journal has an interesting story on some of the factors involved: “The commonwealth is subject to the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, even though local income and productivity are significantly lower than in Mississippi, the poorest American state. . . . At the same time, economists say other local labor laws, including more generous overtime pay and vacation rules, plus laws that make it harder to fire workers, have made employers reluctant to hire.”