Taxation without respiration

Oklahoma House Speaker Todd Hiett has pointed out, reasonably enough, that "Oklahoma has an outdated tax system that prevents us from being competitive."

Okay, fine. I can go along with that. And it might be easier to swallow were it not for Hiett's tendency to harp on the same things over and over and over again.

House Bill 3125, which got out of committee this week, is Hiett's latest shot against the state estate tax; should the bill pass in its present form, the tax would be eliminated entirely.

Now I'm not one to scoff at a tax cut, even one which won't affect me in the least — the existing estate tax has a $1 million exemption, which exceeds the amount of my estate by, um, rather a lot — but this quote from Hiett bugs me slightly:

It is an article of faith among Oklahoma Republicans that every business between here and International Falls is champing at the bit to relocate at the drop of a tax provision, and we're missing out because we don't [fill in item from GOP agenda]. Once in a great while this might even be true, but mostly it's bluster. Remember when right-to-work was supposed to break down the walls? Do you know of any jobs that were created thereby?

Neither does Todd Hiett. But you have to admit, he does a good job of sticking to the script. And while there's nothing in the world wrong with attracting "capital, wealth and industry," I fear you'll wait a long time for House Republicans to come up with any ideas to build some of it here instead of trying to import it from somewhere else. No wonder this state seems to have an inferiority complex.