Kicker Shock
Oregon has a very interesting provision in its constitution, a “kicker law.†What is it? Well, it has nothing to do with football.
Or soccer. Or the mistreatment of dogs. It has to do with giving money back to taxpayers.
When revenues exceed economist-predicted amounts — amounts which determine the size of each year’s mandated balanced budget — by 2 percent or more, the extra funds are to be returned to the taxpayers.
I think the “kicker†part is that a refund “kicks in†automatically.
I could be wrong. I have set my researchers on the origin of the term. It could be that the law really kicks politicians in the pants if their economists don’t do a good job of predicting a year’s revenue.
Like any good kick in the pants, one hears a lot of howls.
Basically, a whole lot of people in Salem, the capital, believe the money shouldn’t be given back. Why, the government taxed it fair and square.
The fact that bigger taxpayers get back bigger refunds bothers some people a lot, too. Steve Buckstein — of Oregon’s innovative Cascade Policy Institute — recently defended Oregon’s taxpayers’ and their refund against the claims of, well, envy.
“Envy is a powerful emotion,†he wrote, “but it should not trump reason. If we can find a better way to restrain runaway government spending, we should do so. But until that day arrives, the kicker law,†Buckstein says, retains enough kick to keep politicians in line.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
