Author: Steve Haner
-
VA Employers Stuck in COVID Time Warp
By Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. Despite the stunning and rapid success of the vaccines in arresting the spread of COVID-19, if you enter a Virginia workplace you go back in time to the pre-vaccine era of doubt and fear. Virginia acted in haste in adopting…
-
Clean Virginia Dissed Again, Dem Takes Dom Cash
by Steve Haner Prince William Democrat Hala Ayala, who had pledged not to accept campaign contributions from Dominion Energy Virginia and took money instead from its opponents, has now accepted $100,000 from the regulated monopoly. Heads are exploding. The anti-Dominion activist group Clean Virginia had given her $25,000 in her bid for the Democratic nomination…
-
Democrats Fight Back as Boss Bills Cracks Whip
by Steve Haner Two Virginia Democrats who have been loyal soldiers in the army to turn Virginia green as well as blue are under attack in the June 8 primary for the sin of accepting campaign donations from Dominion Energy. It doesn’t matter to the attacker – our old friend Clean Virginia — that Dominion…
-
Protect Taxpaying Virginians From Coming Inflation
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. One of big financial winners with the May 1 Virginia minimum wage increase is the state itself, because the entire raise is subject to a 5% state income tax. With its low standard deduction and personal exemption amounts, Virginia squeezes…
-
Tech Prof Corrected WHO, CDC on COVID Spread
by Steve Haner Wired has chronicled a one-year struggle by a Virginia Tech teacher and researcher, working mainly with other non-physicians, to convince the Centers for Disease Control and World Health Organization they were dead wrong on COVID. The kind of dead wrong that made more people dead. The battle was quietly won when on…
-
State Tax Harvest Under Northam Expands Again
by Steve Haner With the release today of the April 2021 Virginia state revenue report, a correction in an earlier post becomes necessary. Overall general fund state tax collections are not up 26% so far compared to four years ago, they are up almost 30 percent. Corporate income tax collections are not up 68%, but…
-
Seven GOP House Primaries on June 8
by Steve Haner Virginia Republicans in seven of the 100 House of Delegate districts still have House nominees to pick in the June 8 primary. The focus on last Saturday’s unassembled convention for statewide candidates has overshadowed these races. They will also be overshadowed by the Democratic nomination contests on the same date. But some…
-
TCI Debate Rages in Comments on Proposed Rule
by Steve Haner The political wannabes in both parties and the state’s media are continuing to ignore it, but the argument over the proposed motor fuel carbon tax called the Transportation and Climate Initiative rages in comments on the proposal flowing into its advocates. The Thomas Jefferson Institute has also launched a short video (above),…
-
Virginia Taxes New Firms Higher, NC the Opposite
by Steve Haner Virginia is far more tax friendly to established businesses than it is to new ones. That’s one major conclusion of a major state-by-state business tax comparison released today (here) by the Tax Foundation and KPMG LLC. In neighboring North Carolina, on the other hand, the tax structure encourages new investment with…
-
End the Emergency Orders. Now. Every One.
by Steve Haner There is no more COVID emergency. Every single emergency order issued by Virginia’s Governor Ralph Northam should be lifted immediately. Not relaxed or revised, ended. For the millions of Virginians now vaccinated, this is all just virtue signaling, “pandemic theater.” For the millions of Virginians who have made conscious decisions not to…
-
Corporate Tax Already Exploding in Virginia
by Steve Haner First published this morning in The Roanoke Times. With Virginia’s fiscal year now three-quarters complete, and basically one year since the depths of the COVID-19 recession, state tax revenues are soaring. Despite reports that the boom results from the economic rebound, it remains clear that changes in tax policy under Governor Ralph…
-
Cox First to Appeal for Second Choice Votes
by Steve Haner Former House Speaker Kirk Cox is the first of the GOP candidates for Governor to take the expected step of asking explicitly for second choice votes. “Delegates, the Republican convention is fast approaching,” he says in new video message. “The Republican nomination for Governor has been spirited. Look, I understand I might…
-
GOP and Virginia Election Laws, Part II
by Steve Haner With the 2021 General Assembly receding in the rear view mirror, the voting rules for this year’s Virginia elections are set. Republicans who are whining that the deck has been stacked against them are making a mistake. Every change the Democrats see as a benefit to them is of equal benefit to…
-
GOP and Virginia Election Laws, Part I
by Steve Haner Let us elevate a discussion from the comment string to the main page: Having examined Richard Hall-Sizemore’s offered examples of Virginia Republicans seeking to discourage voting in Virginia, I reject his assertion (part of a coordinated national campaign) that those bills “would result in fewer people voting.” The broadest Republican bill he…
-
TCI Model Rule Ready for Study, Comment
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. (Happy birthday, Mr. President.) Read the governing document for the Transportation and Climate Initiative and it becomes clear there is more going on than just an effort to reduce motor fuel use with a combination of taxes and shrinking caps. That…