When people live at the margins, even a small increase in taxes – like Maine’s across-the-board one percent payroll tax increase – can be devastating. Today, two-thirds of our states have what economists call “regressive” taxes, that is, they “tax poorer households at higher rates than richer ones.” Some years, it gets worse. For Maine, which is dominated by Democrat taxes, this is one.
Nationally, “Illinois is the most regressive state, given its flat income tax and steep property taxes.” Generally, states with income taxes have higher “overall tax rates,” while “states that rely on sales and property taxes tend to be more regressive.”
But sometimes you get the worst of both worlds, and Maine symbolizes that. They have high-income taxes and high sales and property taxes. Since they are regressive, taxing the hits the poor harder, this often hurts homeowners – whose valuations are driven up by out-of-state buying – and renters, since landlords pass taxes to renters.
While any Democrat state proves the point, Maine is a good example. Robin Hood took from the rich and gave to the poor. Maine’s Democrats take from the poor—to cover a budget twice what it was eight years ago and a $450 million deficit—to subsidize the rich with wind and solar energy.
Maine’s Democrat Governor, Janet Mills, has been notorious lately, first pushing the legislature to wild spending and taxes, then telling President Trump that she will pervert Title IX, hurting Maine girls, even it if costs the state federal money.
Seriously, Governor Mills and the state’s Democrats – like Democrats in several other states – must think we are stupid, or not paying attention. To be specific on taxes, her budget jumped from $6.8 billion to $11.7 billion – after spending $15 billion in federal pandemic money.
She is $118 million in hock, $450 million over the next two years, and wants crazy new taxes. On top of illegal alien housing – at the expense of veterans and huge consulting contacts, she funds floating wind towers (one billion dollars), solar fields made in China, a 103 percent increase in state “administrative services,” 59 percent more for “environmental protection,” 16 percent uptick for an “attorney general” who allows organized crime to ravage Maine while suing oil companies.
If this sounds comic, it is actually tragic. Democrats are pushing a 105 percent increase for “indigent legal services,” 26 percent more for a “human rights commission” that refuses to honor Title 9, a 60 percent increase for Indian tribes, and 11 percent more for Maine’s “Board of Education, even as Maine’s public schools – once the tops – plummet to 50 of 50.
Could it get any worse? Yes. Democrats’ three largest cuts? Maine’s public employees’ retirement fund by 57 percent, Fire Protection Commission by 99 percent, and “efficiency trust Maine” by 100 percent.
What can one say? A gut punch to Mainers, it gets worse. Democrats hope to pass – Republicans in the minority – huge tax increases to cover their largess. They will tax Netflix and Disney, cans of paint, fishing and hunting licenses, and prescription drugs, and add a 50 percent tax increase on cigarettes, with 65 percent of those paying it earning less than $25,000.
That is the definition of regressive taxes, a reverse Robinhood, hurting the poor to benefit Chinese solar companies, building floating wind monsters, file lawsuits that deprive girls of rights. Democrat Governor Mills robs the poor to finance the rich, like other blue states. Time to stop it.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC. Robert Charles has also just released an uplifting new book, “Cherish America: Stories of Courage, Character, and Kindness” (Tower Publishing, 2024).
