Study finds Nevadans face second-lowest tax burden in nation

By David McGrath Schwartz

Thursday, July 1, 2010 | 2 a.m.

If you, Nevada, feel overtaxed, just imagine how the rest of the country feels.

Nevada’s state and local tax burden ranks 50th out of 51, according to one study that includes Washington, D.C. A family of three living in Las Vegas with a $75,000 annual income had the 47th lowest tax burden compared with a similar family in each state’s largest city, another study found. More, we reportedly have near-bottom levels of taxpayer funding for welfare, education and parks.

Yet the political and policy debate in Nevada is all about who can most convincingly promise not to raise taxes. Both candidates for governor say they can improve education by better spending existing revenue (we supposedly rank 49th nationally on spending per pupil). All but a few liberal legislators deny that they will consider raising taxes to close the state’s $3 billion budget deficit.

U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle tapped into the anti-government, anti-tax anger among the electorate to win the Republican nomination to challenge Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

“I would argue that Nevada is No. 1 in anti-tax, anti-government sentiment,” state historian Guy Rocha said. “It drives the political agenda.”

Nevada always has had a libertarian-leaning, conservative reputation. With the size of the federal debt and bailouts, combined with Nevada’s highest-in-the-country unemployment, anger at state and federal government is peaking, according to many political observers.

Rocha blames the political unrest on transplants to the state, upset with the government spending in the states they moved from, such as California or New York. They come to Nevada and assume state spending is similarly out of control and demand taxes not be increased. Or else their children are already educated, and they don’t want to pay for it again, he said.

“They’re taking out their frustration on Nevada,” said Rocha, the longtime state archivist.

A comparison of the 50 states released this week by the Taxpayers Network, a nonpartisan Wisconsin-based group that compiled reports from different organizations, portrays a state that is miserly when it comes to most public spending.

The Taxpayers Network said our welfare spending ranks 50th. We have the fourth fewest state employees. We rank 40th on parks and natural resources. And from 1998 through 2007, state spending per capita was among the slowest to grow.

Republican legislators such as state Senate Minority Leader Bill Raggio of Reno declare that we have one of the leanest state governments in the country. But he’s still met by accusations that he’s a Republican in name only.

He said voters are the angriest he’s ever seen.

“People keep on being fed misinformation,” he said. “I don’t think they understand the true situation of what the tax burden is in Nevada.”

The Taxpayers Network highlighted some anomalies:

• We spend the fourth and fifth most on police and fire services, based on census figures.

• The average Nevada public schoolteacher was 22nd highest paid, according to the National Education Association, the national teachers union.

Not all agree that Nevada is a near tax paradise.

Conservatives point to another study by the Tax Foundation in 2008 that showed per capita, our state revenue is 22nd. Similarly, before the 2009 session, conservatives alluded to studies that showed Nevada’s per-pupil education funding was about average when capital costs for things such as new schools are included.

Geoffrey Lawrence, a fiscal policy analyst with the libertarian think tank Nevada Policy Research Institute, said the growth in state spending from 1998 through 2007 was higher than the Taxpayers Network calculated. When using figures from the state on population size and spending instead of census data, Lawrence said per capita spending increased 13.8 percent over the 10 years, instead of a 6.8 percent increase.

Carole Vilardo, president of the conservative Nevada Taxpayers Association, also warned against using the statistics.

“Depending on what taxes are included, how you calculate it, I could make us a high-tax or a low-tax state,” Vilardo said.

David Steffen, director of external affairs for the Taxpayers Network, said his organization is nonpartisan and without an agenda to increase or decrease taxes.

“We think there’s a lack of objective information provided to decision-makers or opinion leaders. We provide data. That’s it,” he said. “We let other individuals, experts, individual parties interpret (them) and spin (them). These ranks are very objective and quantifiable.”

With the state facing a $3 billion deficit, how spendthrift or efficient Nevada’s government is will be a key in the debate. Although gubernatorial candidates Republican Brian Sandoval and Democrat Rory Reid are loath to suggest taxes, a tax proposal is likely to come from the Legislature.

“We’re going to have a $3 billion shortfall in the existing budget, which has been cut pretty drastically,” Raggio said. “The level of funding we provide for what we call essential services, I don’t think it’s exorbitant. It’s pretty reasonable.”

But what qualifies as “reasonable” is always a matter of debate.