BCT Editorial – 8/8/07

This page was last updated on August 28, 2007.

Tax haven; Editorial; Beaver County Times; August 8, 2007.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“Pennsylvania is a good place to retire.

“That might seem odd because so many retirees move to Florida or other supposedly low-tax Sun Belt states to get away from the Land of Taxes.

“But a recent article on Forbes.com named the commonwealth one of the ‘Seven Best (Unknown) Retirement Tax Havens.’ In addition to Pennsylvania, the other states were Michigan, Georgia, Mississippi, Illinois, Kentucky and South Carolina.

“The main reasons Pennsylvania made the list were because it does not tax Social Security or pensions. The third reason cited by Forbes.com was that each individual taxpayer can deduct $12,000 per child a year in contributions to any state’s 529 college saving plan.

“The article stressed that with ‘a little research you might discover your own retirement tax haven is close to home.’ That’s why retirees and future retirees need to look at the entire tax picture - 401(k)s, Social Security, private pensions, IRAs, public pensions, property taxes, estate taxes and other income breaks - before deciding on where they want to live.

“Advertisements that ran in The Washington Post a few years ago reflected what Forbes.com reported. The ads promoted a retirement community near Gettysburg, and the fact that Pennsylvania did not tax pensions and Social Security was a major part of the sales pitch.

“Of course, taxes alone do not a retirement haven make. We can’t uninvent air conditioning, which makes Sun Belt states like Florida, South Carolina and Mississippi inhabitable year round.

“But can we at least stop laying all the state’s slow-growth woes at the feet of taxes? (See the following editorial.) Given the right circumstances, Pennsylvania is still a good state in which to live, whether you work or are retired.”

[RWC] In case you haven’t been keeping count, we’ve had three editorials in two days tell us our taxes aren’t bad and that we’re selfish for not wanting our taxes raised. These are only the latest exercises. My records indicate a series of editorials expressing similar sentiment going back at least 17 months to editorials entitled “No excuses” and “Ohio envy.”