Today, I want to look back at some of the recent actions taken by our state legislature and how we might be impacted by them.
But first, we observed a local election process last month that all of us can and should be proud of. As Free Press Editor Bryan Hanks observed, “This was an election in which the candidates were running FOR something instead of AGAINST someone.”
Our congratulations go out to all the candidates, and certainly to the victors — Mayor B.J. Murphy, City Councilman Robbie Swinson, and newly-elected Councilman Wynn Whittington, and to the winners of the campaigns for town commissioner in La Grange and Pink Hill.
Congratulations to all those who offered themselves for service to our area.
Now, to the North Carolina Legislature. On Sept. 30, I had N.C. Sen. Brent Jackson, R-Sampson, and N.C. Rep. John Bell, R-Wayne, on my television program. Rep. Bell visited with me again on Nov. 25, and among my guests this week is N.C. Sen. Louis Pate, R-Wayne.
They all expressed pleasure in the direction our state is headed. To put things in better perspective, let’s look back at where we were just four years ago: North Carolina’s unemployment rate was 9.4 percent (fifth highest in the nation), and we were ranked by the non-partisan Tax Foundation as having the seventh worst business climate in the nation.
Our top personal income tax rate was 7.75 percent, the highest in the Southeast and 11th highest nationally and our corporate tax rate of 6.9 percent was the highest in the Southeast.
Now, let’s look at the situation as of today: Our unemployment rate is 8 percent and we have jumped from 44th to 17th most business-friendly state in the nation. Our personal income tax rate will drop to 5.75 percent by 2015, and will be a flat tax. Our corporate tax rate will dip to 6 percent in 2014 and to 5 percent in 2015.
Under present trends, both these taxes could very well be non-existent in just five years.
Elizabeth Malm, an economist with the Tax Foundation, said that North Carolina ranks at the top of the nation in magnitude of tax reforms this year.
Folks, regardless of our political persuasion, I believe we can all feel a sense of optimism about the business-friendly direction in which our state is headed.
In other areas, let’s look at the actions taken on the education front, where the legislature replaced teacher tenure with multi-year contracts, introduced merit pay, assigned schools performance-based letter grades, strengthened charter schools and offered private-school scholarships to as many as 13,000 students with below-average household incomes or special learning needs.
In the transportation area, Gov. Pat McCrory and legislative conservatives rewrote the spending formulas, with the goal of actually making our roads safer and more driver-friendly. They endeavored to set priorities, not on political considerations but on actual transportation needs, concentrating on fixing potholes and strengthening our highway infrastructure.
There were, of course, many other legislative transactions which took place recently, and I will be covering some of them in future columns, but I do want to mention just one more today, and that is the legislature’s move forward to drill for the estimated 42 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in North Carolina. This might well be the biggest economic boost this state has ever seen.
Let’s go for it!
Reece Gardner is the host of “The Reece Gardner Hour,” which airs on TACC-9 on Mondays at
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