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That claim ignores economic research and real-life scenarios of states punishing investment and success. High taxes on businesses and top earners drive capital out, slow growth, and shrink employment opportunity. Massachusetts’ “millionaires surtax” was followed by roughly $4.2 billion in net outflows in 2023. New York officials have admitted similar policies helped push more than $14 billion in income out of their state. Washington is not exempt from economic gravity.

Washington used to compete. That was part of its advantage. As recently as 2014, the state ranked among the top 10 for tax competitiveness. Now it has fallen to 45th. That is not an accident. It is the direct result of policy choices that make Washington less attractive to employers, investors, and job creators, while states like Texas, Florida, and Tennessee gain ground. The next Amazon or Starbucks will not call Washington home, and established companies are already leaving.

The deficit was created in Olympia, not D.C. Just last biennium, state spending jumped 15.8% while revenues grew 3.8%. The shortfall was visible before the budget ink was dry and before any federal bills had passed. When legislators returned in 2026, they faced a self-created $4.3 billion deficit, of which roughly $330 million (7.7%) was attributable to federal decisions.

The numbers do not support the scare campaign. In key cost-driving areas (such as K-12 education, low-income health care, and corrections) caseloads have generally declined since COVID and are projected to keep falling. This is not a crisis of demand. It is a crisis of spending discipline.

The tax relief is tiny. For most families, the targeted exemptions amount to roughly $50 to $200 per year. Lawmakers rejected broader relief that could have saved about $400 per person, even while pushing a tax package expected to raise billions. This was never about meaningful relief. It was about creating a new stream of revenue for a government.

Today’s promise is tomorrow’s loophole. The tax applies broadly to Washington taxable income and depends on a $1 million deduction that lawmakers can change at any time without voter approval. Olympia Democrats refused to constitutionally protect that threshold. That tells you everything you need to know. They want the power to come back for more when revenues cannot keep up with their structural spending problems.

That talking point depends on incomplete analysis. It leaves out how transfers and public benefits reduce tax burdens for lower-income households. When Medicaid, subsidized child care, and tax credits are included, more comprehensive research places Washington much closer to the middle. The irony is hard to miss: the same majority pushing this tax rejected amendments that would have used this revenue to reduce taxes for those who need it most.

This is completely backwards. Broad-based sales taxes are among the most stable revenue sources. Income and capital gains taxes are among the most volatile. Shifting core government funding onto a narrower, more fluctuation-prone base is not reform. It is fiscal recklessness. Proponents also ignored research showing Washington had one of the most reliable tax structures in the nation over the past five years. Since passage of the income tax Moody’s has already downgraded Washington’s fiscal outlook from stable to negative citing, in part, the uncertainty surrounding the income tax.

The opposite is true. In 14 of the past 20 years, state revenues grew faster than GDP , often by wide margins. Since 2015, revenue growth has also outpaced median household income by roughly two to one. The real story is not that government is starving. It is that government is growing faster than the people paying for it.

The math simply does not support this argument. The current budget relies on billions in one-time resources, including the rainy-day fund, pension funds, dedicated accounts, and CCA funds, while projecting a return to multi-billion-dollar deficit in 2027-29. That is before accounting for another $3-$4 billion in anticipated collective bargaining agreements in 2027. This tax will not finance some promised future of expanded essential services. It will be used to backfill overspending and prop up a structurally unstable budget.