“Tax-Cutter” Pawlenty Raised Taxes for 90% of Minnesotans

The Cons tried to deny it, but to no avail — Tim Pawlenty raised taxes for nine out of ten Minnesotans:

Between 2002, the year before Pawlenty took office, and 2008, the wealthiest Minnesotans – the top 10 percent – saw their effective state and local sales tax rate decline slightly. Meanwhile, lower earners generally saw their rates increase slightly.

And Pawlenty’s policies played a role in that shift. For example, he supported cuts to Local Government Aid, which prompted some local governments to raise property taxes for many Minnesotans. That increase largely hit middle-and-lower income earners, according to the Minnesota Department of Revenue. A new cigarette fee backed by Pawlenty also changed effective tax rates.

But something else happened during Pawlenty’s time in office: The richest Minnesotans got richer, in part due to unusually high capital gains income. So, while taxes may have increased for everyone in the state, in terms of percent of income, those changes were less dramatic for the state’s wealthiest.

The rich got richer, the rest of us got shafted, and Pawlenty never did actually “fix” the deficit he’d played a key role in creating back when he ran the Minnesota House in the late 1990s. Funny how that works.