Retailers Note "Unintended Consequences" of Targeted Tax Hikes

The Puget Sound Business Journal reports that retail leaders believe the governor's tax proposals will raise the cost of groceries and put jobs at risk.

The mix of taxes will have a disproportionately high impact on small retailers like 7-Eleven stores that sell all of the items on Gregoire’s tax list, said Jan Teague, president and CEO of the Washington Retail Association.

“I don’t think that — when she put the budget together— she thought about the unintended consequences of hitting a retail segment like that,” said Teague.

The story quotes Tim Martin, head of Harbor Pacific Bottling Co. on the impact of a penny-an-ounce tax on bottled water.

“That’s a 102 percent increase in price for bottled water,” said Martin. “If we can’t pass this tax on to consumers, we’ll go broke immediately.”

But even if the company can pass costs along their taxes, “the volume (sold) is going to decline dramatically,” Martin said, and less volume sold will mean less jobs.

“I could see easily 10 employees, up to 15 of our 40, having to be laid off. We’re talking good, family wage jobs — some union, some not.”

Whatever legislators do in the next few weeks, there will be consequences, intended or unintended. Let them know that you expect them to adopt a budget that will help employers put people back to work.