My summer has been incredibly busy. As I was slogging through the chores, personal and professional, last month, I swore I was going to pretend I was European — or a member of the U.S. Congress — and take August off.
Unfortunately, that’s not happening. But you can put away your tiny violins playing the world’s smallest sad song for me.
Judging from a recent Forbes story, I might be better off, at least financially, just staying home.
The magazine reports that state and local governments across the country are getting more aggressive about taxing tourists.
Some examples cited by writer Janet Novack:
- Alaska’s new $50 per person “head tax” on cruise ship passengers.
- A new permit fee on tour buses, up to a maximum of $2,200 per bus per year,
entering the Nation’s Capital, which no doubt will be passed along to passengers riding into D.C. - Ever-rising taxes on rental cars, both at airports and off-site rental facilities, across the U.S.
What’s driving these tourist taxes? Tax-cut promises that state lawmakers made to permanent residents.
According to the Forbes’ article, a recent survey by the National Governors Association and National
Association of State Budget Officers found that for fiscal 2008, governors had proposed a net total of $3 billion in personal
income tax cuts.
To cover those reductions, the states show a net increase of $1.2 billion in tobacco
and alcohol taxes and a net increase of $2.1 billion in miscellaneous
taxes and fees.
And visitors to the states are just part of that miscellaneous money.
