I wasn’t just dreaming. Consistent with things his administration made when it rolled out the silly “We’re Not Mars” campaign, Governor Dennis Daugaard told the Pierre Chamber of Commerce last Thursday that the best way to recruit young people to the state is to talk quality of life, not low taxes:
Responding to a question on attracting workers to the state, the governor said his office has embarked on a marketing campaign aimed at potential employees living in surrounding states.
This ad campaign isn’t focused on tax advantages or the low cost of living in the state — as these aren’t the things young people are interested in. Instead, the campaign has a different focus.
“Are there entertainment venues? Are there bike trails? So we’re pitching quality of life. We’re going to do that for a number of years,” he said. “That is our best shot at trying to attract people successfully to South Dakota to get them to fill jobs here” [Lee Zion, “Governor Discusses Employment, Economic Development,” Pierre Capital Journal, 2016.02.23].
Rep. Thomas Brunner (R-29/Nisland) warned on the House floor yesterday that increasing our state sales tax to fund competitive teacher pay (see House Bill 1182) will drive more young people away from the state, as they’ll feel taxes are too high and decide to go elsewhere. If they’re looking for lower sales tax, they’ll have thirteen places to choose from, including Washington, D.C. (so that’s why Kristi Noem keeps running!). But Governor Daugaard recognizes that young people aren’t looking to dodge taxes (that’s the billionaire retiree trust-funders and RVers!); they’re looking for good places to live, places that adequately fund their public goods and services.
If anything, attentive young people may get annoyed with our increasingly regressive tax structure (the fourth worst in the nation, and possibly climbing up in the ranks once we add the Governor’s half-percentage point for teacher pay). But rather than being driven away by bad tax policy, perhaps those young people will love entertainment and bike trails and better-funded schools so much that they;’ll stick around, translate their Bernie Sanders political engagement into state-level political action, and make tax reform the central issue of the 2017 Legislature.
THis is from your link Cory:
“Daugaard said the fund does not have a dedicated funding source, but is funded whenever the state has a budget surplus. He added that the state has had a budget surplus every year that he has been governor.”
So much for the argument that there is not enough money in the existing budget to fund teacher pay. Daugaard is a flaming tax and spend liberal hypocrite. And it is the same chamber of commerce that is promoting the sales tax increase on the working poor in order to fund their tax breaks. But don’t tell everyone else the truth, the crony capitalists want to make money building fine art centers, aquatic centers, and other entertainment venues…all in the name of “quality of life”.
South Dakota doesn’t need young people to stay in the state but it does need white retirees from somewhere else to lord over documented workers willing to toil in the frozen tundra for less than subsistence wages.
The only young people actually moving into South Dakota are the teenage girls being imported as wives for the FLDS, the Hutterites and as sex slaves to bikers.
That’s a little too harsh larry. There are a few young people who move here from Haywarden, Iowa and Steen, Minnesota every now and then.
You have to forgive Rep. Brunner. He lives in the middle of nowhere and homeschools his kids. He doesn’t get enough contact with non-family young people to understand what motivates them. How many young people actually say to themselves, “I gotta move to Wyoming because my Mt. Dew just went up a penny.”?
Nutball Schoenbeck has been driven from the legislature. Who is Gov. Daugaard’s appointee to replace his catholic assets?
While low total taxation is a factually accurate representation of SD, the whole low cost of living thing is a myth. 3rd quarter ranking of SD cost of living puts us right in the middle of the nation as a whole.
PP will rent an apartment in Watertown when he’s appointed to Schoenbeck’s seat, Larry.
I’d say paying 6% more on food is more detrimental to attracting residents then .5% to fund education. But then then legislators are a whole lot smarter than the people that vote them in. Proven each election cycle.
Mr. Brunner must not get out much. Minnesota, the land of tax and spend liberals is kicking our behind in economic development and education funding and performance and in quality of life for young people. Yet, Minnesota has a (gasp) income tax and generally higher levels of total taxation. Minnesota seems to be prospering while SD, with the exception of Sioux Falls and possibly I-29 corridor, seems to be barely moving forward. Mr. Brunner seems to have no idea what young people look for in a state to live in.
Washington. D.C. may have a lower tax rate but it costs a helluva lot to live their.
Mr. Brunner needs to get out more.
True that, Roger! D.C.’s cost-of-living index in 2015 (annual average!) was 146.8, higher than every place else but Hawaii. In our neighborhood:
Montana: 102.7.
South Dakota: 102.5.
Minnesota: 101.5.
North Dakota: 101.2.
Wyoming: 92.8.
Nebraska: 92.3.
Iowa: 92.0.
Sibby, as usual, you’re wrong. Get your head out of your slogans and quantify:
First, Daugaardonomics is leading us toward annual deficits. You’re trying to appropriate surpluses (surpli!) that will not exist. You’ll need Medicaid expansion to run a surplus in FY2018.
Second, even if past surpli guaranteed future performance (tut, tut), they are inadeqaute to solving the problem. We are fighting to get $80M to raise average teacher pay about $8,500, which still leaves us at the bottom of the regional salaries. One could argue the Governor’s plan is not bold enough, but at least the teachers who are left after the small schools shed 630 teachers will be close enough to North Dakota to longer be laughed at. We’ll also rank 37th in the nation.
South Dakota’s FY2015 surplus was $21.5 million. Over the past four years, the average surplus (and boy, do they fluctuate, making this an even worse basis for stable and competitive teacher pay) was $23.3 million. The proportionate $2,500 per teacher we get from that amount (and I’m rounding up) leaves us over $6,000 behind North Dakota. We move up to 50th, just past Mississippi.
Go ahead, show me other money if it’s there. I even wrote last July that I was fine with dividing up the surplus among teachers as a bonus check. But you’re showing me a quarter that you used to have when we need a buck right now.
I don’t think the increase in sales tax would be in the top 10 reasons young people are being driven out of South Dakota.