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One would love to report that Democrats in the state of Washington have finally learned their lesson from enacting destructive tax hikes on work, savings and investment. But the lesson they seem to be drawing is that the Evergreen State can have a poor tax climate—just as long as it’s not the poorest. Call it a race (almost) to the bottom on economic competitiveness. By one measure Washington pols already hit rock bottom before finally realizing it’s not a race that anyone should want to win. Jim Brunner reports for the Seattle Times: Democrats in the state Legislature have generally dismissed warnings that new taxes on the very wealthy might lead multimillionaires to flee to lower-tax states. But some are now acknowledging that one tax-the-rich policy they approved last year — a big increase in Washington’s top estate tax rates — may have backfired. Lawmakers are moving quietly to roll back the changes, which boosted the tax rate on the wealthiest estates to 35%, by far the highest in the country.
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