A serious crime in the Biden Administration is the sale of incandescent light bulbs, the sale of which is now illegal.

The Biden administration has enacted a regulation that places retailer or online seller offering incandescent light bulbs for sale subject to severe punishment under the full enforcement of the federal government.

The crackdown on Thomas Edison’s familiar light bulb has been in the works for a long time. It started with provisions tucked into the big 2007 energy bill signed into law by then-President George Bush. These provisions created energy efficiency standards for residential lighting that incandescent bulbs would have great difficulty achieving.  The regulations were designed to get progressively more stringent in the ensuing years.

At the time, many environmental activists and some advantage-seeking light bulb manufacturers were aggressively pushing compact fluorescent lamps (CFL) as the green alternative. But those twisty CFL bulbs, with their high price and harsh glare, proved very unpopular with consumers – a backlash not unlike the one seen early this year after a Biden administration official suggested banning gas stoves.  Nonetheless the Obama administration Department of Energy (DOE), in its waning days in January 2017, finalized rules accelerating the demise of incandescent bulbs.

By Manish Bhatt, Tax Foundation

(Editor’s Note: The Tax Foundation recently published a report on Montana’s new tax changes, explaining them and evaluating their potential effectiveness.)

Montana is renowned for its vast natural beauty and outdoor recreation, but the state also boasts a competitive tax climate, ranking fifth in our 2023 State Business Tax Climate Index. Like many other states, its coffers are overflowing, and lawmakers have rightly prioritized tax reform to share the strong revenue position with those calling the Treasure State home. Legislators should build on these efforts and provide sustainable and sound property tax relief.

Short- and Long-Term Tax Reforms

In 2023, Montanans will be eligible for tax refunds and rebates on income and property taxes.  Generally, one-time, or short-term, tax relief options are not efficient or effective and can exacerbate the negative effects of inflation. However, these measures were paired with long-term, pro-growth tax reforms that could boost the competitiveness of the state overall.

Montana’s seven individual income tax brackets will be consolidated into two in 2024. Previously, the top rate was set to drop to 6.5 percent (down from 6.75 percent), but Senate Bill 121 will reduce it further to 5.9 percent. The bill also raises the state Earned Income Tax Credit to 10 percent of the federal credit. House Bill 221 creates two rates (depending on income and filing status) for taxing capital gains—4.1 percent and 3.0 percent—replacing a 30 percent net long-term capital gains deduction set to take effect in 2024.

Businesses in Montana will benefit from House Bill 212, which raises the business property tax exemption from $300,000 to $1,000,000; this will eliminate 78 percent of current taxpayers from the rolls at a cost of a mere $9 million a year, absorbed by the state. Additionally, Senate Bill 124 revises corporate income tax apportionment from three-factor (double-weighted sales factor) to single sales factor beginning in 2025.

Principled Property Tax Relief Is Needed

Overall, these reforms are commendable and other states should follow the example Montana has set. However, like elsewhere in the Mountain West, Montana property owners are facing rising property values and, in turn, are saddled with greater property tax burdens. Property tax collections don’t need to keep pace with soaring property values because the cost—and value—of government services isn’t dependent on those values. While inflation has increased the cost of government, there’s no reason why a community where property values have increased by, say, 40 percent should have to remit 40 percent more in property taxes from that same set of properties. Residents are not receiving 40 percent more or better government for their money.

Ballot Initiative 2, now before the Supreme Court after an attorney general’s determination that the initiative is legally insufficient, seeks to limit property taxes through several provisions, including: (1) establishing 2019 as the base for real property valuations, (2) instituting a valuation assessment limit of two percent unless the real property is newly constructed, significantly improved, or changed ownership, and (3) limiting the amount of ad valorem tax that may be assessed to one percent of the real property’s value.

Despite the good intentions, this proposal is not sound tax policy and could create detrimental market distortion. Assessment limits are problematic because they incentivize property owners to remain in their homes longer, as purchasing a new residence triggers a new assessment and, potentially, higher taxes. This often disproportionately impacts younger or lower-income purchasers as the supply of starter homes is reduced when more established, higher-income property owners forgo new purchases.

Moreover, assessment limits could result in similar properties in the same neighborhood having dramatically different property tax obligations depending on purchase date—benefitting those with longer tenures in their homes and, effectively, penalizing more recent purchasers (many of them younger homeowners). Appraisal caps also disincentivize new construction and major home improvements, both of which could result in the owner paying higher property taxes.

The ballot initiative applies to many classes of real property, including multifamily rental units, but it excludes business machinery and equipment. To be clear, including rental property in the relief is positive because the tax burden is less likely to shift from single-family homeowners to lessees in the form of higher rent, which could occur if the measure was less neutral. While the legislature has raised the exemption limits for business property, it will be important to ensure that such equipment is not disproportionately impacted by higher levies in the future to recoup lost revenue from other property classes.

Assessment limitations provide property tax relief for homeowners, but they come with real costs, distorting housing markets to the detriment of many of the homeowners—and would-be homeowners—the limits purport to help. Fortunately, Montanans and their lawmakers have options. They could consider levy limits, which restrict the growth of revenue collections from property taxes, rolling back millages across the board to limit the amount that a jurisdiction’s property tax collections can increase from rises in assessed value alone. This can help avoid the disparities that result from assessment limits, lowering rates for everyone when collections rise due to a spike in assessed values, rather than protecting some homeowners to the detriment of others. If states like New York and Massachusetts manage to get this right, surely Montana can too.

Policymakers could also pursue what some states call “compression,” which is when the state uses its own funds to buy down local property tax rates. Simply capping rates, however, is not effective and would not protect property owners from valuation surges or from other policies intended to raise collections. And compression itself may backfire unless paired with levy limits; without them, local governments could pocket the state transfers and later raise millages back to where they had been previously.

Absent a special session, the Montana legislature next convenes in 2025, meaning taxpayers may have to wait for relief that is sorely needed today. This creates a precarious situation and one in which hasty decision-making could leave the state dealing with long-term negative outcomes. Ballot Initiative 2, regardless of whether it goes before voters, has a flawed design that homeowners may come to rue, but it speaks to a real and legitimate concern over rapidly rising property taxes. Policymakers should pursue principled property tax reform that benefits all property owners without creating market distortions or unfairly shifting the tax burden.

Governor Greg Gianforte recently opposed a proposed resource management plan amendment offered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) that would restrict responsible coal production in Montana.

“Affordable power generated by coal keeps the lights on in Montana and fuels manufacturing across the country and world,” Gov. Gianforte said. “I’m urging the Biden administration to scrap its plan that would undermine coal production in eastern Montana, eliminate a source of funding for our public schools, and destabilize our energy grid.”

Last week, the governor submitted a letter to BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning and other agency officials as part of the public comment process for BLM’s Miles City Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement/Resource Management Plan Amendment.

The BLM is currently contemplating changes to its coal screening process that would nearly block all coal reserves in Montana from production.

Revenues from coal reserves on state trust lands fund schools and other public institutions in Montana.

By Brett Rowland, The Center Square

A congressional watchdog repeatedly warned lawmakers about national spending and debt levels before a second of the Big Three credit rating agencies dropped the United States government’s credit rating down a notch.

Fitch Ratings made the decision recently to downgrade the government’s credit rating from the highest level of AAA down one tier to AA+. Fitch pointed to the U.S. government’s high national debt and deficits and an “erosion of governance.”

“In Fitch’s view, there has been a steady deterioration in standards of governance over the last 20 years, including on fiscal and debt matters, notwithstanding the June bipartisan agreement to suspend the debt limit until January 2025,” according to credit-rating agency. “The repeated debt-limit political standoffs and last-minute resolutions have eroded confidence in fiscal management. In addition, the government lacks a medium-term fiscal framework, unlike most peers, and has a complex budgeting process. These factors, along with several economic shocks as well as tax cuts and new spending initiatives, have contributed to successive debt increases over the last decade. Additionally, there has been only limited progress in tackling medium-term challenges related to rising social security and Medicare costs due to an aging population.”

After the announcement from Fitch, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the downgrade was “arbitrary and based on outdated data.” In 2011, S&P Rating dropped the U.S. government’s credit rating one notch. Moody’s is the only one of the Big Three that has kept the U.S. credit rating at the top level of AAA. 

But the federal government’s own agencies have repeatedly raised concerns about federal spending and debt.

In February, the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s audit of the federal government’s financial statements found it “continues to face an unsustainable long-term fiscal path.”

“The growing debt is a consequence of borrowing to finance increasingly large annual budget deficits,” according to the report. “GAO projects that spending for Social Security, federal health care programs, and all other federal program spending increases more than revenue, resulting in the primary deficit; and net interest spending, which primarily represents the federal government’s cost to service its debt, steadily increases over the next 30 years, further widening the total budget deficits.”

The International Monetary Fund listed the United States’ debt as a percentage of GDP at 106% in 2021. Countries with high debt-to-GDP figures in 2021 included Cyprus (142.82%), Italy (146.55%), Singapore (163.89%), Eritrea (176.25%), Sudan (181.97%), Greece (212.4%) and Japan (221.32%).