CAP: PA in Bottom 10 (again) for Business

May 14, 2013:

Chief Executive Magazine released its 2013 ranking of the states. Once again
Pennsylvania is in the bottom ten with a rank of forty-second.

The comments from most of the CEO’s are not flattering:

"God help anyone dealing with PA’s department of revenue."

"I consider [Pennsylvania] the ‘stupid state’ not because it is consistently bad,but rather is inconsistent, which is far worse to plan business."

"Pennsylvania Environmental regulations and their bureaucracy make it difficult
to plan and build new projects in a timely manner."

But, it is not all bad:

"Pennsylvania is by far the highest taxed for corporations but our workforce and
those available to do work (welders, fitters, etc.) are the highest skilled. We
also have an excellent group of colleges and universities in our area to supply
us with engineers and other college-degreed employees. All of the states we are
in except Pennsylvania are ‘right to work’ states and we are a non union shop."

It should not come as a surprise that the commonwealth scores low in the areas of taxation. Currently, Pennsylvania has the second highest corporate tax rate in the nation.

On the bright-side, the Pennsylvania House just passed legislation that would reduce the corporate tax rate from 9.99 percent to 6.99 percent over
the course of ten years. A shorter time frame would be better for attracting jobs (and help current job creators), but it is a step in the right direction.

Hopefully, the Senate does not waste any time and enacts this crucial tax change.

Citizens Alliance of Pennsylvania (CAP) is a non-profit organization founded to
raise the standard of living of all Pennsylvanians by restoring limited government, economic freedom, and personal responsibility. By empowering the Commonwealth’s employers and taxpayers to break state government’s "Iron Triangle" of career politicians,bureaucrats, and Big Government lobbyists, this restoration will occur and Pennsylvania will prosper.