One of the most common arguments for not raising taxes on the wealthy in North Carolina is the claim that they will flee to other states, taking their money and businesses they own with them.

The folks at the Locke Foundation make this case often and did so again this week, pointing to a study by the Empire Center for Public Policy that found that New York led the nation in the last decade in the percentage of residents who left for other states.

One story about the study said that “most analysts blamed N.Y.’s High taxes…” Locker Donna Martinez chimed in saying that “tax policy does have consequences.”

Martinez didn’t say anything about North Carolina’s ranking in the Empire Center report, most likely because it doesn’t fit with their claims about North Carolina tax rates keeping people away.

The report found that North Carolina actually had the second highest domestic migration in the country from 2000-2010. That would be the decade when lawmakers raised taxes to balance the budget, the same decade in which year after year the Lockers claimed that high taxes were hurting the state’s growth.

A report co-released this week by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the N.C. Budget and Tax Center found that tax levels rarely figure into decisions about where people move.

BTC Director Alexandra Sirota points out that in 2003 after North Carolina added a new tax bracket for the wealthiest taxpayers, there was an increase in wealthy people moving to the state.

Shockingly, that study didn’t show up anywhere on the Locker’s site.

Graduation rates rise, Berger praises cuts

Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger had an interesting response to this week’s news that the state’s high school graduation rate increased to 77.7 percent last year from 74.2 percent the year before. There is still plenty of room for improvement, but last year’s rate is an all time high.

Berger spent much of the legislative session pointing to the state’s graduation both as evidence that public schools were failing and as justification for slashing funding for education. This week he tried to make those points again and threw in the standard Republican talking point about people in education always wanting more money.

What they actually want is enough funding to do their job.

Berger never mentions that North Carolina ranked 46th in the nation in per-pupil spending on public schools. And that was last year, before the Republican budget. The cuts that Berger and his colleagues made drop North Carolina to 49th, just below Mississippi.

No reaction to the higher graduation rate yet from House Majority Leader Paul Stam, who wants to do more than slash education funding. Stam’s goal is to dismantle public schools altogether. He introduced voucher legislation this session to begin that process…..

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