Two Things at One Time

Megan McArdle doesn't understand the concept of walking and chewing gum.  She takes Ezra Klein to task because he argues that union support of Medicaid proves it cares about the least among us.  McArdle's "argument" is that

[i]n the most recent quarter for which the Census has data, corporate income taxes provided about $9.2 billion worth of revenue to all 50 states.  This is less than 20% of New York State's Medicaid bill. It is also about 3% of the overall tax revenue collected by the states.  This goes up to about 4.5% in the second quarter of the year, which includes April 15th, but overall, it is not a very significant source of revenue.

Sales and gross receipts tax are much more significant--about $72 billion, or a quarter of the total tax take.  But general gross receipts taxes are used in only a minority of states; most of that is sales tax revenue.  And sales taxes are generally assumed to ultimately be borne by the consumers, not corporations.

So the unions are not lobbying against corporations, who do not have much of a dog in this fight.  Who does?  Taxpayers, and consumers of health care services.

You know what unions want to do about this right? Raise corporate tax rates. It's not just that she dumb and lazy it's the near perfection of her dumb laziness, the characterization is meant with all due civility.