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Tuba City, Arizona has highest sales tax in the nation!!!
Of course things only get worse when it comes to taxes. When the sales tax is 20 percent, folks will say "remember the good old days when the sales tax was a measly 13.725 percent" Compare that to the Boston Tea Party. The tax on tea was a lousy 1.75 percent tax. Or the first U.S. income tax in 1913. It was a lousy 1 percent tax and shot up to 6 percent if you made over $500,000. Tuba City tops for sales tax Combined rate of 13.725% is highest in U.S.; Ariz. average is 2nd in nation by Salvador Rodriguez - Feb. 18, 2012 10:03 PM Cronkite News WASHINGTON - Vans Trading Co. has been around since 1946, but it's only in the last decade that customers at the Tuba City general store have yelled at the cashiers after they get their receipts. That's because Vans is in the town with the highest sales tax in the nation and the town, in turn, is in the state with the second-highest combined sales-tax burden in the nation, according to two recent reports. "After we ring up the total in the product and the tax comes up, they're not happy with it," said Vans owner Lucky Mokhcia. "But I tell them I have no control over that. "They just yell at my cashiers. They're saying it's too much." The Tax Foundation reported last week that the average combined sales tax in Arizona at the start of this year -- adding up state, county, city and tribal taxes -- was 9.12 percent, second only to Tennessee's average rate of 9.45 percent. In Tuba City, a $1 purchase comes with a 13.725-cent sales-tax bill: 6.6 percent for the state, 1.125 percent for Coconino County tax and another 6 percent tribal tax levied by the Navajo Nation's To'Nanees'Dizi local government. Tuba City's No. 1 ranking was confirmed by both the Tax Foundation and a separate report from Vertex Inc. Some experts say the high sales tax reflects Arizona's decision to rely on less on income taxes for state revenues and more heavily on the purchase of goods and some services. "We've always been heavily reliant on sales taxes," said Kevin McCarthy, president of the Arizona Tax Research Association. "Different states might rely more on other taxes." The Tax Foundation report backs that up, saying Arizona relies on sales taxes for almost 36 percent of its revenue and on income taxes for about 13 percent. Nationally, the average is 22.9 percent of state revenue from sales tax and 21.3 percent from income tax. McCarthy said Arizona has long had high sales taxes. He said polls have shown that property and income taxes tend to be less popular with people than sales taxes, so when Arizona has needed money, that's where its lawmakers have turned. "They have a tendency to lean toward the sales tax because they view that to be the least offensive," McCarthy said. "As a result, that's where we've gone, and we continue to go back to the well." Sales taxes are also less likely to scare off potential businesses than property and corporate income taxes, said Garrick Taylor, spokesman for the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry. But while Arizona's sales tax is not necessarily driving away businesses, it could be driving away their customers -- or at least driving down sales. |