539: 'The only tax people like is the one somebody else pays'

Plain Talk

We are 31 days away from election day and, here in North Dakota, the hottest race in the state probably isn't for the U.S. Senate, or the U.S. House, or even the governor's seat. It is, arguably, Measure 4 which, if passed, would eliminate taxes on property values and order the Legislature to compensate local governments for that loss of revenue at 2024 levels.

It's such a hot issue that when Prairie Public recently hosted a debate between U.S. Senate candidates Kevin Cramer and Katrina Christiansen, they asked the candidates about Measure 4, even though that issue really has nothing to do with the federal office they're running for.

Aaron Birst joined this episode of Plain Talk to discuss Measure 4, and what's driving both the support for it and opposition to it. Aaron is the executive director of the North Dakota Association of Counties.

"The only tax people like is the one somebody else pays," he told Chad Oban and I.

Birst isn't arguing that there are no problems with local taxing and spending. "Do we need to have a conversation about how much we spend at the local level? Sure," he said, though he argued that Measure 4 just isn't the right fix.

"We can try something different. I'm just not sure we're going to find something better," he said. He also argued that passing Measure 4 could create legal and policy-making chaos that would be with North Dakota for a long time. "If this passes...we're probably going to have a decade of court cases to figure out what this means."

Also on this episode, Oban and I discuss the recently-released polling in North Dakota's statewide races, and some intrigue at the North Dakota Industrial Commission.

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