Fairness fouled up in fed's tax bill

Cha-Ching! Washington taxpayers, your federal tax bill has already gone up.

If you itemize your tax claims, you will have to pay an average of about $550 more money this tax year, unless Congress acts quickly to restore the now-expired provision permitting taxpayers to deduct their state sales tax from their federal tax bill. For taxpayers in Washington and seven other states, the tax meter is running up and time is running out. Congress will return in September for a brief session before members hit the election trail.

For the past two years, taxpayers who paid state sales taxes have enjoyed the same privilege of deducting state taxes as those in the rest of the states with income taxes.

For 18 years before that, they were forced to pay a federal tax on their state tax. That unfair circumstance amounted to the residents of Washington, Alaska, Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Wyoming paying a subsidy for the rest of the country.

Two years ago, a coalition of lawmakers from the sales-tax states, including Rep. Brian Baird, D-Vancouver, were able to push through a sales-tax deduction — but only for tax years 2004-5.

Now Washington taxpayers are about to be raided of their $500 million annual portion again.

The deduction's renewal was imbedded in the recent, monolithic Senate bill that would have cut the estate tax and raised the minimum wage. For Washington, the bill actually would have cut wages for tip workers. Despite the bill's good points, it was ugly for its size, haste and election-year cynicism. It failed to advance.

The sales-tax deduction is about fairness and should not fall off the table. It should not merely be extended but made permanent.