Startup & tax attorney. QSBS (§1202), equity comp & WA tax strategy. Tracking I-645 → https://nitter.gq/t.co/4RUxqpO5t3
Seattle
Joined May 2008
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Olympia has a big idea: your income is not your property.
Before ballots are due, look at how Washington’s new 9.9% income tax works.
It’s sold as a tax on “the rich.” But the $1 million deduction is written into a statute. A future Legislature can change it.
Lowering the threshold is already being discussed. In a recent KUOW debate, Rep. Cindy Ryu supported extending the tax to household net incomes as low as $250,000, with a lower rate below $1 million.
But there’s a more fundamental issue.
Washington already has constitutional protections. Article VII limits property tax rates and requires uniform taxation within the same class of property.
In Culliton, our Supreme Court held that income is property.
We also have a process for changing the constitution: approval by two-thirds of each legislative chamber, followed by approval from voters.
The Legislature didn’t use it. It passed the income tax by a simple majority, leaving the courts to decide whether it can stand despite Culliton.
In my view, lawmakers who want a graduated income tax should ask voters to amend the constitution.
Constitutional protections are supposed to constrain legislative majorities. They should mean more than whatever a majority wants this year.
And look at what lawmakers already put in this law.
They amended longstanding tax exemptions for benefits under several public retirement systems, making those benefits subject to the new income tax.
The $1 million deduction still applies. But if lawmakers lower the threshold, those retirement benefits have no separate exemption from this tax.
If courts uphold the tax as outside Article VII’s property tax rules, those rate limits and uniformity requirements won’t protect taxpayers from it.
That would leave future legislatures with much more room to expand the tax.
I-645 would repeal the new income tax and prohibit state and local taxes on individual income, including taxes measured by individual income.
It’s a statute, too. It doesn’t amend the constitution.
But it would stop this tax.
I’m voting YES on I-645.
Joe Wallin retweeted
49 days of inaction.
I’m beginning to think @CarnegieMellon shares its employees views.
Joe Wallin retweeted
Fun fact: The foreign-born population in Wisconsin has risen 69% over the last 26 years. In 2000, there were 194,000 residents who were born outside of the U.S. Today, there are an estimated 327,000. To put that into perspective, there are more than three times as many foreign-born residents living in the state than the entire population of Green Bay in Brown County.
Joe Wallin retweeted
You have a once in a generation chance to vote for sanity to return to Washington state.
Yes, on the three initiatives on the ballot. Then, vote for each of these Supreme Court candidates to return sense to the ship.
Joe Wallin retweeted
Forgot to plan a costume? We've got some REALLY scary ones for Washington voters!
Joe Wallin retweeted
The aim of classical education is not to produce useful workers, but free human beings.
A proper education once meant:
— Reading difficult books
— Writing long essays
— Learning history
— Studying philosophy
— Training memory
— Arguing clearly
Now it means:
— Career prep
— Standardized testing
— Group projects
— Slide decks
— Credential collection
Somewhere along the way, education became workforce training.
If you really want to send a message to Olympia, send 5 outsiders to the state Supreme Court.
Pos. 1: Scott Edwards
Pos. 3: David Stevens
Pos. 4: Sean O'Donnell
Pos. 5: Dave Larson
Pos. 7: Todd Bloom
Joe Wallin retweeted
My mom every day would drop me off to school and say the same thing: “when you were born God told me you were designed to do great things in life.”
Every day. 18 years.
That installed in me great strength because my identity was formed that no matter what, God said I was going to do great things so if I failed a test or got hurt or whatever, I was good.
This guy is demonizing a loving mother! Who’s doing her God-given role. He sees good as evil. His worldview is upside down.
The jealousy, the hatred. The oppress vs. oppression mindset is toxic and will only lead you down a path of more sadness & grief.
Keep this guy far away from policy making.
Joe Wallin retweeted
Great idea!
Send a shakeup message to Olympia and vote for these Supreme Court candidates.
Joe Wallin retweeted
Daimler closes truck manufacturing plant in north Portland; Lays off 375 workers.
A truck manufacturing plant in northwest Portland closed for good on Friday, laying off almost 400 workers.
Daimler Truck North America made the announcement in July, saying 375 positions would be eliminated.
In July, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers union issued a statement in response:
“Our employer’s decision to leave the Portland area does not remove the heart and soul that our members have put into their work at Daimler. And the IAM will support and fight for our members regardless of any decision their employer makes.”
Daimler Truck will shut Portland factory, lay off 375 and move production to the East Coast
River point medical going to announce next week moving 200 jobs from district 2 to Clark county. $175k avg salary.
We just lost 575 jobs and $115M+ annually in wages in portland.
Unfortunately, that's only part of the story.
When you include local suppliers, Daimler's decision will wipe out more than 1,200 Living Wage jobs.
And that's just the beginning.
Every lost job means less spending in local shops, cafés, restaurants, and services, putting even more small businesses and jobs at risk.
This isn't an isolated setback—it's the predictable outcome of years of anti-business policies from the DSA government that have made Portland a less attractive place to invest, expand, and create high-quality jobs.
Investment goes where it's welcome, and right now Portland is sending the opposite message.
The government needs to change direction immediately.
If it doesn't, the economic doom loop of lost investment, lost jobs, and declining local economies will only accelerate—and it will become far harder to reverse.
This due to high crime, high taxes, failing schools, high Utilty cost and anti business City and State.
Blazers are next.
DSA can’t defend their failed policies that are destroying quality of life in Portland and growing poverty and misery for all Portlanders.
At least foie gras is banned!
@MayorKWilson
@mitch4portland
@pnwpolicyangel
@PortlandDSA
@TeacherTiff4PDX
@GovTinaKotek
kptv.com/2026/10/30/daimler-…
If you really want to send a message to Olympia, send 5 outsiders to the state Supreme Court.
Pos. 1: Scott Edwards
Pos. 3: David Stevens
Pos. 4: Sean O'Donnell
Pos. 5: Dave Larson
Pos. 7: Todd Bloom
Joe Wallin retweeted
Seattle's Socialist Mayor Faces Business Revolt As Utopia Dreams Implode, Nearly Half Weigh Exit zerohedge.com/political/seat…
Joe Wallin retweeted
The remarkable thing about Seattle's Mayor Wilson is how completely and totally oblivious she is to basic economic realities. To actually believe what she does is to be economically illiterate, historically revisionist, and reality denying. @MayorofSeattle
They told us nobody would leave.
Mayor Wilson called it "super overblown." Then she waved bye to the millionaires.
Here's who's waving back:
Bezos to Florida.
Fisher Investments to Texas.
Howard Schultz to Miami. Starbucks sending 2,000 corporate jobs to Nashville.
Moment to Wyoming.
Soak & Sage expanding in Nashville, not here.
Now NIC Global. Closing its Woodinville plant. 103 jobs. Moving to Spokane and Tennessee.
Nearly 1 in 4 Washington employers say they're
thinking about leaving.
The 9.9% income tax doesn't even start until 2029.
They're not waiting.
Who's next?
Joe Wallin retweeted
Income tax is an abomination that punishes people for creating economic value and crushes entrepreneurship. It also leads to fat state governments that have so much tax revenue they have to create new programs to spend it on. I can't imagine wanting to hurt your own economy.
For just over 136 years, Washington State has managed just fine without an income tax. In that time, we built one of the best state economies in the world, with companies other states are jealous of that provides great jobs and benefits.
A permanent state income tax that will apply to all of us in no time is an existential threat to our economy and to taxpayers, because after “the rich” move to avoid the tax, all that will be left is you, Democrats recklessly spending your money for little results, and with no meaningful tax relief.
Meanwhile, some states that do have an income tax are considering eliminating it so that they can usher in the capital that ours chases away. Other states that have income taxes also don’t have 7 other wallet busting taxes to pay.
It’s amazing to me sometimes that these clear facts are even partisan. Implementing this income tax in WA is not only unconstitutional, it’s economically illiterate and politically brain dead.
Why are the unions backing it with so much cash? Occam’s Razor my friends. Because it’s not to fund schools, healthcare, or anything other than to fund unions who turn around and spend millions on taking more from your wallet. I spend my days buried in our state budget, and this is clear as day to me. It’s clear as day to them too, except they aren’t honest about it, because honesty would lose.
Democrats and their media friends knowingly spread lies to strangle common sense to death in WA.
A yes vote on the initiative is a vote to protect our future from economic arsonists, socialism, fraud, corruption, and wasteful government spending.