Environmentalists are bemoaning the apparent demise of the “Visitor Green Fee,” a $50 charge that would need to be paid by whoever, as a nonresident, wants to visit parks, beaches, scenic sites, and other places of natural beauty. Most of … Read More
“Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him [well].” In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Yorick was the court jester who had become a skull by the time Ophelia’s burial takes place and Hamlet talks about him. This legislative session, the same fate has befallen … Read More
How it all Happened. The hosts for this show are Jay Fidell and Tom Yamachika. This legislative session, death has befallen the broad-based tax reform proposal that would have widened our income tax brackets, increased the standard deduction, and hoisted … Read More
For a long time, Hawaii has had income tax incentives to encourage television, movies, and other productions to work their magic here in Hawaii. The production credit was enacted in 1988, at which time it was 4% of regular production … Read More
We’ve come to that part of our legislative session where all the public hearings are done. From here on out, lawmakers in the House will be chatting with their counterparts in the Senate to hash out any differences between their … Read More
In the sports world, we have “March Madness.” Last week in this space, we wrote about “Credit Madness.” Now, lest we miss the forest for the trees, let’s discuss madness at the Legislature in general. A month ago, Civil Beat … Read More
Here at the Tax Foundation of Hawaii, we try to follow and report on bills proposing new taxes. We try like heck to pick up any bill that mentions taxes, or affects the tax codes. But that’s not enough. Lawmakers … Read More
Now that our Legislature is in session again and pondering several bills including some tax increases, we wanted to re-examine a tactic that has surfaced in recent years that has been applied to appropriation and tax bills – or could … Read More