Minneapolis Star-Tribune: Tax Avoidance Might Make Financial Sense, but Is It Fair?

One feature of sales taxes is that they cost lower-income people a bigger chunk of what they take in than is the case for more affluent people.

In Minnesota the bottom 20 percent of taxpayers by family income only pay about 8.7 percent of their income in state and local taxes. In Florida the poorest 20 percent of taxpayers pay close to 13 percent of their income in state and local taxes.

The top 1 percent in Florida pay only about 2.3 percent, according to the nonpartisan Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.

As it turns out, low-tax Florida is not much of a low-tax state if you are not well-off. And before making the move there, you have to ask yourself this: Does that seem fair?

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