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Kansas Governor Sam Brownback proposed, for the second straight year, major tax changes during his State of the State speech. These new changes include lowering the tax rates to 1.9 and 3.5 percent, eliminating itemized deductions for mortgage interest and property taxes paid, and raising the sales tax.

Arthur Laffer’s consulting firm–Arduin, Laffer & Moore Econometrics (ALME)–has released a report purporting to show that North Carolina could usher in an economic boom if it repeals its personal and corporate income taxes and replaces them primarily with a much larger sales tax. Prepared for the Civitas Institute, “More Jobs, Bigger Paychecks” relies on an economic analysis that is fundamentally flawed to the point of making it entirely useless.

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal has said that he supports the elimination of the state’s personal and corporate income taxes. In fiscal year 2012, Louisiana collected nearly $3 billion in revenues from its personal and corporate income taxes.

Following an election that left half the states with veto-proof legislative majorities, 39 states with one-party rule and more than a dozen with governors who put tax reform high on their agendas, 2013 promises to be a big year for changes to state tax laws.

The fundamental purpose of taxation is to raise the revenue necessary to fund public services. While there are many ways to achieve this goal, a widely agreed-upon set of principles should be used to evaluate tax systems. This policy brief provides a basic overview of five commonly cited principles of sound tax policy: equity, adequacy, simplicity, exportability, and neutrality.

Almost without exception, state lawmakers do not closely scrutinize special tax credits, exemptions, and other “tax expenditures” on a regular basis. A recent report by the Pew Center on the States found, for example, that half the states have done nothing even remotely rigorous in the last five years to determine if even a single one of their economic development tax incentives is working.

The tax systems of virtually every state are pushing poor families deeper into poverty. But state tax systems also have the potential to play a role in fighting poverty. The four low-income tax credits discussed in this report are among the most cost-effective anti-poverty strategies available to lawmakers: the Earned Income Tax Credit, property tax circuit breakers, targeted low-income tax credits, and child-related tax credits. This report identifies the states in which each of these credits is offered, and provides specific recommendations tailored to policymakers in each state as they work to combat poverty.

One of the thorniest problems in administering state corporate income taxes is how to distribute the profits of multi-state corporations among the states in which they operate. Ultimately, each corporation’s profits should be taxed in their entirety, but some corporations pay no tax at all on a portion of their profits. This problem has emerged, in part, due to recent state efforts to manipulate the “apportionment rules” that distribute such profits. This policy brief explains how apportionment rules work and assesses the effectiveness of special apportionment rules such as “single sales factor” as economic development tools.

For much of the last century, estate and inheritance taxes have played an important role in helping states to adequately fund public services in a way that exempts middle- and low income taxpayers.