Taxation

Once again the Pennsylvania impact fee–the equivalent of a state severance tax on all oil and gas drilling in the state–will bring in an enormous amount of revenue for the state: $223.5 million for calendar year 2014 to be exact. That’s down slightly from the $225.7 million levied in 2013. Yesterday the PA Public Utility Commission (PUC) released the official numbers, a day after state Republicans leaked a draft version of the report. Those rascally Republicans wanted to share the news that the impact fee is doing just fine, thank you very much, and we don’t need Democrat Gov. Tom Wolf’s Marcellus-killing severance tax of 17.3% just to feed the beast (teachers’ unions). Note that drillers are required to pay their impact fee/tax by April 1st. Last year the PUC, under then-Gov. Tom Corbett, released a preliminary report of monies raised and to be distributed on April 4th (see 2013 PA Impact Fee Sets Record: $224.5M, Grand Total Now $630M). This year the PUC, under Gov. Tom Wolf, still hadn’t released the report by early June. Why did the PUC hold back the report this year? It took Republicans leaking the details to force the hand of the PUC into releasing the official numbers. Was the PUC, under Wolf’s newly appointed chairperson Gladys M. Brown, sandbagging for political reasons–to influence the debate on the severance tax by withholding important information? You decide. Below we have a breakdown of the numbers for 2014–who’s getting how much–along with some pretty charts from the PUC…
Read More “PA 2014 Impact Fee Disbursement Info: Why Did PUC Delay?”

After being shamed into it by state Republicans, the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC), after delaying it for two months, yesterday released the numbers for the 2014 impact fees–the equivalent of a severance tax on PA’s drillers. The total raised was $223.5 million, to be divvied up between those places where drilling takes place (receiving 60% of the fee) and other boondoggles cooked up by Harrisburg politicians (the other 40%). See today’s companion story on who gets what from the 2014 impact fee (PA 2014 Impact Fee Disbursements: Why Did PUC Delay?). This post concentrates on the drillers themselves and how much money each one contributed to the impact fee pot for 2014. Below are some helpful pie charts from the PUC (including the number of active wells in the most-drilled counties), followed by the entire list of who paid how much…
Read More “PA 2014 Impact Fee Payments: List of Drillers & What They Paid”

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf continues to face stiff opposition from the public at large, and (more importantly) from Republicans in the PA state legislature. The leadership of both the PA House and Senate have lined up against Wolf’s severance tax, which he claims is 5% but now everybody freely admits is really closer to 17% (see PA Official Admits Wolf Severance Tax Highest in Nation @ 17.3%). The PA budget is due by June 30. Negotiations between Gov. Wolf and the legislature continue. When the two sides meet, the temperature in the room noticeably drops. Wolf is in over his head and apparently doesn’t know it–or won’t admit it. He set an unrealistic expectation with teachers’ unions that he would pay them off for their support by taxing the #$#@ out of the Marcellus industry–transferring the hard-earned money of Marcellus producers to Big Education takers. PA Republicans in the state legislature are the firewall. Let’s hope the firewall holds…
Read More “PA Republicans Hold Firm in Opposing Wolf Severance Tax”

A mixed editorial by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s ill-dated severance tax plan. The Post-Gazette believes, like most liberal Democrats, that the gas in the ground belongs “to the state” and not to individual, private property landowners. In their minds, a piece of the action (i.e. tax) should be levied on the gas coming out of the ground to transfer that wealth away from the people who own it–landowners–and give it to teachers’ unions instead. It’s always “for the children,” of course. (Utter bunkum.) Anywho, the Post-Gazette, while loving things like severance taxes, has begrudgingly faced the music on Wolf’s plan. They now see the fatal flaws and (consequentially) admit them. Their aim with the editorial is to have Wolf “fix” his broken plan, which isn’t likely to happen. Wolf doesn’t think his plan is broken and his attitude, along with the smug attitude of his lieutenants like Dept. of Environmental Protection Secretary John Quigley, is that the Wolf severance tax plan is superior and needs no fixing. Reality is gradually starting to dawn on the Dems–that they’re not going to get a severance tax this high–and so the blame game has begun. The worm has started to turn…
Read More “The Worm Begins to Turn re Gov. Tom Wolf’s Severance Tax”

The head of Pennsylvania’s so-called Independent Fiscal Office (a partisan organization) testified before a joint hearing of the state Senate’s energy and finance committees yesterday and said (fantastically) non-Pennsylvanians will “eventually” pick up most of the tab for a nosebleed high severance tax proposed by PA Gov. Tom Wolf (Democrat). Matthew Knittel, head of the Independent Fiscal Office, also testified under oath that Wolf’s severance tax will have an initial effective rate of 17.3% in 2016–instantly skyrocketing to become the nation’s highest severance tax…
Read More “PA Official Admits Wolf Severance Tax Highest in Nation @ 17.3%”

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf has proposed a slew of new taxes as part of his proposed budget. Yes, there’s a 15% (or according to his own government advisers, 17.3%) severance tax in the package of tax increases Wolf wants. But there are a number of other taxes the PA Democrat governor, who took office in January, wants as well. When you add it all up, its over $12 billion in new economy-crushing taxes. So the Republicans running the PA House held a vote yesterday on the entire package of Wolf’s tax proposals. In other words, do you really want this? Is this the way to go? The vote was taken, and every single House member, all 193 of them–Republicans and Democrats–voted against Wolf’s tax proposals. Wolf called the vote a “stunt” and said, “This is the kind of gamesmanship that we were not sent here to play.” Er, did we miss something? YOU wanted all of these new taxes Gov. Wolf. So when YOUR taxes were voted on–all together in one package–you didn’t want it after all? Did you have a change of heart? Why did you propose those taxes if you didn’t want them voted on? This is the kind of gamesmanship we’ve come to expect from the Democrats in the Keystone State. The kind of political “stunts” they play. When the Democrats’ enormous appetite for taxing and spending is exposed and brought out into the open, they run away…
Read More “PA Gov Wolf Tax Package (Incl Severance Tax) Voted Down 193-0”

A diverse coalition of industry and business groups has come together, led by the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry, to oppose PA Gov. Tom Wolf’s disastrous idea of a severance tax on the Marcellus Shale industry. The coalition has just launched a very effective television commercial. How do we know it’s effective? The Democrat PR machine (i.e. PBS’s StateImpact Pennsylvania) writes about the commercial and shows a screen shot of the Youtube version of it–but they don’t embed the Youtube version so you can actually watch it . Don’t worry, we embed it below. PBS can’t have anyone actually watch the thing for goodness sake! That might actually sway a few people. Amazingly, we do get an admission from the Democrats at StateImpact that if the price of natgas remains low in PA, Wolf’s severance tax actually zooms up to 20%–not the 5% he claims it is. Looks like somebody at StateImpact didn’t follow instructions to let the governor’s office review the story before it was published. Oh oh…
Read More “Democrats Admit Wolf’s PA Severance Tax Goes as High as 20%”

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf is a typical Democrat. When he doesn’t get his own way, he throws a temper tantrum and stomps his feet and behaves like a child. Yesterday he sent his chief of staff, Katie McGinty, off to the Pennsylvania Press Club to give “reporters” the narrative they should use to try and mass brainwash the PA population on why his 15% severance tax plan is such a great idea (see today’s companion story). Meanwhile, Wolf sent a temper tantrum letter off to the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry along with a 16 other PA business organizations to lambaste them for having the gall to disagree with his severance tax plan and point out its shortcomings…
Read More “PA Gov. Wolf Throws Temper Tantrum at Groups Opposing Sev. Tax”

According to Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s chief of staff Katie McGinty, the Marcellus Shale industry is lying about its own economic health (or unhealth), and the only “responsible” thing to do is pass Wolf’s Marcellus-killing severance tax. That’s essentially what she said at a talk delivered to Democrat operatives–otherwise known as “reporters”–attending her speech at the Pennsylvania Press Club. “Reporter” Robert Swift was in attendance to take dictation/receive marching orders from McGinty and he “reports” this…
Read More “Wolf Chief of Staff: Marcellus Industry Lying About Tax”